The triumphant return of one of comicsrsquo; greatest talents, with an engrossing story of one manrsquo;s search for love, meaning, sanity, and perfect architectural proportions. An epic story long awaited, and well worth the wait. Meet Asterios Polyp: middle-aged, meagerly successful architect and teacher, aesthete and womanizer, whose life is wholly upended when his New York City apartment goes up in flames. In a tenacious daze, he leaves the city and relocates to a small town in the American heartland. But what is this ldquo;escaperdquo; really about? As the story unfolds, moving between the present and the past, we begin to understand this confounding yet fascinating character, and how hersquo;s gotten to where he is. And isnrsquo;t. And we meet Hana: a sweet, smart, first-generation Japanese American artist with whom he had made a blissful life. But now shersquo;s gone. Did Asterios do something to drive her away? What has happened to her? Is she even alive? All the questions will be answered, eventually. In the meantime, we are enthralled by Mazzucchellirsquo;s extraordinarily imagined world of brilliantly conceived eccentrics, sharply observed social mores, and deftly depicted asides on everything from design theory to the nature of human perception. Asterios Polyp is David Mazzucchellirsquo;s masterpiece: a great American graphic novel.
