Sneha Jaiswal (Twitter | Instagram)
Tall girls have it tough. Especially Anna 2, because she is taller than her town’s church, and her “right kinda tall” mother isn’t very kind about it. So Anna 2 passes on the generational trauma to Anna 3, and the women keep fighting the same demons: shorties who think they run the world.
This graphic novel by Mia Oberländer was funny, weird, and, since I’m a short person who’d probably only come up to Anna’s ankles, very unrelatable! I actually stumbled upon it while looking for German books to read in the Goethe-Institut’s online library for students (yes, I am trying to learn German) and was surprised to discover, after borrowing it, that it was in English, which meant I was also a little relieved.
Set in the fictional town of Bad Hohenheim, which roughly translates to “bath high-home,” the title feels like a bit of wordplay in English, because you could read it as being “bad” to have a tall body. Because, you know, our body is our home after all. But the Annas are made to feel alien in their hometown, standing out wherever they go, unable to ‘fit in’.
Creator Mia Oberländer humorously captures the lives of three women across generations, often comically exaggerating their bodies to illustrate their struggles in a town that simply cannot handle women being taller than the average resident. The cons far outweigh the pros of being able to reach things on the top shelf or simply having a better view.
The artwork in the graphic novel is very simple, and some of the panels look like they could’ve been drawn in MS Paint. Mia Oberländer’s style sometimes feels like a more stripped-down version of Daniel Clowes’ work (‘Ghost World’, ‘Monica‘, ‘Patience‘), which I mean as a compliment, because Clowes’ graphic novels and comics are a wild trip of their own.
And despite the simplistic illustrations, the artist uses surreal, whimsical and metaphorical imagery throughout the book to keep things interesting. For instance, during the climactic pages, when one of the characters finally allows herself to vent her feelings and have an emotional outburst, the graphic novel hilariously likens it to a dormant volcano erupting. Yes, not very subtle, but pretty funny.
In the end, this is an odd but entertaining look at the challenges of being different from the rest of the world and how generational trauma gets passed down. While the ending feels very abrupt, it wraps things up on an exaggerated but happy note… at least for one of the Annas.
Rating: 3.5 on 5 stars.
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