Becoming Unbecoming
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4.8 • 5 Ratings
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- $16.99
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- $16.99
Publisher Description
This extraordinary graphic novel is a powerful denunciation of sexual violence against women. As seen through the eyes of a twelve-year-old girl named Una, it takes place in northern England in 1977, as the Yorkshire Ripper, a serial killer of prostitutes, is on the loose and creating panic among the townspeople. As the police struggle in their clumsy attempts to find the killer, and the headlines in the local paper become more urgent, a once self-confident Una teaches herself to "lower her gaze" in order to deflect attention from boys.
After she is "slut-shamed" at school for having birth control pills, Una herself is the subject of violent acts for which she comes to blame herself. But as the police finally catch up and identify the killer, Una grapples with the patterns of behavior that led her to believe she was to blame.
Becoming Unbecoming combines various styles, press clippings, photo-based illustrations, and splashes of color to convey Una's sense of confusion and rage, as well as sobering statistics on sexual violence against women. The book is a no-holds-barred indictment of sexual violence against women and the shame and blame of its victims that also celebrates the empowerment of those able to gain control over their selves and their bodies.
Una (a pseudonym) is an artist, academic, and comics creator. Becoming Unbecoming, which took seven years to create, is her first book. She lives in the United Kingdom.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
This challenging debut graphic novel is dense with facts, figures, and exposition, but the issues it explores sexual violence and the public response to it are what make it truly difficult to read. U.K. artist Una juxtaposes her own formative years with the hunt for the Yorkshire Ripper, who murdered over a dozen women in England in the late 1970s. And though the artist thankfully didn't meet such a grizzly fate, her own early encounters with male sexuality left an enduring mark, which she explores through a rich collage of drawing styles. The book is largely expositional, as Una digs deep into her memories, the words and images seemingly pouring out of her pen as she unflinchingly explores a nation's scramble to stop a serial killer and her emotional struggles with her own sexual abuse. It's as well crafted as it is difficult and an important document of the lingering effects of male violence against women.
