Pizzeria Kamikaze

Back in 2001, Israeli writer Keret's collection "The Bus Driver Who Wanted to be God and Other Stories" was one of my favorite books of the year. So, I was psyched to see that he'd taken one of its stories ("Kneller's Happy Campers") and hooked up with well-known NY-based illustrator Tomer Hanuka to create a graphic novel. The story originally ran in segments in Hanuka's comic book, Bipolar, and here gets a really nice square format treatment in rich black and metallic silver ink on a lovely paper stock.

The story opens from the bottom of a grave, as protagonist Mordy informs us that he committed suicide. Immediately thereafter we learn that he is now "living" in a kind of afterlife inhabited solely by those who have killed themselves. It's very much like the "real" world, only most people walk around scarred by the manner in which they killed themselves (for example his sidekick sports a large bullet hole in his forehead). The exception are "Juliets" -- those who used methods such as poison or ODing, that left them unmarked. In any event, 20something Mordy leads a slackerish afterlife, holding down a crummy job at a pizzeria, and going to the same bars every night and never meeting anyone he connects with. The problem is that he pines after his presumably still living ex-girlfriend, who was ostensibly the reason for his suicide.

About a third of the way into the story, he learns that she also killed herself, and so he drags his pal Uzi off on a quest to find her. They drive out into the countryside, pick up a gorgeous hitchhiker, and end up at a weird kind of kibbutzish place where people can perform little miracles. The plot gets even more surreal after that, and sort of disolves into nothing. The problem is that while there are flashes of bizarre brilliance here and there (including a cameo by Kurt Cobain in which everyone finds him annoying), people who commit suicide are essentially unsympathetic narcissistic characters. It's pretty much impossible to care very much about Mordy or his quest, and so while Hanuka's art is top-notch, one can't help but wish for a better story. In many ways it's the kind of story that probably actually works better in its original prose form, where the reader's imagination is left with a little more leeway. Still, it's very nice as an artistic piece, for those who appreciate such things, and I will check out another of Keret's graphic adaptations, "Jetlag".

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Etgar Keret

Reader Reviews:

Beautiful Production Needs Better Narrative (5/5 people found this helpful)

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