jobnik! [Perfect Paperback]

Miriam Libicki (Author, Illustrator)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 3, 2008

Miriam Libicki, an American Jewish girl from a religious home, enlists in the Israeli Army one summer against everyone's better judgment. Many qualities seem to make her unsuited for IDF life: her Hebrew isn't great, she is shy and passive, and she has a tendency to fall in love with anything that moves. If that weren't enough, the Al Aqsa uprising, a.k.a the second Palestinian Intifada, erupts a few weeks after she is stationed as a secretary in a remote Negev base. Will Miriam survive threats of terrorism, the rough IDF culture, and not least, her horrible taste in men?

Editorial Reviews

Review

"In this unusual but important autobiographical graphic novel, ... [t]he artist gives all the characters the startled sense of weight she gives her own character as if adult bodies were some vast surprise.... [P]art of the deadly innocence of youth is how the young can get inured to awful things, and the story shows this excellently well." --Publishers Weekly

"Libicki simultaneously charts her journey as raw recruit in the Israeli Defense Force and young girl painfully searching for intimacy. Love and peace, war and youth, the mixture is irresistible." --Stephen Notley, creator of Bob the Angry Flower

"The so-called comics experts tell us the Golden Age of comics is long past. I contend this isn t so. In fact, I suspect we re in comics golden age right now. In even the recent past, the amazing diversity of comics we enjoy today simply wasn t available or even possible. The idea of an autobiographical exploration of one young woman s years in the Israeli Defense Force, during the height of the second intifada, being published as a comic series, much less finding a readership, was an idiot s dream. Now it s not only possible, the book exists. Miriam Libicki s Jobnik! is proof that we re in the golden age of comics today." --Bill Willingham, author of Fables

About the Author

Miriam Libicki was born in Columbus, Ohio. After living in Jerusalem and Seattle, Washington, she is now based in Vancouver, BC. She completed her Bachelor s of Fine Arts from Emily Carr Institute in 2006. She is the creator of the comic series, jobnik!, and the drawn essays Towards a Hot Jew, ceasefire, fierce ease and Jewish Memoir Goes Pow! Zap! Oy! (published in The Jewish Graphic Novel: Critical Approaches, from Rutgers University Press, December 2008).

Product Details

• Perfect Paperback: 152 pages
• Publisher: real gone girl studios; 1 edition (October 3, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 097842770X
• ISBN-13: 978-0978427702
• Product Dimensions: 10 x 6.5 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #553,009 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Had me captivated, November 12, 2008

By 

Josue Menjivar (Vancouver, Canada) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: jobnik! (Perfect Paperback)

Miriam's work is not to be missed. She is one talent that deserves so much attention. Keep an eye out for her, she is just beginning to gain her stride. I can assure you that greater things are ahead. Her work is beautiful to look at and her story keeps you involved. She even has a glossary of words to help the story read better. This book is a great read and hopefully you will become a Libicki fan as I have.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars stunning autobiographical tale about the IDF, Israel, and Jewish identity, November 12, 2008

By 

Edward (Florida) - See all my reviews

This review is from: jobnik! (Perfect Paperback)

Miriam Libicki is one of the most gifted graphic novelists and illustrators and her candid and illuminating tale merges the personal and the political in exciting and surprising ways. Whether one is interested in the graphic novel/comics genre or the Jewish memoir itself, Libicki's work is simply not to be missed.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars I really could not put it down until I finished it., October 19, 2009

By 

B. T. Denyer "Web designer" (San Francisco, CA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: jobnik! (Perfect Paperback)

I first saw Miriam at the Alternative Press Expo in San Francisco where she was on a panel discussion for artists. Gives a great talk; if you get the chance to see her you really should make the effort to go.

This is not one of those polished Sandman graphic novels, but a pencil sketch/drawing along the lines of Crumb. And by mentioning Crumb, I mean that her characters are thick-bodied individuals like the way he draws them. (In fact, Crumb gives his endorsement on the back of the book complimenting and making light of this fact.) It's the drawings that really pulled me in. There is something eerie about the way Miriam captures the facial expressions of herself in the book. The flippant looks, the sideways glances, the cowering, the anger, all so well done.

The story will throw some people at first, for it feels a bit choppy. But for those that have served, that is how the time feels: chopped up into segments that don't seem to make sense.

Some of the pages are heavily sketched with the Chiaroscuro shading where faces are deep and detailed, while others are made up of about 5 or 6 lines and rough. While this may sound chaotic, it really depended of what the story was talking about. Some of the more mournful and sobering parts got detailed while some of the mundane day-to-day soldier life was given less gravity. But in no way less enthusiasm, just different.

I highly recommend this book for educators teaching courses on women's studies, women in the military, Jewish literature. Of course, I also recommend as a fantastic read that you will not be able to put down.