The Body Factory: From The First Prosthetics To The Augmented Human by Héloïse Chochois. Translated by Kendra Boileau. Graphic Mundi, 2021. 9780271087061. 156pp.
Chochois’s graphic novel opens with a wordless section in which a young man gets into a motorcycle accident. He awakens to find his left arm has been amputated. Ambrose Paré, the father of amputation, then appears to give a history of the procedure before explaining how the young man’s was performed. More wordless interludes about the young man’s life and recovery take place between informative chapters on phantom limbs, prostheses, and transhumanism (modifying people’s bodies using technology so they can do things that weren’t previously possible).
Chochois’s art style is simple enough that even the pages about surgery and the detailed discussions of anatomy don’t feel too graphic. This is a fantastic book that has a lot of shelf appeal.
My favorite part: “You too can properly amputate, thanks to the TOURNIQUET!” a one-page how-to of sorts at the end of the section on the US Civil War.
