Tales from Outer Suburbia

It was back in June that I had initially decided to make a short note on this graphic novel; yet time passed and I was nowhere near to it.
What made it so difficult for me to write about Shaun Tan's? It is exactly that which makes his novel so special: Proper storytelling is not dependent on the age of the story's receiver: proper storytelling is an art in itself, it's magic storytelling. The Arabian Nights have always been a prime example for this.
And it's for this reason that

Tales from Outer Suburbia is a book for every human being you know, from the age of nine and up. It’s heartbreaking, and funny, and weird, and smart, and unlike any other book you’ve read up until this point in time. It’s what happens when someone tells you a dream they just had and you end up crying and laughing at the description all at once.[...]
In brief, each tale takes place (to some extent) in suburbia. Where people have lawns and bus stops and playgrounds. But it’s a suburbia where the peculiar is almost commonplace (though anything that shakes up the neighbours takes on a special glow). There are tales of water buffalos, rescued turtles, marriage quests, and a single nameless holiday. It’s the stuff that crawls around in your head when you're half asleep, and you could maybe even chalk it all up to subconscious ramblings if the stories didn’t make so much sense and didn’t linger in your head for quite so long. [...]

And what better display of the power of proper story telling than by careful crafting of all details in an ever-complementing combo with the graphics? It's a book to read over and over, and then to dream it, again.

Credits for the 2 images & full review go here.