Tales From Outer Suburbia by Shaun Tan gives readers great pictures to look at and decipher and short vingettes to think about. Many stories, most only a few pages, make up this book that is part prose and part picture book.
My personal favorite is called Grandpa's Story. It is a story, told by a grandfather, about how "weddings were more complicated in those days". The grandfather goes on to tell how the bride and groom were sent out before the ceremony with an evelope and a compass and had to solve a number of cryptic riddles and find objects on a list. How he and "your grandma" had to work together and almost did not make it back. Like most of the stories in this book, "Granpa's Story" is meant to teach a lesson or highlight some aspect of everyday suburban life.
I liked Tan's first graphic novel The Arrival, which is wordless. It really gave me a lot to puzzle over. Tales From Outer Suburbia gave me a lot to think about too. I would recommend this book to readers who like to be visually stimulated. It reminded me of Chris Van Allsburg's books like The Widow's Broom and The Wreck of Zephyr.
-Katie at Chester County Library
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