D + Q announces three new books for Spring 2022

Drawn + Quarterly has revealed three titles they plan to release next Spring from Emma Grove, Rumi Hara and Travis Dandro.

First up is The Third Person by Grove, which is about a woman who may have Dissociative Identity Disorder. They also announced Hara’s The Peanutbutter Sisters and Other American Stories, a collection of stories that range from science fiction to slice of life. And finally, Dandro’s Hummingbird Heart is about a teenager who moves in with his dying grandmother after his father commits suicide.

You can find more details from the publisher on each of them below.

In the winter of 2004, a shy woman named Emma sits in Toby’s office. She wants to share this wonderful new book she’s reading, but Toby, her therapist, is concerned with other things. Emma is transgender, and has sought out Toby for approval for hormone replacement therapy. Emma has shown up at the therapy sessions as an outgoing, confident young woman named Katina, and a depressed, submissive workaholic named Ed. She has little or no memory of her actions when presenting as these other two people. And then Toby asks about her childhood…

As the story unfolds, we discover clues as to Emma’s troubled past and how and why these other two people may have come into existence. As Toby juggles treating three separate people, each with their own unique personalities and memories, he begins to wonder if Emma is merely acting out to get attention, or if she actually has Dissociative Identity Disorder. Is she just a troubled woman in need of help? And is “the third person” in her brain protecting her, or derailing her chances of ever finding peace?

The Third Person is a riveting memoir from newcomer Emma Grove. Drawn in thick, emotive lines, with the refined style of a comics vet, Grove has created a singular, gripping depiction of the intersection of identities and trauma. The Third Person is a testament to the importance of having the space to heal and live authentically.

The Peanutbutter Sisters is a glorious balance of contradictions, at once escapism and realism; science fiction and slice of life. Two students explore the urban landscape while following Newton Creek, the polluted Queens-Brooklyn border. As they do, they plan a traditional Japanese play with contemporary pop culture. Another story features an intergalactic race of all living things set in the year 2099 and is a dazzling treatise on the environment and journalism. Yet, sometimes the fantastical collides with the quotidian in the same story. A man struggling with vertigo during quarantine encounters a world of sexual revelry whenever he has a dizzy spell. The Peanutbutter sisters ride a hurricane into NYC and yet aren’t able to hitch a ride back with a whale due to a heavily polluted ocean.

Hara’s magical realist tendencies and diverse cast of characters all contort the tropes of the American comics canon. Yet above all else, her innate control of the comics language—her ability to weave the absurd with the real on such a charming and commanding level—is refreshingly unrivaled.

Still reeling from the death by suicide of his drug addicted father, Travis moves in with his grandmother to become her caretaker as she battles cancer. Meanwhile he tries to live a typical teen life of pulling pranks, occasional shoplifting, dating, and endless drives through the twisting backroads of Central Massachusetts with Nirvana’s Nevermind as the soundtrack. When the police intervene after a prank backfires, the boys realize that their time as children is rapidly disappearing and they may never fully understand each other as they move apart.

After his Lynd Ward Prize-winning graphic novel, King of King Court, explored the power that parents hold over their children’s emotional lives, Travis Dandro employs his signature dream imagery and crass humour to tell the story of teenage independence and resilience as he prepares to head off to art school.

Hummingbird Heart is a detailed and stylish account of a time of great uncertainty. Dandro’s densely crafted pages create a deeply emotional experience as his story swings from character confrontation to finely-wrought domestic detail—a slapstick cafeteria destroying brawl gives way to the beautifully rendered flight of the impossible hummingbird.