Eartha

by Cathy Malkasian

Malkasian’s stunning landscapes and depictions of nature, gestural character nuance, and sophisticated storytelling are on display in her latest graphic novel. For a thousand years, the unfinished dreams—sex fantasies, murder plots, wishful thinking—from the City Across the Sea came to Echo Fjord to find sanctuary. Emerging from the soil, they took bodily form and wandered the land, gently guided by the fjord folk. But recently they've stopped coming, and Eartha wants solve the mystery. Without thought or hesitation—the city isn’t on any map, or in anyone’s memory—she ventures into the limitless waters, hoping to find the City.

Genres: Graphic Novels, Comics, Fantasy, Fiction, Graphic Novels Comics, Adult, LGBT

256 pages, Hardcover

First published March 15, 2017

About the author

Cathy Malkasian's alternative comics career began at age four, with the covert distribution of sketches to an unreceptive neighbor (“Keep your brat’s pamphlets off my porch!”). Hot on the heels of this and various kindergarten triumphs, she became overbearingly enthused, teaching herself to sketch and paint, pursuing music lessons, play auditions and somehow ending up with a degree in musicology. Her blend of goofiness, sarcasm, and rumination has carried her through the years.

In the early 1990s Malkasian began her career in animation, starting in design and storyboarding, then directing series episodes and pilots, and eventually co-directing the Wild Thornberrys Movie in 2002. Soon after she turned her efforts to novel and graphic novel storytelling, and returned to animation to direct many episodes of Curious George TV.

Reviews

[Dave Schaafsma · Rating 3 out of 5]

Eartha is a 2017 Ignatz-nominated graphic novel that is 255 way-oversized pages. A fantasy comic, a kind of allegory about Earthly happiness, it focuses on Eartha, a very large and very sweet Earth-mother kinda woman who is kind and sweet and doesn’t find happiness through the attainment of status and power. This is true for all the people she lives with, but is especially true for her. The status and power people tend to live in the City Across the Sea, where Dreams of many kinds seem to develop, and then float to Echo Fjord, Eartha’s home, a rural place where the people help nurture dreams to a conclusion.

Since the Dreams do not seem to be coming anymore from the City for some reason that never seems to be clear, she decides to go to find out why. She finds a lot of corrupt people living in some kind of darkly surreal world, though some there do want what Eartha cares about. Eartha listens to stories and tells stories. She wants interconnections. She wants peace and love.

The tone of the story and the accompanying artwork is sort of ethereal, warm and possibly a little vague. There’s a certain combination of warmth and quirky sense of humor that informs the work, which I’ll now admit I had a hard time following at times. I found it easy to put down, which I know sounds damning, but fantasy is not exactly one of my central go-to genres. And it’s way long, especially for the pretty thin story that it tells. Sometimes some of the male characters seem surreal, which I like. Surreality seems to be associated with the general City unhappiness.

I like nice Eartha, and I like Betty, her cat, and the contrasting surreal images. I don’t quite get why the Dreams seems to seek sanctuary in the Fjord, but if you like allegory/fantasy, you might just love this and help me understand it better.

[Donna · Rating 2 out of 5]

This review contains some general spoilers for triggering elements, but not the story, itself.

I had been wanting to read this graphic novel for a while because the artwork on the cover looked soothing with its monochromatic neutral colors, and the story sounded inventive from the summary. And it didn’t disappoint me in both those areas, and even pleasantly surprised me with its inclusiveness. But it did disappoint me by including some jarring cruelty and sexually perverted elements, especially when perpetrated upon a gentle and child-like main character when she travels to the city across the sea. Adding fat shaming into the mix, this impressive graphic novel failed to impress me. As a warning, it could also be triggering for certain readers, which is why I’m including this information in a review that isn’t spoiler free. If these kinds of story elements don’t bother you, you might enjoy this graphic novel which is wildly imaginative and different from anything I’ve ever read. It gives new meaning to the phrase “news consumption” and eerily mirrors some disturbing things going on in the world today. But beware of the above mentioned elements that might disturb you or leave you feeling repulsed.

[Mir]

Graphic novel equivalent of one of those Literary novels that I can't manage to find interesting or enjoyable despite conceding that they are probably well executed.

[Loz · Rating 2 out of 5]

I don't really know yet how I feel about this book. The art is stunning with a shifting spare color palette used to excellent effect. The story is...a lot. And there were a couple really big turnoffs that I don't know whether they were necessary. Still processing. May update.

[Molly · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm glad Cathy Malkasian is winning awards, because I do not feel like I hear enough about her from the comics community at large. Her stories are surreal and beautiful and this one is certainly no exception. Dreams have started to disappear from the land where Eartha lives and she is concerned - perhaps the only person who is concerned enough to do something about it.

[Lata · Rating 2 out of 5]

Ok, I did not really get this story. The style of artwork was kind of interesting, and the connections between a few of the characters, and well, the cat really was the best part of the story. Because everything's better with cats. So,the cat's presence adds a star to my initial one-star rating.

[Raina · Rating 3 out of 5]

I wasn't sure if I would like this story. At first glance, the art didn't blow me away, and, once I started reading, the world took some getting used to.

I'm glad I persevered, though. This world is a bit bizarro, but has plenty of thematic parallels to (my) world, and the story goes someplace and wraps up neatly. Eartha herself is a character I'd be able to cosplay well if I did more of that kind of thing. I loved the dreamy little world Eartha starts in - it felt like a maze - and of course the Scriptorium is gah.

It made me think about the messages we surround ourselves with (SOOO real in the age of social media), and how we treat people's inner lives and fantasies, and how we consume information in the first place.

Worth a read.

[Isa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ahhh, amazing! I loved everything about this!

[Charan Singh · Rating 3 out of 5]

A metaphoric tale simply and well told. Had nice artwork too.

[Lauren Dushay · Rating 4 out of 5]

The first thing about this graphic novel is that the art is gorgeous. The second thing is that there are too many themes, motifs, and plots to even try to interpret without a long-winded spoilerific examination. Suffice it to say that this book will make you think about capitalism, human nature, dreams, and the ways people can hurt each other while claiming that their helping. Read it and then sit down for a good contemplation. An important warning is that this book is NSFW.

[Amy · Rating 3 out of 5]

The art work is kind of ethereal (and monochromatic), which is interesting at first, but it's also unchanging so that got a little boring. The first ~190 pages (out of 255) of the story was kind of weird with the dreams "growing" out of the ground, and the city people and their news biscuits was just, odd. I was actually all set to give this 2 stars, but it had a pretty stellar ending when Eartha learns the true meaning behind the falling moon dream.

[LeAnn Suchy · Rating 3 out of 5]

I don’t know about this one. I almost stopped reading it at one point, and I skimmed certain parts, but it does have some interesting things to say about happiness and our obsessive culture.

This follows Eartha who lives in a land where the people capture the dreams of city folks and lead them to their end. It’s a little confusing why they have to do it, but do it they do, until dreams start getting scarce. They wonder what happened to the city people and why no more dreams are showing up, but no one wants to venture there, so they assume the worst. Then someone tricks Eartha to go, and when she gets to the city she finds them obsessed with biscuit cookies that have the news printed on them, and they crave these biscuits and trade their most precious items, even their homes, to get more. They’re so obsessed with reading the news on the biscuits, all of which is bad, so they stop sleeping, which is why they’re not dreaming.

The obsessiveness over the news and how people believe what they read or follow blindly was very interesting, especially in our current climate. One could make comparisons between what Eartha sees and what’s happening now in real life, so that part I enjoyed.

Some of the other odd things here aren’t that interesting and were kind of stupid, and I don’t even want to explain them because it’ll sound odd if you haven’t read it, but let’s just say I could’ve done without the storyline that contains large chickens with huge female breasts on them. That whole story could’ve gone and I would’ve enjoyed it much more.

So it was okay. I didn’t hate it. I didn’t love it. I probably wouldn’t recommend someone read it, though, so maybe my three stars rating is a bit high.

[Deepa Nirmal · Rating 2 out of 5]

Weird book that I wanted to like better than I did. I think the author was going for a dystopian situation but wandered all over and began beating the reader over the head with it. Could have done with a bit of ruthless editing and been cut down to half its size, that would have helped. I kept turning the pages hoping to be pulled in. The art is ok, not exceptional.

So on the whole, meh.

[Clint · Rating 3 out of 5]

For whatever reason this just never really grabbed me, though I constantly felt like it was just about to be great. It’s an allegorical fantasy story built around an imaginative and pleasantly surreal world, but its message never stops feeling too vague despite not being subtle either. Dreams and desires are involved, as is using news to make people feel a perpetual anxiety to be performatively informed without knowing what to do about it beyond feel bad, but the result still never coheres into anything for me. Malkasian’s color-penciled art is enjoyably lo-fi and I particularly loved how she drew her characters’ expressive faces and mannerisms.

“People believe that, sure, but do they know it?”

“Everyone looked pained by what they read, but they didn’t do anything to feel better.”

“So that fools can own the bragging rights to bad news, pantomiming concern, or cynicism, or worldliness...”

“Almost became an opera singer. Almost became many things.”

“Once I breathed my own story. Now it breathes in you.”

[Taylor · Rating 5 out of 5]

Everything Malkasian does is so lucid and magickal, and Eartha was no exception. The characters have the childlike, buoyant personalities that I love her other books, and the story is a fable about the value of being fully alive. Her work is intrinsically optimistic, without being afraid to look into the dark. After reading Eartha, I'm left with the thought: What if we're not in as deep as we think we are? What if all the trouble in the world is just a big misunderstanding? It seems possible that *real* life is right on the other side of our eyelids, and all we have to do is wake up.

[Emily · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book takes you on a beautiful journey. The character development was really well done, especially with so many characters and such a short amount of time/space within which to develop them. I sometimes have a hard time following each panel of a graphic novel, but Malkasian does a good job of creating another world without losing the reader in the illustration of the story. Overall, I loved it!

[Erin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Parts of this were wonderful. The colors are far softer then most graphic novels which made it easier to read. Other parts were rather graphic in ways I was not expecting. Look, the giant chickens with women's breasts complete with nipples and areola being enjoyed by a man will haunt me. Forever. Granted it did lead to a funny part later and once you get over the shock the sheer absurdity is funny but that image is branded in my mind.

[eHawk · Rating 5 out of 5]

The story is really precious and poignant. The art is beautifully whimsical, reminding me a bit of Shaun Tan.

[Esme · Rating 5 out of 5]

The first thing I noticed when I opened this up is the quality of the art. It's not your average cartoony comic book (though there's nothing wrong with cartoony). Eartha has lush settings and the characters have detailed, unique faces. The prose is worthy of the illustrations--beautiful, suprisingly weighty, and thought-provoking. This book is more generous, more whimsical, more kind than I had guessed based on the description "sex fantasies, murder plots, wishful thinking." The other part of the description--"a metaphorical fable that resonates with contemporary themes"--normally wouldn't catch my interest. I'm not interested in reading fables or satires for modern times, as I get plenty of contemporary themes in my daily life already. I'm more interested in the adjectives used to describe books, like "witty, romantic, fantastical," and yet Eartha is a fable for modern times, and I loved it for that. In the end, the novel was surprisingly well-plotted, and entirely satisfying. I immediately went to my husband upon putting the book down and said, "You have to read this!"

[Murat · Rating 4 out of 5]

Cool story with nice allegories and lovely style of drawing.

Let me tell you my dream out of it:

City: Twitter and Facebook, where most people are reading/sharing sad/extreme things, whining/complaining about the world we live in and doing nothing to fix it.
Echo Fyord: Goodreads, where everyone holds dreams (books) and connect them.
Eartha: Regular lovely people who are taking photos of blooming trees on spring and helps elderly to carry their shopping bags. The ones make life beautiful. Caring mother earth.
Old Lloyd: Writer herself. Working in the archives where everything is rearranged by pure desire and emotion just like the story.

[Rachel · Rating 4 out of 5]

What in life really matters? Knowledge? Status? Power? To the kind and comforting Eartha, these are just foolish. But to the people of the city, the people from whom dreams sprout, they are not. At least, that's what they think after the war. Eartha doesn't know about the woes of the city people at first, all she knows is that the dreams have pretty much stopped coming to her home Echo Fjord. The people of this idyllic rural place help dreams to find their conclusion, and find satisfaction in their task, and their daily lives. Without the dreams, their happiness wavers, so with the prodding of one old man, Eartha sets out. When she arrives in the city, she finds a place that is full of misguided and corrupted individuals who have forgotten what really matters. Among them though, are those who see the truth though. Eartha does what she does best, she listens and helps, and ultimately does find her way back home. Her story, and the stories that she hears, are often moving and thought-provoking. Malkasian's small, almost monochromatic palettes are key in establishing Eartha's wistful, and comforting tone. The character's may look a bit comic, but they are human, some fall at the feet of their foibles, while others follow their heart.

[Amanda F · Rating 4 out of 5]

This graphic novel was just so bizarre. I'm giving it so many stars because I think the overall point of the story was really well done, but it just had some really weird moments and again, I spent the first bit of the book just confused about what was happening.
We follow the adventures of Eartha in this book. She lives among a race of people who catch dreams from "the city" and send them on their way. That whole concept is still confusing for me about how all of that works, however, that isn't really the whole point of the book. The point is that there are no more dreams coming to them, and Eartha goes off to find out why. I mean, she doesn't know that's why she's going, but she goes nonetheless.
The city is in an uproar and things are happening there that are keeping people from dreaming. I can't go into what's happening with spoilers, so I'll just stop there and say that I really liked the way everything came together and was tied up and connected at the end. It was a really good story of good people making bad decisions and how those things spiraled out of control.

[Antoinette Van Beck · Rating 5 out of 5]

really enjoyed this! don't know why everyone's such a hater on a slow-paced book with thematically relevant imagery and symbolism tossed in, but this story was really beautiful. i loved the art and text style-- the slight differentiation between dialogue and narration. absolutely gorgeous artwork as well.

others who rated this lower seemed to go into this story and not adjust to a fantasy world and that seems like a very goofy reason to not like the book. reading a graphic novel over longer than a day or two is bound to disengage you from what's going on in the story.

to me, it was laid out plainly in the first 20pgs or so once i learned that the main character and everyone in her land guides dreams to their finish and sweep up the dust left behind when they disappear. like, i'm not a huge fantasy fan, but the world-building in this was very straightforward??

lots and LOTS of symbolism and allegory present in parallel with the contemporary world. no one dreams anymore as they remain constantly caught up in the whirlwind of bite-sized catastrophic news. resolution was clean and meaningful. very well done!

[Jennifer · Rating 3 out of 5]

Overall, I enjoyed this, especially the whimiscal premise of an island refuge that learns about the world, and helps the world, by tending to others' dreams. However, the execution did not live up to the potential. This seemed like another case of Fantagraphics trying to be "literary" and succeeding, at least in marketing to snooty people (e.g. people who find graphic novels from bestseller and book award lists) but overall seeming just okay to me.

I enjoyed the landscape art, but I'm not a huge fan of the sometimes-grotesque appearance of the humanoid character. I am also not a fan of the unnecessary, and repeated, groping of the main character who is portrayed as a physically fully-grown female with an intellectual disability. The book's pacing is uneven. It is understandably slower at the beginning to communicate a sense of wonder, and provide background for how the fantasy setting works, but the story then sags in the middle and then reveals all the "twists" in short order at the end in an unsatisfying manner.

[Rick Ray · Rating 3 out of 5]

Eartha is an imposing woman distinguished for her motherly and sweet-natured temperament in the quaint but somewhat eccentric rural town of Echo Fjord. Though Eartha's figure is striking due to her sheer size relative to her fellow townsfolk, she's considered a kind and obliging personality that has well liked within the community. Echo Fjord is a quiet little place where not much happens, other than the fact that the dreams of a nearby city come alive and visit their sleepy little town. But when the dreams stop coming, it's Eartha who goes to investigate why. At the City Across the Sea, Eartha spends her days listening to people's stories attentively and with a charming earnestness.

This is a quaint, ethereal and somewhat surreal fantasy tale with some nice warm watercolor artwork from Cathy Malkasian. The story itself didn't fully capture my interest, but the world building via the artwork was pretty great. The strange world of Eartha evokes a little of what Shaun Tan did with The Arrival which was what captivated me the most.

[katherine]

An aside: incredibly grateful for my neighbor for sharing this book with me!

Eartha is striking. From the blasts of lights that are emitted from the dreamers' heads, to rowing a boat aimlessly into the unknown, to a society addicted to cookies, the reader is caught in a deeply imaginative world. For each setting, there is a moment of adjustment to under the rules that Malkasian has set in the world. After this brief period, it becomes a vibrant world, enhanced by the colored-pencil illustrations.

The main character is able to propel the story forward while saying so little. She wanders, she cares for a cat, she cares for her town, and somehow that is enough to envelope us into a complex story. Each character and idea is so intentionally placed within the story, that it feels like we are handed a completed jigsaw puzzle by the end.

similar readings: Maus (layering light imagery with darker meanings), Arrival (architecture, scenes, world building)

[Ulyera · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was a bit hestitant at first reading this, but I ended up really enjoying it. I do think that there needed to be a bit more introduction to flesh out the story a bit more. At the beginning I kind of felt thrown into the story, like there was a backstory that I needed to understand. It was like I jumped into a lake but didn't expect just how frigid the water was.
After my intial shock, I found myself settling in comfortably to the story. Eartha is such a sweet and enjoyable character. I felt anxious for her as she wandered into the unkown city, and gradually felt proud of her as she overcame her obstacles in order to help the people around her.
The art itself was phenomenal. It felt cozy, and handmade, like I could see the artist huddled over the thick drawing pages, meticulousy scribbling with colored pencils.
I thoroughly enjoyed this, and would recommend it to everyone.

[Joy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Finished before I had to return to the library. Confused about the reviews left here so I wanted to take the time to leave some words. The allegory is apt and yet light- it’s apparent the work was started before 45 was elected in America, so the overbearing wave of “fake news fake news!” thankfully doesn’t affect this book. What I’m saying is, it’s a perfectly contemplative and endearing examination of the news in our lives before “truth” was a partisan affair. Each character is present for a specific function and the way they’re introduced is intentional… especially for the protagonist and primary antagonist. Was appreciative of the ideas of found family, queerness, isolation explored in light touches. TLDR; a perfectly inoffensive, thought-provoking afternoon read. Have a little fun readers!

[Blue · Rating 4 out of 5]

Eartha is beautifully drawn. Paneling can be a bit confusing at times, but the pastel colors and especially the pastoral drawings contrasted with intricate city drawings make up for it. The story is maybe trying to be too many things at the same time. On the one hand, the story of human greed that spawns destruction, perversion, corruption, and depression, on the other the story of isolation and ignorance in the face of conflict and war... There is, as someone else said earlier, too much, and some of it gets lost in the mix. All in all, the plot is convoluted, but interesting and the loose ends get tied in the end, maybe too neatly, but in a satisfying way.

Recommended for those who like cats, big cities, plums, and archives.

[Ms. Arca · Rating 3 out of 5]

2.5?
I think maybe I’m one of the people who didn’t get this book... I can’t say I enjoyed reading it as a whole. BUT there were moments warmth or just gentleness that I could feel which I think is special in a book. Beyond those moments though, it was a bizarre read that maybe I’ll keep thinking about and come back to reviewing. I thought quite a bit of it was over the top, which I understand allegories often need to be.. but this felt like it was distracted with how many points the author was quite heavy handedly trying to make. I did like the story of a few of the characters that wove together...