Saturday, September 27, 2008

Persepolis 2

Persepolis 2: The Story of a Return Persepolis 2: The Story of a Return by Marjane Satrapi

rating: 3 of 5 stars

I read Persepolis last year for my YA Lit class. I didn't have a huge desire to run right out and get Persepolis 2, but the other day I decided to pick it up at the library.

Persepolis and Persepolis 2 are graphic novels detailing the life of the author. Marjane Satrapi was born in Iran and was sent as a teenager to live in Austria to escape the Iranian regime and the Iran-Iraq War. Much of Persepolis 2 details this time in Austria where she struggles to fit into Western society and ideals. Eventually, she returns to Iran where she feels that she doesn't fit in either because of her time in the West. She eventually gets her life on track by focusing on her education.

This book is usually found in the YA section, but I think this book has a lot very mature themes including drug use, violence, sexual content, and explicit language.

Melissa hit the nail on the head when she said this is not an easy book to read, but it does give some important insight on what it is like to live in a country where the people are repressed by the governing regime.


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2 comments:

Corinne said...

Yeah, after watching the movie I decided to pass on 2. I liked the first one enough though.

Ana S. said...

How odd that it's kept in the YA section...I definitely don't think it was written with a young audience in mind. Maybe the fact that it's a coming of age story of sorts plus the fact that it's a comic make some people assume it's a YA book?