Jerusalem: The Story of a City and a Family

by Boaz Yakin, Nick Bertozzi (Illustrator)

Overview

Jerusalem is a sweeping, epic graphic novel that follows a single family—three generations and fifteen very different people—as they are swept up in chaos, war, and nation-making from 1940-1948. Faith, family, and politics are the heady mix that fuel this ambitious, cinematic graphic novel.

With Jerusalem, author-filmmaker Boaz Yakin turns his finely-honed storytelling skills to a topic near to his heart: Yakin's family lived in Palestine during this period and was caught up in the turmoil of war just as his characters are. This is a personal work, but it is not a book with a political ax to grind. Rather, this comic seeks to tell the stories of a huge cast of memorable characters as they wrestle with a time when nothing was clear and no path was smooth.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781466838642
Publisher:	First Second
Publication date:	04/16/2013
Sold by:	Macmillan
Format:	eBook
Pages:	400
File size:	139 MB
Note:	This product may take a few minutes to download.

About the Author

Boaz Yakin is a screenwriter and film director based in New York City. Yakin studied filmmaking at New York City College and New York University. As a producer he has been involved in bringing projects as diverse as Hostel and the award-winning Bombay Beach to the screen. His first graphic novel published by First Second, was Marathon with Joe Infurnari.
Nick Bertozzi lives in Queens, NY, with his wife and daughters and is the author and artist of many other cartoon stories, among them The Salon, Houdini: The Handcuff King, and First Second's Lewis&Clark and Stuffed! He is a teacher at the School of Visual Arts.

Boaz Yakin is an American screenwriter and film director based in New York City. He has written and/or directed many major Hollywood movies such as “The Punisher,” “The Rookie,” “A Price Above Rubies,” and “Remember The Titans.” He published the graphic novel Marathon with illustrator Joe Infurnari.
Nick Bertozzi has written and drawn many comics over the years, including Becoming Andy Warhol, The Salon, Lewis&Clark, and the New York Times bestselling Shackleton: Antarctic Odyssey. Bertozzi has won two Harvey and has taught Cartooning at the School of Visual Arts since 2003. He lives in Queens, New York, with his wife and daughters.

Editorial Reviews

This grim and relentless comic by filmmaker Yakin was inspired by tales his Israeli father told him. It follows the families of two estranged Israeli brothers—focusing primarily on the sons of those brothers—as the many wars involving Jerusalem rage around them. They suffer life, death, and everything in between, all while searching for their own identities within a passionate love for the place they call home. The book draws lovely if depressing parallels between these families and the Arabs and Jews, as they fight for control of Jerusalem. While the troubles of the Middle East are familiar , it’s impossible not to get drawn in to the plight of these characters. The youngest sons, first cousins Motti and Jonathan, are perhaps the sole bright spots and also the most tragic aspect of this work. Best friends regardless of their fathers’ estrangement, they are eventually pulled apart as they grow up, and as Jerusalem continues to pull itself apart. The way Motti and Jonathan’s story ends is somehow both shocking and inevitable. Bertozzi’s art, in grimly appropriate shades of black, white, and grey, sets a fitting tone for a story filled with unflinchingly honest violence. (Apr.)

Publishers Weekly

Those who like the graphic novel format and have an interest in people holding true to their beliefs or have experienced living in a situation filled with mayhem and disorder, may find this book helpful.” —VOYA

“This is most powerful for investing a massive and complex issue with real human emotion.” —Booklist, starred review

“A hefty tableau of beautifully gnashed teeth.” —Kirkus Reviews

From the Publisher

This ambitious graphic novel traces the chaotic, bloody early history of the modern Jewish state in Palestine, focusing on a fractious family living in the hotly contested city of Jerusalem. In April of 1945, the Halabys live in the motley Machane Yehuda neighborhood of British Jerusalem. After inheriting property from his late father, kind, soft-spoken patriarch Izak now lives in a modest apartment with no-nonsense Jewish-Egyptian wife Emily and their four sons and lone daughter (and, eventually, a down-on-their luck family Izak takes pity on, much to Emily's chagrin). Idealistic, artistic Avraham joins the Communist Party, under the leadership of noble Elias Habash, urging class solidarity between Jew and Arab alike. With Avraham returned from serving overseas with the Jewish brigade of the British army, dutiful David now enlists, devastating young Motti. Defiant Ezra delivers telegrams--and anti-British propaganda, journeying deeper into violent insurgency. Fearless, intelligent scamp Motti is best friends and classmates with cousin Jonathan, whose wealthy father, Yakov, deeply resents Motti's father--his own brother. Bashful Devorah struggles with self-esteem as the world around her falls apart, though Jonathan insists she's the most beautiful girl in the neighborhood. Through perils large and small--military occupation, suppression of Jewish identity, labor protests, internecine disputes, theater productions, open warfare--the family and city spiral into darkness, drenched in blood, as kindness and honor fail to overcome perceived slights. This dense work of nearly 400 pages offers almost no narration, save the opening six pages (map, condensed textual histories, illustrated family tree) that serve as a legend to be flipped back to time and again as the complex tale whirls mercilessly toward an intercut montage worthy of Francis Ford Coppola's Godfather. Filmmaker and author Yakin (Marathon, 2012, etc.) doesn't offer an easy read--the story is unapologetically larger than its pages--or any easy answers, which is bittersweetly appropriate given the subject matter. Bertozzi's (Lewis & Clark, 2011, etc.) clean lines and deceptively cartoonish art deftly capture everything from subtle emotion to human dismemberment. A hefty tableau of beautifully gnashed teeth.

Kirkus Reviews