Graphic Novel Review: Juliette or, the Ghosts Return in the Spring by Camille Jourdy

Posted on January 30, 2024 at 7:26 am by Gene Ambaum

Juliette or, the Ghosts Return in the Spring by Camille Jourdy. Translated by Aleshia Jensen. Drawn & Quarterly, 2023. 9781770466647.

Juliette returns home for a not-quite vacation, to deal with her anxiety. It’s unclear why she thinks spending time with her family might help. Her sister Marylou is struggling to balance her two kids, life with her husband, and an ongoing affair. (She frequently meets the young man she’s sleeping with in the greenhouse in her backyard. He owns a lot of animal costumes.) Their aging parents annoy them both in different ways. Juliette meets Polux, who seems interested in more than friendship, and who adopts a duckling to impress her. The book is about the interaction of all of these characters, and it all feels organic, personal, and compelling.

Jourdy’s soft colors and panel-less borders make everyone in the book seem more human and their emotions more subtle. Juliette makes me think of Michel Rabagliati’s Paul books because they’re all about family and the people in it, though the families are not at all similar.

I’m still pondering the image on the copyright page, under the book’s dedication, “Thank You to Émile.” It’s a female garden gnome facing me, having opened her coat, flashing the reader. I’m not sure how this sets the tone for the graphic novel, but it made me laugh.