Keezy Young’s win in the Best Artist category in the Broken Frontier Awards this year was all the more noteworthy for the incredibly strong shortlist of names nominated. Young’s first full-length graphic novel Hello Sunshine has garnered widespread acclaim, and deservedly so. It blends queer romance, explorations of mental health issues, and supernatural thriller into one long, winding mystery story. It features an engaging, well-rounded cast, makes pertinent social commentary in an entertaining way, and also has things to say about the sometimes problematic horror genre itself. That it succeeds on all these fronts is a testament to Young’s intricate skills as a visual storyteller.
Hello Sunshine is an ensemble character piece following the lives of a small group of teenagers as they look into the disappearance of their friend, Alex. Noah, who was on the cusp of a relationship with Alex, returns from Bible camp to discover he has vanished in unexplained circumstances. Alex’s twin Jamie is angry with himself for not noticing Jamie’s state of mind, while his girlfriend Izzy is guilt-ridden that she did but didn’t do enough. And childhood friend of the brothers, Sky, is going to find Alex no matter what. Hanging over everything is the haunting presence of the twins’ late mother Desdemona who had her own demons to face…
Young structures the story into chapters focussing on each of the characters, allowing us to see events from their perspectives but also meaning the readers are invited to piece together back story events themselves, giving the audience a sense that they are also part of the investigation. It’s a story structure that never condescends with overt exposition, allowing them to build up a feeling of gradual revelation as things progress for the characters. Indeed, some of the queer themes of the book are not explicitly spelled out initially, rather they become gradually apparent to us in a far more organic way narratively.
Work like this rewards re-reading and it’s to Young’s credit that their approach here ensures that on completing the book the reader will immediately want to return to its opening chapter looking for clues or motifs they may have missed the first time around. At the best part of 400 pages it’s obviously a slower build to those eventual answers. But every page nevertheless feels like a vital part of that journey. Hello Sunshine may be aimed at a YA readership but Young never patronises or compromises, and remains unafraid to make us work to put the puzzle pieces together. It’s an approach that keeps us constantly guessing and feeds into the often disconcerting atmosphere the book seeks to foster.
As a drama Hello Sunshine is an intriguing mix of slice-of-life character study and claustrophobic horror story. Young’s art, balancing realism and expressionism, works so well because it taps into both sides of that thematic equation. Similarly their page layouts are constantly shifting to reflect the eeriness of the characters’ experiences while Young’s use of lettering to express ideas of intrusive voices and psychosis is simply some of the finest and most effective I have ever seen in twenty years of reviewing at Broken Frontier. Other tools, like an ongoing playlist, also add extra layers to the story.
In its depictions of schizoaffective disorder and traumatic episodes, Hello Sunshine roots the realities of mental health issues within the trappings of horror and the supernatural, without the latter ever trivialising or exploiting the former. It’s an astonishing piece of comics, one of the finest examples of graphic fiction of this decade, and a book that is deserving of all the acclaim it has received. Outstanding and unmissable.
Keezy Young (W/A) • Little, Brown, $18.99
Review by Andy Oliver
