Mimosa: A Graphic Novel

by Archie Bongiovanni

Archie Bongiovanni, the comics artist behind the award-winning hit A Quick and Easy Guide to They/Them Pronouns , explores queerness in the shockingly frank and funny graphic novel Mimosa .

Best friends and chosen family Chris, Elise, Jo, and Alex work hard to keep themselves afloat. Their regular brunches hold them together even as the rest of their lives threaten to fall apart. In an effort to avoid being the oldest gays at the party, the crew decides to put on a new queer event called Grind—specifically for homos in their dirty 30s.

Grind is a welcome distraction from their real after a messy divorce, Chris adjusts to being a single parent while struggling to reconnect to their queer community. Elise is caught between feelings for her boss and the career of her dreams. Jo tries to navigate the murky boundaries of being a supportive friend and taking care of her own needs. And Alex is guarding a secret that might change his friendships forever. While navigating exes at work, physical and mental exhaustion, and drinking way, way too much on weekdays, this chosen family proves that being messy doesn’t always go away with age.

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

272 pages, Hardcover

First published March 7, 2023

Reviews

[s.penkevich [hiatus-will return-miss you all] · Rating 4 out of 5]

‘Bad decisions don’t make themselves.’

This book attacked me at the turn of every page and I love it for that. Growing up is hard. And I’m not just talking teenage coming-of-age stuff, because growing up and growing old doesn’t actually get any easier. It’s just less mineable for cute stories. Thankfully we have Mimosa from Archie Bongiovanni (author of A Quick & Easy Guide to They/Them Pronouns), a graphic novel about a queer friend group approaching their 40s that shows maturing doesn’t necessarily mean less mess…or even more maturity.

Attacked! I don’t think I’ve ever had just one job at once…

This is quite the feel-good book that drags you through a lot of hurt feelings. When the friends organize a night club event for older queers (Grind: The Dance Party for Mature Queers), their personal lives start to get messy, their co-dependent support network starts to crumble and tensions get high. It’s a comical spiral of bad decisions, selfish motivations, hurt feelings and even more bad decisions that are often ‘the kind of mess we’d get into in our 20s, not our mid-30s.’

Bongiovanni offers a really blunt look at being queer in your 30s and offers an insightful commentary on how so much of the efforts for offering queer-specific spaces and support tends to aim towards teens and young adults and is something many feel they grow out of and feel left on the outside. It is also a look at the idea of found-families (the group here meets all working at a restaurant, the classic queer friend group location) and how friendships that were once so tight-knit can start to drift apart as life goes on.

We have Chris, a genderqueer single parent, who feels pulled away from a social life by their child and fears turning 40 in a month (hanging out at nightclubs they are too old for doesn’t help with the existential crisis); Elise who makes the poor decision to start dating her boss right before an important promotion; Jo, a trans performer, who is really leaning into a job as a teacher at a queer music camp and feels the group doesn’t care; and Alex, a trans painter, who’s financial secret might make the entire group feel betrayed. It’s all a mess, but a fun mess to watch because it feels very real and there are some lovely moments of self reflection along with all the bad choices and hurt feelings. Highly sexual, crude and full of fun, this was a winner of a graphic novel. Also shoutout to Dave's review for inspiring me to read this one!

4/5

[CaseyTheCanadianLesbrarian · Rating 5 out of 5]

This graphic novel about a group of thirtysomething queer friends was so so so good. I know a lot of reviews say "when I finished this book I went back to the beginning and started it over again." I always kind of roll my eyes, like really? But I actually mean it with Mimosa! I just wanted to experience the arc of these friendships and the character journeys another time while already knowing who they were. No regrets!

Mimosa is so true and so real, so messily queer and trans, with representations so authentic to being a thirtysomething queer person today that the recognition often stunned me. Bongiovanni is not afraid to have their characters make mistakes or lean into their flaws. All the characters felt very much like people I know or have met in queer community -- in both good and bad ways.

As a new queer mom, I was particularly touched by the portrayal of Chris, a nonbinary parent struggling with balancing being a divorced queer wanting intimacy and being a present single parent for their kid. Elise's need to epically fuck up (dating wise) in her thirties having not done so in her twenties really resonated with me too. You know a character making a huge mistake is well written when you want to scream at them "what are you doing?" while also totally understanding why.

Have I mentioned this book is also very funny, in the best of gay ways? There are a lot of fun Easter eggs in the drawings. Pay attention to book covers and sewn on patches and T-shirt logos for extra laughs. I literally laughed out loud so much while reading this, especially at the relatable dialogue, although I did also cringe a few times (when I was supposed to, of course).

Mimosa is definitely a required read for anyone old like me who still misses regular Dykes to Watch Out For updates. Even if you're not a DTWOF fan, but you love messy real queers and a focus on queer friendship and/or are a queer person in your mid-life thirties, Mimosa is not to be missed.

[Rod Brown · Rating 2 out of 5]

It's all friendship turbulence as members of a found family take turns becoming self-involved and neglectful of their friends then getting pissy when their friends get all self-involved and neglectful. I tired of all the whining and sulking from what would have otherwise been likable gay and trans characters. It's an unexpected amount of immaturity from a bunch of thirtysomethings.

[Lucy A · Rating 2 out of 5]

I don’t like these people.

[Paige · Rating 1 out of 5]

There are a number of problems with this graphic novel, and other reviews critiquing it highlight some of these issues well. I'd like to add a few more.

Mimosa has poor exposition.
It feels like exactly what writers are told you shouldn't do when it comes to exposition. Here, have some examples:

Chris: I'm a nonbinary almost-40-year-old anarchist punk at a party called Tittrap.

This is a quote from Chris talking to their group of friends that we've been told have all been friends for a decade or more. Why are you talking to your closest friends like that?

Here's another example:

Elise: If this were to become a thing, maybe the door fee could be donated to Relief and Rescue?

Alex: Donating to not only your job but also the only trans-focused mental health nonprofit in town? Fuck yeah!

Writing like that is a great way to kill my suspension of disbelief. It's obvious from the start of the book that this group knows everything there is to know about one another, so this dialogue was incredibly unrealistic.

The characters are... not great.
They spent the whole book going through their issues, personal and friend group-related, but none of it ever felt resolved. Occasionally two characters who had pissed each other off would apologize to one another, but pretty quickly someone would do something else shitty and everyone would be right back to being annoyed with everyone else.

Some issues felt glossed over too and nothing felt satisfactory. And I get that maybe all of that was the point, as the book is self-described as "messy," but that seemed to quickly trump the other self-proclaimed theme of found family and leave it in the dust. Only two of the group members are ostensibly even friends by the end of the book!

I know plenty of other reviews have brought up the character issues, like everyone not acting their age (seriously, if the point of your book is about 30+ queer people...have them act 30+!), but I wanted to add my own thoughts as well.

The art style
I'm not an artist, so I don't feel like I have a really solid place to critique someone else's art, but I do read a lot of graphic novels. Some graphic novels have a really simple art style that is still able to convey an active environment for the story to take place in (for all my meh feelings about it, The Book Tour did a good job of this). Mimosa's art style is not super detailed, but in addition to that the backgrounds feel really static, when there is a background. It hindered the flow of the story, and it felt like there was a noticeable lack of something in the art.

Alex
I thought the treatment of Alex was really weird. The group finds out that he's got a trust fund, although the exact amount is never revealed. I'll say right away that him borrowing money from his poorer friends when he had that money was shitty of him, especially since nobody knew he had the trust fund. But... the way they reacted when he told everybody made me wonder if he was keeping that a secret for a reason. He's almost immediately exorcised from the group! At the end of the book, when they realize they're "old friends" now instead of active friends in each other's lives, there's no appearance from Alex, just a snarky "I heard he moved to Portland." "Of course he did." conversation between two characters.

It just felt really weird to me that they would give up on having a relationship with Alex because of that. Chris did an objectively shitty thing (cheated on their wife with multiple people) and the whole friend group supported them through it! So it rubbed me the wrong way that Alex didn't even get a fraction of that support.

All in all, this was not good, and I finished the book feeling really put off by it. I was really excited to find a graphic novel with a nonbinary author, but I was hugely disappointed by this. It didn't even take that long to read but still felt like a waste of my time.

[Maia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Chris, Jo, Elise, and Alex bonded over being the only queer waiters at a restaurant, but their friendship long outlasted their stint at the job. Ten years on, the crew, now in their mid and late thirties, face a whole slew of new challenges: parenting, vying for promotions, balancing partying and work, being judged by baby gays at the club, and scariest of all, drifting apart. Fans of Bongiovanni's Grease Bats will enjoy the familiar flavors of a messy, horny, queer and trans friend squad but paired with a more nuanced slice-of-life narrative. These characters are trying to stay true to themselves, invest in their communities, get laid, and support each other. But it's not so easy to balance all of those conflicting needs, and they frequently fall short. I was left hoping that the characters could forgive each other's deeply human failings. I had the pleasure of reading an advanced copy of the book- it's available for pre-order now, or check it out when it's released in March 2023!

[Libby · Rating 5 out of 5]

WOW, feeling very seen by this book as a queer person close to entering their 30s and all of the “adult-y” responsibilities I find myself having catching up to me. I’m literally sick at this very moment due to burnout.

I identified less with the characters in this book who were desperate for dates, relationships, and hookups, but Jo…Jo I understood. I’m unsure as to whether others would see me in her, as I continually struggle to understand how others view me, but her dynamic in the friend group felt achingly familiar to me. However, she was also into music and books…literally the two things I have degrees in…so…

ANYWAYS

This book was essentially queer 30-somethings trying to figure out how to balance the responsibilities of their jobs and personal lives. Which seems simple because that’s only two things I listed, but IT IS NOT.

I won’t spoil the ending, but it was not what I was expecting. Rather, it is far more realistic and bittersweet.

Highly recommend as this book is easy to read in an evening and leaves an impact.

[danielle · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book, y’all! I learned that you are supposed to read a graphic novel multiple times (shoutout to the Reading Rainbows Book Club!) and that completely changed my view of this work. The discussions of friendship and growing older, and being queer, were just so thoughtfully done. I have a huge appreciation for this book.

[tane'a · Rating 1 out of 5]

if this is how people communicate and interact in their 30’s..

[Andrew Eder · Rating 5 out of 5]

After book club, I’m raising my rating to 5 stars because I didn’t realize how much i related to or how much this book would mean to me. I didn’t realize how much I loved it until I had to go to bat for it, and I am willing to go to bat. I will be rereading this a few times probably.

I laughed and laughed and shook my head over and over.

I loved the dynamic of the friends and what it’s like trying to make and keep relationships as you age.

I loved how different each character was, too! There were pieces of each character that I found so connected to me, too.

There was also so much personal responsibility needing to be taken which was great to see. The individuals that worked on THEMSELVES got happy endings! Shocking, huh??? I just love when individuals are selfish in what they need. And if they’re not getting what they need they do something about it.

I loved how messy it all was and actually liked how nasty they all were to each other. I feel like the friends all grew up together too much and they never learned how to be by themselves and learn how to learn to live their own life.

Also shoutout to all of the artist decisions that went into this book and how intentional every piece of the art and coloring was.

[Katherine D. Morgan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked a lot of what MIMOSA was doing. Rarely do I ever get to read books about a group of queer friends in their 30s, and rarely are those friends as messy as the ones in this book (whew chile). The only thing that I didn’t like is that the ending felt kind of rushed. There’s supposed to be a big moment and then that moment…whooshed by and then it was the end and certainly SOME time had happened, but I don t know how much time, and know that would have been quite helpful.

Also, yeah, after finding out Alex’s secret, I would have hated his ass too.

[annabelle · Rating 1 out of 5]

jesus christ, everyone in this book was so insufferable.

[Richard Dominguez · Rating 4 out of 5]

Four trans friends for over 10 years come to a point in their lives where growth and dreams come between their friendship.
This is a fabulous read, enjoyable and at times enlightening. The story is a fast read with some fun illustrations.
Over all this is one that can be enjoyed by anyone

[Lizzy · Rating 1 out of 5]

What if queer found family but it’s actually just as toxic as the blood family they seek to escape.
Everyone is a massive, insufferable asshole, no one learns, they all end in worse places at the end with no real satisfying growth or ending or wrap-up.
Like there’s messy and lovable and then there’s just cruel and self-absorbed. Chris in particular cheats multiple times and is needlessly mean to their poor child. They complain about not getting laid or high enough — they turn 40 and have a kid??? They complain about being alone on their birthday—they have a kid??? That’s not alone! The kid who is just relegated to babysitting and screens. But apparently the character who lies about their financial status to fit in is the absolute worst.

[Haylee Perry · Rating 4 out of 5]

As a 23 year old, I imagine 30 being the magical age where adults really become adults and have their shit together. The older I get, and the more I connect with friends who are older than me, the more I realize there isn’t just a magical age where that happens. This graphic novel explores that exact idea, and it was really comforting. It also made me sad. I want to think that the friends I have now, that have stuck with me through my college years (or who have come after my college years) are going to be lifelong friends. Chris and Elise being the only two who keep in contact by the end confirmed that that just isn’t always true.

[Hannah · Rating 2 out of 5]

I’m glad I didn’t end up buying this and checked it out from the library instead.
All the characters were so unlikeable. The way the all treated each other was horrible. I liked the fact that they wanted to have a place for older queer folks but other than that, there really wasn’t much else to like about this story.
I was able to identify with Chris as far as having a child and also trying to maintain a relationship with their friends, the birthday where no one showed up, etc. The amount of times I rolled my eyes at shit their friends said….
The ending felt very rushed but I’m happy that Chris and Elise were able to mend their friendship.

[Méli · Rating 3 out of 5]

More like 3.5
Nothing up to page 22 could be considered a natural dialogue with your (allegedly??) friends of 10+ years. If a close friend tells me "I'm a nonbinary almost-40-year-old anarchist punk at a party called tittrap"... y'ALL

[annie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Deeply inconsistent. Sometimes it resonated with me; sometimes it had me rolling my eyes. Sometimes the art was pleasing in a loose way; sometimes it was sloppy. I did wish the best for these characters but sometimes they really needed to grow tf up. I still have a beef with this brand of queer fiction that reduces it all to buzzwords, in-jokes and stereotypes, but I didn’t hate this.

[Larakaa · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you miss Alison Bechdel's Dykes, this is the perfect comic for you. 
Queer lives are just as messy as others' but honesty, self-reflection and friends help to cope and find a way. 

[Suzanne · Rating 4 out of 5]

A meditation on being queer in your 30's (and turning 40), on queer parenthood and divorce, trying to balance sex work with instructing queer youth, the pitfalls of messy romantic entanglements, of holding several jobs and trying to find one that pays the bills, of being a Grade A prat.
This book was a *ride.* The four friends hurt each other so much and it's not even their fights that do it, it's their absence, their negligence, their selfishness. But is it selfish to move on from a friendship, even one you've had for 10 years? I'm not sure it can be called selfish if you're not in the same place anymore, if you can't muster up the empathy to care for people who don't seem to care for you.
I was expecting something other than what I got, but what's here is sad and beautiful, messy and hopeful, confusing and frustrating... rather like life. I appreciate that Bongiovanni steps outside the "acceptable" queer narrative and includes sex work, arguments, cheating, divorce, occasionally resentful parenting, the isolation and ageism of queer spaces, and more.
This is a great book.

I received an advanced digital copy of Mimosa for review at Shelf Awareness. This is not that review. :)

[Kristina · Rating 1 out of 5]

1. Man, what awful characters. The first half of the book is almost unbearable and pretty unrelatable, but the second half is better and more sincere. I am still not sure why their friendships couldn't have been mended. Their fights weren't over anything serious. If anything, Pepper is the one who should be most hurt yet she just shrugs it off.

I am trying to support Surely Books, but they are becoming too hit or miss with putting good things out. Such a shame.

[Eva B. · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'd call this "Company for gay people" but Company is already Company for gay people. A fast, compelling read full of disaster gays and big fuck-ups with a mostly-satisfying conclusion.

[Lauren · Rating 4 out of 5]

messy queers in their thirties trying to figure out their lives? i'm here for it

[Casey · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fun graphic novel about a queer friend group living in Minneapolis (not a huge part of the plot, but I noticed) in their thirties (and turning forties). We love to see queer adults having fun and living life!!

This was perfect to read while camping/traveling, since it was pretty light-hearted and plot-light, while still emotionally grounded and entertaining. I wish there was a little stronger wrap-up, I feel like the book just ended with many of the plot lines left conclusion-light to conclusion-less. I could imagine this being more of an ongoing thing though so maybe that’s part of it?

[Squirrel · Rating 3 out of 5]

That was... Underwhelming. While I appreciate this being about slightly older queers (ie those in their 30s), I just didn't especially like these characters.
ETA: I take that back. I do like Jo but the rest of the characters can get over themselves.

I think that I came into this with expectations that this would be fluffy like a whole lot of graphic novels about queer people and that it would have a happy or at least a satisfactory ending. But no, this is a book about adult queers with real adult flaws that cause them adult pain. The characters seem to have done OK as long as they weren't in conflict with each other but this book is about what happens when they all simultaneously go through rough patches and don't seem to have other people to rely on besides each other.
The book also highlights the extent to which so much queer therapy speak can be used vapidly as placeholder content without real feelings behind it.
There are real structural and social issues at play in these dynamics and I don't think that they ever really got dealt with. Truly Jo got the short end of the stick over and over again and none of the white characters really grappled with it.
So this is a tale of a friend group imploding instead of being a friendship-is-magic scenario. Which I can live with tbh, in part because it did spark a significant discussion with another friend. People are messy and we need complicated narratives of queer life. It just seems that this author didn't quite have the deft hand to pull it off.
Bumped up to 3.5 stars. I don't know that I'd recommend it but if I did I'd make sure that the other person wasn't looking for a more happy plot line.

[Sarah Cavar · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was such a fun, funny, and real read. The two-toned art and color scheme were fantastic, and the illustrations overall were so vibrant. I wish that the plot and especially context were better explained, and actually think that Mimosa could have worked better as two separate and better fleshed-out volumes. There were points where I felt detached from the stakes of characters’ choices and relationships because I simply hadn’t had enough time (or pages) to connect with them.

[Audrey · Rating 2 out of 5]

There was just something about this I didn't like. The whole thing felt super incohesive. The characters were really shitty with each other... and not in an adorably messy way as the book was advertised, but more in a way of just... being shitty.

[Elizabeth A · Rating 3 out of 5]

A fun graphic novel about queer thirtysomething friends navigating life, love, parenting, and getting older. I liked the illustration style and appreciated that it didn't' center around YA or NA cast of characters.

[Shaunee Broadley · Rating 3 out of 5]

it was a quick read, and honestly the only character i liked was Jo

[Giovanareadshere · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reading a queer graphic novel about a crew of messy ass queer best friends in their thirties as a queer 30 something myself? 😍👏🏾 Hell yeah, I was locked in. Living in the Bay, I’ve definitely had my share of chaotic queer friendships and relationships, so a lot of this hit close in the best way. I was laughing out loud and cringing right along with them. 😂

One thing I really loved was how they threw a party specifically for the 30 plus queer crowd. Yessssss!! 👏🏾👏🏾 I’ve been in that exact situation, where you’re like, can we please have something cute and low key that doesn’t involve yelling over a DJ or squeezing through a crowd of twenty baby Queers? 😂😂😂😂That alone made this graphic novel feel extra real.

This book is messy as fuck in parts, and I say that lovingly. It shows how friendship shifts and stretches over time. How sometimes you grow apart, need space, fall back in, and it’s still love. I appreciated how it didn’t force neat resolutions or pretend queer friendship is always soft and easy. Sometimes it’s complicated, loud, and full of hella drama. And sometimes you just need a break. And that’s okay. 🤷🏾‍♀️