Arrival

"A shockingly imaginative graphic novel that captures the sense of adventure and wonder that surrounds a new arrival on the shores of a shining new city. Wordless, but with perfect narrative flow, Tan gives us a story filled with cityscapes worthy of Winsor McCay." —Jeff Smith, author of Bone

In the beginning of this wordless story, we see a young father leaving his wife and daughter to establish a new home for them in a foreign country. The clothing and technology, at first, look just like pictures you'd imagine of an immigrant coming to the shores of America during the mid-1800s, but the look evolves and is definitely not what you expect as the story continues. As he reaches the new land and starts building his new life, he has to rely on the kindness of strangers to survive. Along the way, he meets several other immigrants who tell him their incredible stories of fleeing from their homelands. 

Many of us stay pretty enclaved in our home communities and countries. Traveling opens our eyes to different cultures, but it's still hard to imaging leaving our familiar lives forever. In this story, the surrealist art accentuates just how foreign one would feel moving to a new land, with its unknown language, strange food, housing, transportation, animals, etc. It also spotlights our shared humanity.

We brought in this book at the recommendation of Kerilyn Wilson (author/artist of Faint of Heart), as she said Shaun Tan is one of the biggest influences of her art. In many ways reminiscent of Hayao Miyazaki's Studio Ghibli, this is a steampunk meets immigration story told totally in spectacular pictures and with deep feeling.