AUTHOR: Sophia Glock
PUBLISHER: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
RELEASE DATE: November 30th, 2021
GENRES: Young Adult Graphic Novel Memoir
Thank you TBR and Beyond Tour and Little, Brown Books for Young Readers for a review copy and the opportunity to be on this tour!
Where to Buy: Amazon | Barnes and Noble | Book Depository | Indigo | IndieBound
Synopsis
An unforgettable graphic memoir by debut talent Sophia Glock reveals her discovery as a teenager that her parents are agents working for the CIA
Young Sophia has lived in so many different countries, she can barely keep count. Stationed now with her family in Central America because of her parents’ work, Sophia feels displaced as an American living abroad, when she has hardly spent any of her life in America.
Everything changes when she reads a letter she was never meant to see and uncovers her parents’ secret. They are not who they say they are. They are working for the CIA. As Sophia tries to make sense of this news, and the web of lies surrounding her, she begins to question everything. The impact that this has on Sophia’s emerging sense of self and understanding of the world makes for a page-turning exploration of lies and double lives.
In the hands of this extraordinary graphic storyteller, this astonishing true story bursts to life.
Review
Passport was a good read but felt a bit rushed. I initially had some difficulty rating it because it was a memoir. While I enjoyed reading about Sophia’s journey to feeling like she belonged, towards the end, I felt there was a gap that made the ending a bit choppy. Passport follows Sophia, a young girl who was born American but has never really lived there or any country long enough to call home because of the nature of her parent’s career. Sophia is often kept in the dark of what that secret is but as she gets older and questions more, eventually gets more insight form her parents.
Passport is a quick read and a pretty good coming of age story. I really enjoyed how the author depicted a turbulent teenage life. She showed Sophia [herself] trying to fit in while still trying to maintain the good daughter her parents want her to be. As she gets older, she craves more for that independence and acceptance. Sophia’s somewhat strained relationship with her sister was something I wish had a bit more backstory for. My assumption was that the sister knew about her parents and wanted to leave out of that lifestyle the minute she had the chance. I was happy to see that their relationship was growing a bit once her sister came to visit. Sophia as a character was okay. She was a teenager navigating a place still very foreign to her even though she’d lived there for years but managed to still create some friendships and have an average high school experience.
Overall, if you are a fan of Persepolis or enjoy a memoir that is a quick read, you will enjoy this memoir. It was a quick, light but enjoyable read with a unique color scheme that worked well with the tone of the story.
About The Author
Sophia Glock is a cartoonist who lives in Austin, TX. Her graphic memoir,Passport, is on sale 11/2/2021 from Little Brown Young Readers. It is available for pre-order here.
Sophia’s comics and cartoons have been published in The New Yorker, Buzzfeed, Narratively, MUTHA Magazine, and Time Out New York. Her work has also been featured in various anthologies including, Ink Brick, Suspect Device, Quarter Moon, DIGESTATE, Rabid Rabbit, and Kilgore Quarterly. Her collection of comics Born, Not Raised was selected to be included in The Society of Illustrators Cartoon and Comics Art Annual 2016 and her short comic The Secrets in My Mother’s Nightstand was shortlisted for The Cartoonist Studio Prize for Best Web Comic of the Year in 2016.
In 2008 she was a recipient of a Xeric Foundation Grant for her comic, The Deformitory. She is also the author of The Lettuce Girl, SemiSolid, Over Ripe and Passport: Fig. You can pick up her mini comics at indie-friendly stores across the country, or from Bird Cage Bottom Books.
Author Links: Website | Instagram | Goodreads | Facebook | Tumblr
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