Aya, vol. 3: The Secrets Come Out

by | Jun 22, 2012 | 0 comments

Aya: The Secrets Come Out
   
This installment of Aya, by Marguerite Abouet, picks up where the last one left off. Secrets do in fact come out. The first secret that we readers are exposed to involves the fallout from Aya’s father’s mistress and secretary Jeanne having exposed the affair and left her (and Ignace’s) children at Ignace’s house. This has wide ramifications, and the first part of the book deals with the fallout of this revelation from the perspective of many of the principal characters.

Aya attempts to reason with Jeanne, and through this process hears more about how her father was duplicitous. Félicité, the young maid, reacts with fear. She supposes that with this revelation the family will split up, forcing her to move back to her village. Ignace tries to explain things to his wife, Fanta, before quickly leaving to take his and Jeanne’s children back to Jeanne. While he is gone, Aya talks with her mother and the family friends about the situation.

The second big secret unearthed is that Albert’s girlfriend is discovered. Discovered by Félicité as Innocent (Inno), the male hairstylist in town. As to be expected Félicité confides in Aya, and then Aya is largely at the center of the narrative of this story. She’s the one that everyone ultimately revolves around. Inno decides the homophobia of his home is too much and confides in Aya that he wants to move to Paris with Albert. Albert has to make a big decision, family or love?

Other than the two big secrets, this book mostly focuses on the exploits of various town peoples. It also features the Miss Yopugon pageant. This pageant brings all of the townsfolk together in short order, and serves as the unifying event of this volume of Aya’s life. If all of this sounds very soap operaish, that’s because it is! This is one of the narrative’s great attractions.

Clément Oubrerie’s art is another selling point. He excels in using character body language and posture to display the subtext of a scene. This combined with bright colors gives each character a distinct and recognizable personality. The scene when Félicité confesses to Aya that she saw Albert and Inno together is one that features this talent. Aya’s posture moves from demanding to comforting as Félicité starts at reserved until she breaks down and confesses the secret with tears and a plaintive wail. The only mark against his art is that it is likely that the red jacket that Inno wears in this volume is an anachronism. It appears to be a Michael Jackson red thriller jacket, when that video did not appear until 1983 and the story is set in 1980. That being said, the art taken as a whole is superb.

As before, this volume of Aya’s story is human centric and focuses primarily on young people. The series is set in the Ivory Coast in 1980; this is what sets it apart from most other “real life” type stories told in comic form. It deftly handles serious and humorous situations without veering into the maudlin. This makes it a worthy purchase for both Academic and public libraries. High school libraries should also consider it depending on individual circumstances.

Aya, vol. 3: The Secrets Come Out
by Marguerite Abouet
Art by Clement Oubrerie
ISBN: 9781897299791
Drawn and Quarterly, 2009

Aya, vol. 2: Aya of Yop City

by | Nov 26, 2011 | 0 comments

Aya of Yop City
   
Aya of Yop City by Marguerite Abouet is best described as a more realistic soap opera. Set in the Ivory Coast of the late 1970’s it deals with the families, loves, foibles, schemes, and eccentricities of a group of young people in Yop city (Yopougon) and its surrounding area. While place plays a role, this story is very much about the people.

The lives of all the characters in this story intersect on a regular basis. It depicts a closeness and mutuality that rings true. This interdependence is on display with what is perhaps the thrust of the first part of this volume, the quest of Adjoua’s family to find who is her baby’s father. Her father, Hyacinte, hatches a scheme to photograph all of the villagers so as to suss out who the baby’s other parent is. He succeeds when a photograph of Mamadou is brought to his attention. Watching Adjoua and Mamadou’s parents negotiate economic help (from Mamadou) for the newborn is a humorous experience (the reader feels embarrassed for Mamadou). After the father is found the baby still makes regular appearances, with Adjoua’s friends and families taking the time to help out with the child.

Aya is of course one of the main characters and, in this volume, perhaps the most virtuous. She is everywhere, helping one of her friends (Adjoua) with a new baby, giving pageant advice to her housekeeper (Félicité), and agreeing to teach her friend who is illiterate (Hervé) how to spell. She is even present for the cliffhanger at the end of the volume that makes the reader want to find out what happens next.

Through the course of the novel, all the characters interact in some way. It shows how interconnected they all are. The effect is to make Yop city feel like a real place where people are always crossing paths. Clément Oubrerie’s art adds to the effect. He uses shaky pencil-like lines with bright colors to give the characters a sense of life. His talent shines when highlighting the familial resemblance of Mamadou with Adjoua’s baby. There is no doubt in the reader’s or characters’ mind that they are related. It is not limited there, all of the characters pop and feel like people with idiosyncrasies and hopes and dreams.

Unfortunately most of the idiosyncrasies of the men involve them being disingenuous, conniving or unfaithful to others. Other than Hervé, who is portrayed as a rather simple person, all of the men are portrayed rather negatively. This doesn’t feel like it negates the “truth” of the story, though it is something to consider while evaluating it.

Given that it is a human centric story and that it focuses primarily on the lives of young people, Aya of Yop City is high school age appropriate. The story tackles very real subjects (teen pregnancy and relationships both romantic and familial) in a thoughtful and humorous way. In addition it depicts Africa and the Ivory Coast in a time and place (stability) that few stories, who make it over to the Western Hemisphere, do. This makes it an important comic and one that should be widely read.

Aya, vol. 2: Aya of Yop City
by Marguerite Abouet
Art by Clement Oubrerie
ISBN: 9781897299418
Drawn and Quarterly, 2008