Review: Essex County

[hockeyrules12]

I had a great time reading a graphic novel by the name Essex County which is a rural community in the province of Ontario. The characters that are displayed each shows a strong feeling of battling loneliness and loss. Starting with Lester who lives so deeply in his imagination wanting so bad to be a superhero, has you will see when revealed his love for comic books. The beginnings of this imagination stemmed from the loss of his mother who died from cancer and his father who he never knew. He went to live with his Uncle who was a farmer and tried so hard to give his nephew a sense of friendship and social longing . There is a character in the first book that Lester encounters at this creek which plays a very important role in the book you could label it has a sanctuary. You will see other patterns concerning locations in this small community of Essex County. The character that Lester encounters becomes someone you would least expect, both helping each other in their loneliness. The second book definitely pleases the crowd of hockey players and hockey fans alike. Two brothers from farm country take a chance in the big city of Toronto to make a career playing hockey. They were a vicious brother duo, making a huge impact. As you will see a pattern reappears, as an event changes the personality of the brothers tremendously especially the one. The one brother's girlfriend Beth comes to visit from Essex County and creates an attraction with the other brother he immediately fell in love. During a little get together after the game Beth's boyfriend fell asleep due to a little intoxication and gave an opportunity for the other brother especially when Beth gave an impression that she knew his desires. They went up on the roof during a cold evening and looked at each other deeply in the eyes and couldn't resist. As you will see later on the consequences of his action played a huge affect on the decline of his physical and mental state. Knowing that his brother loved this woman and that he saw a future made it even more difficult once he found out that she was pregnant. "The two best ways to find yourself alone is in a crowd and in total isolation", as i mentioned the mental state became very difficult for the one brother as he had to keep this a secret. "Routine is a great way to battle loneliness", you see a lot of this in this chapter. You will see the numerous characters throughout the book as part of an Essex County family tree and a very signature symbol throughout this novel is a blackbird (a crow) that seems to resemble a watchman keeping an eye on these numerous characters bringing them together, the soul of Essex County. Due to the characters failure of discovering their place where they wanted to be they chose to pursue their struggles by returning to their roots, "Home".