Adherent

by Chris W. Kim

One of NYPL's Best New Comics of 2023 for Adults. A poignant fable about a young woman who is captivated by a set of recently discovered notebooks and leaves her isolated community to search for their author—a journey that ultimately makes her question what she wants and what she's willing to leave behind.

The residents of an isolated village in a dreamlike world scavenge for supplies in the surrounding forest, collecting scattered items left over from a time long past. No one strays far from this community, fearing what may lie beyond it. When they find a stack of notebooks by an unknown author, a young villager becomes obsessed with their contents. She sets out on a quest to find the writer. As she ventures into the unknown, she discovers a world both barren and increasingly complex. The closer she gets to her goal, the more she realizes that the encounter she's been seeking probably won't be what she wanted.

In Adherent, Chris W. Kim (Herman by Trade, Strays) brings us a fabular tale that examines the ways we connect—and the ideas and places we value—in our own increasingly disconnected world. 

Genres: Graphic Novels, Comics, Dystopia, Graphic Novels Comics, Sequential Art

220 pages, Paperback

First published May 23, 2023

Reviews

[Drew Canole · Rating 3 out of 5]

Conundrum Press is slowly giving D+Q a run for their title as Canada's best comics publisher.

This was a pleasant short book set in a future post-apocalyptic world of some sort. Humans are isolated in smaller communities and salvage items left over. Some of the people also start to create a knowledge base by collecting books and creating catalogues. A young woman in one of these isolated tribes finds a stack of notebooks and sets out trying to find the author.

Chris W. Kim draws a ton of sketch-styled landscapes and decayed architecture as our protagonist journey across this landscape in search of the author. Certainly the mood and the nice drawings are the best part of this comic.

[Izzy Pilares · Rating 4 out of 5]

Loved that this story took place in a quiet and eerie dystopian future where the majority was depicted through images and not words - it was immensely true to the world constructed. I also really enjoyed how the artwork mimicked the type of artwork that the main character would have found in the notebooks the village discovered. It felt like a re-telling of the allegory of the cave.

[Samira · Rating 2 out of 5]

The blurb on the back was misleading, and so I think I’m more disappointed than I would be than if I had gone in with fewer expectations. It was more of a melancholy rendition of ‘never meet your heroes’ than writing and missing pieces.

I see both positions, of the protagonist and her mystery author. You need to have both: the writer and the archivist. Both their positions make sense—they’re not at odds, ideologically.

I liked reading about a post-apocalyptic world, but I wish the world was more detailed.The book felt like a thought experiment. I guess I want more answers but I don’t think that’s this book’s aim.

[Kyle · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beautiful contemplation on the search for knowledge.

[Jasmine · Rating 5 out of 5]

A gentle, quiet and sparse read that invites the reader to surrender to taking in a fabulously illustrated world. Most of the storytelling is done through the visuals, with very little text, only there when absolutely necessary. I will have to reread as I am sure I missed some of the symbolism in the imagery.

Em travels from village to village to try to find the author of a mysterious pile of carefully kept notebooks archiving her surroundings. On her voyage she comes across a variety of abandoned objects that seem to be thematically intertwined, but I am just not entirely sure how or why. Ultimately, Em's meditative, lengthy journey helps her ground her desire to fill an empty page for herself.

[Samwise]

I have a weird feeling in my body that this book was something I needed to read around this time. I feel I may return again and again to it.

Mostly beautiful art with spare dialogue but when it speaks it knows exactly what it wants to say. I continue to be floored by what gets created in the graphic novel medium.

Delightful.

[Peacegal · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars--A woman navigating some sort of desolate, damaged landscape (exact time period and what sort of disaster occurred is unclear) goes on an obsessive quest for meaning after discovering a traveler's abandoned notebooks.

[el · Rating 4 out of 5]

I imagined this to be a post apocalyptic GN that explores the desire to reclaim items from the fall of capitalism. One character, on her search for an author who wrote descriptions of everything they saw, follows a trail of objects the author discards on their own journey, ultimately finding no use for them except a knowledge of their existence.
While the plot itself sounded fascinating, I found it to be lackluster in reality, and had more questions about the setting, the state of mind of the people still alive, and the means of destruction that spelled their current lifestyle that were not answered in the text.

[Kathryn Hemmann · Rating 5 out of 5]

Adherent tells an ambiguous yet hopeful story set in a ruined world almost entirely devoid of people. A nameless woman living in a small community finds a shack in the woods filled with illustrated notebooks that inspire her to leave home and track down the author. Most of the panels in Adherent are wordless depictions of the woman’s travels through dense forests, barren deserts, and abandoned cities, but the narrative pulls the reader through the pages at a steady pace.

Unlike many postapocalyptic stories, Adherent makes no attempt to explain what happened to human civilization. Instead, it asks a larger question about creative documentation. Is there innate meaning in the act of recording one’s experiences, or does meaning only come into being through the interpretation of the reader?

Ultimately, Adherent sets aside abstract philosophical ruminations in favor of the immediacy of its meticulously detailed monochromatic art, which focuses on the beauty of discarded objects amidst crumbling architecture. Adherent celebrates journey and discovery, and its gorgeously illustrated story encouraged me to rediscover the joy of sitting outside and observing the environment with my own sketchbook in hand.

[Online Eccentric Librarian · Rating 3 out of 5]

More reviews (and no fluff) on the blog http://surrealtalvi.wordpress.com/

This is one of those meditative pieces that is all about staring blankly at visuals and pondering life. In this case, a random post apocalyptic world where life has reverted back to 'villager' stage and the humans scavenge things from a civilization long gone. One woman comes across a diary of a wanderer who chronicled whatever she saw - whether a flower sprouting or reflections of water on a pond. The villager will spend the rest of this novel traveling to find the wanderer just to talk with her.

Story: a young villager comes across an abandoned notebook in a shack and is fascinated by the contents of a life spent just observing things. So she randomly decides to brave the unknown and venture out to find the notebook's owner. When she finds her, it's not what she expected and perhaps things weren't as deep or interesting as she thought.

There are very few words; most of the book is contemplating scenery. As such, we get a lot of the same scene page after page, just redrawn a bit differently. Our protagonist is likely supposed to be following the example of the wanderer and observing - but everything comes across as very simplistic. There's no real threat, the people at other new villages and towns aren't very interesting (or interested in the protagonist), and eventually she finds the person who wrote the diaries. It's anticlimatic. Nothing much happened except a lot of scenes showing her walking.

This has very simple black and white line drawings. At times, it can be hard to tell people apart or even get any expressions out of them to make it interesting. If anything, our protagonist walks, talks, and (infrequently) interacts with people like a robot. It makes for a very disaffecting read.

I enjoy contemplative pieces but I can't say that the graphic novel format really enhanced or was appropriate for this story. There were no real revelations, insights, or even a raison d'etre in the world or the people. As such, at the end I felt like I wanted those 25 minutes of my life back. Reviewed from an advance reader copy provided by the publisher.

[Andy Hickman · Rating 4 out of 5]

Adherent, Chris W. Kim
Beautiful and perplexing thin pencil sketches that are so detailed. The story reveals broken pieces of household items that are littered far and wide across the changing landscapes. What happened? Why is this like it is? But the people live in their own secluded villages and are not willing to go beyond what they know, but there is one young person, Em, who has found a diary of handwritten notes and observations. Oh, to find this person!! ****
“.. I just want to talk, to ask her about what she wrote.”
“Only by seeing the world at large can I be assured of what I’ve written.”

[Rachel · Rating 3 out of 5]

The black and white drawings of landscapes, scattered societies, and curious minds throughout this book are truly captivating. The imagery sets a tone of melancholy and novel exploration simultaneously. I always love graphic novels that build worlds where questions are left unanswered in the end, as it's amazing fuel for letting the reader imagine the possible outcomes and why the characters chose to do what they did. It was a bit slow for me, but that was fitting for the world within the story.

[Werka · Rating 2 out of 5]

2,5
nie wiem czy zrozumielam XDDD
bo albo zrozumialam i mi jei siadlo albo niezrozumialam
ale raczej to 1
pismo jest tak meczace do odczytywania, przez pierwsze strony to w ogole nie moglam sie odczytac

[Lisa · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was fine! I liked the artwork/sketching style, especially all of the cross-hatching, but ended up not liking how any of the people looked. The plot was also fine, although certainly not very satisfying to me.

[Maxine McEwan · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5 stars. It's mysterious but I just didn't make me think. Very little text which does help but I found it still spelt out what it wanted you to take from it instead of allowing the reader to come up with their own interpretation.

[Max · Rating 4 out of 5]

immersed in a world almost solely from the art (few words)

[Swishy · Rating 2 out of 5]

very confusing. I don't really get what the message of the book was meant to be. however art was top tier. the buildings look phenomenal.

[Sarah]

I think perhaps I don't understand this story. The art was vague, and I had trouble differentiating characters. No rating, because my lack of comprehension is not necessarily a sign of bad writing.

[Shawnna · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5/5

[B.R. Prezzini · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not a book that will stay with me, unfortunately.

[Sonic · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved this poignant fable that could almost only be told in the graphic novel format.

[Fiore · Rating 3 out of 5]

Aimless melancholia that still manages to at least be appealing visually and the tiniest bit hopeful.

[Mark Medland · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not quite Solar Punk but close enough. Loved the confidence that Kim had in letting the art do the talking and leaving a lot unsaid.

[Joseph Young · Rating 4 out of 5]

Somewhat of a slower paced book, in a post-apocalyptic wasteland, where old trash and scraps are now valuable commodities. There's some reflection on knowledge searchers and how they are perceived by others. I did find the rejection of previous self somewhat cringeworthy, and reflective of people who do not want to associate with their past selves. I don't think this book is for most people, and it's themes have to be searched for; they are not as bluntly stated for the reader.

[max moon! :) · Rating 1 out of 5]

maybe i’m just odd, but this book was kind of boring for me. i didn’t finish it. i appreciated the art though.