Reader's Diary #2015- Yvan Alagbé, translated by Donald Nicholson-Smith: Yellow Negroes and Other Imaginary Creatures

The art work in Yvan Alagbé's Yellow Negroes and Other Imaginary Creatures is unlike anything I've encountered before. The black ink is heavy and rough but there's still a grace to the linework, especially the curves. It's artistic and simultaneously challenging and inviting.

The stories themselves I found to be mostly incoherent. Panel by panel, I could, and sometimes did, take it to be much like visiting an art gallery. They were provocative and left a lot of room for interpretation. However, when hints that they were supposed to be part of a larger narrative arose I found it more frustrating. There were gaps in the plot, it wasn't always clear who was speaking, and so on.