Team Photograph

This book has a lot going on....maybe....too much going on?? I really liked the parts about the Civil War history and the idea of playing soccer on these former battlefields is really powerful, and the erasure poems from the news articles about the arson committed on the historic cabin owned by a free Black man and his formerly enslaved wife were gorgeous.

But, also in the graphic novel art...everyone is drawn as wolves? And I was like ok...it's a metaphor...the team is a pack...sure. And then because of like, Maus and also the way animal symbolism works, I was sort of expecting the historic Black figures to be depicted as another animal? But they were also wolves? And then at the very end of the book there's a text epilogue that explains that everyone is wolves because her dead brother's favorite animal was wolf. Which isn't really referenced anywhere inside the text? Like...if that's what your grief journey is maybe that should have just been for your journal or something???

I also didn't love the earlier poetry interspersed with the graphic novel, but I really liked the arson poetry. I think this could have been a dead brother grief book and then also a Civil War history book and that would have been 2 strong books instead of 1 like...very weird book.

It's possible that my third eye just isn't open wide enough for this.