The more I read comics, the more I appreciate comics like this. The first comic I read back in 1998 or so was Miller's Dark Knight Returns. The second was Moore's Watchmen. Since then I've read me a lot of superhero comics. Some of them are really fine. I enjoy the hell out of a good batman story, and Whedon's X-men was some damn fine storytelling. But comics like this one and Blankets are an entirely different sort of story. They're stories about regular people living their lives, and I love se...

Emotional and Accessible - 5 Stars I don't read many comics or graphic novels in any given year. From time to time, one looks interesting enough to pick up and read through. Being that this is set where I live and grew up, the story was especially significant.There are several stories in the work told from the perspective of three main characters. Essex County is the major connection between the stories. The setting is developed to the point that it becomes a character and he uses several plot

This book broke me. And then it fixed me.With Jeff Lemire’s name and bright cover art, I was expecting something heart-warming. It was warm, in fact too warm that it managed to melt my heart a little bit.Like the title says, it is the story of Essex County, an agrarian Hockey town, of its people and their lives spanning over generations. There are three separate stories that subtly segue between various characters and time periods. There is a prevailing sense of loneliness and longing in every c...

I'm so sorry. I know this is a beloved graphic novel, but I just didn't like it at all.Maybe it's because I don't understand the deeper meaning behind sports (hockey, in this case), or maybe because I'm not Canadian, or possibly it's because my crusty heart looks like a shriveled up chunk of beef jerky?But I was expecting to feel something when I closed Essex County.And I did. Just not anything that gave me the warm & fuzzies or made my eyes glisten with tears.I felt like I had wasted my time wi...

#Read-EH-Thon Book #1Essex County was the first book that I decided to pick up as part of Read-EH-Thon, a read-a-thon in which you are tasked to read books by Canadian authors! I have had this book sitting on my shelf for way too long now and I'm so glad I was able to finally pick it up. So many people told me how amazing it was, including the man who sold it to me at Fan Expo Canada a couple years back! It definitely lived up to the expectations! This story is told in three major parts, each fe...

Such an incredible and beautiful book. It's hard to describe or even discuss for me for some reason, but I wholeheartedly recommend it.

This book collects together what I think is one of the greatest achievements in comics in the last 10 years, Jeff Lemire's Essex County stories. Essex County is a part of Ontario, Canada, and the three books collected here - Tales from the Farm, Ghost Stories, and The Country Nurse - explores the area and it's inhabitants. Tales from the Farm follows a lonely boy called who has recently lost his mother, never knew his father, and is in the care of his uncle. The two have an awkward relationship

I’m rereading this for my Canadian comics class and I’m reminded, yet again, of what a masterpiece it is. This intergenerational story of life on a rural Ontario farm — and the dreams, be they of hockey or of superheroes, that sustain those lives — is moving and heartbreaking. Lemire’s art style is deceptive: what looks rushed and sketched belies an incredible depth of emotion (you will never, ever forget the eyes in this comic). I have no problem labelling this The Great Canadian Graphic Novel

This is Lemire's magnum opus. Love, heartbreak, loneliness, regret, friendship, family. The human condition pressed into one rural Canadian county. It's absolutely beautiful. And I read it in two hours.What I love about Essex County is its ethereal bending of reality, the way memory or imagination can be true but also false. The way Lester can fly, or Lou can travel through time. The ethereal, the way these characters' stories are intricately tied together like a Faulkner story, as well as the s...

book #14 for Jugs & Capes! book #13 for my review series at CCLaP!Check out how cool Canada is: While we’re drooling over Real Housewives of Who the Fuck Cares, they’re watching a show called Canada Reads, where five famous people each pick a book and defend it, and then they all vote one book off each day, winding up with one winner, the book that “all of Canada should read.” That is fucking rad. I learned about that only because Essex County was in this year’s running—the first graphic novel t...

Okay read. Kinda semi-biographical maybe? About living in Essex county that is in the Ontario province of Canada. My guess is that Canadian readers rated this high.

I almost finished this in one night and I could probably read it again; it's that good, with that much depth: literary fiction at its best. It's hard to say which of the three books collected here was my favorite, though the middle one, "Ghost Stories," the tale of two hockey-playing brothers from youth to their estrangement to old age probably elicited the most emotion from me. Within about ten pages I'd felt for the young boy and the old man whose paths cross in the snow, almost teared up at a...

3,75/5Even if I didn’t feel a strong personal connection with these stories, I can appreciate their value. The Essex County feels like an intimate work , even more because it’s written and illustrated by the same person and because it is, above everything else, a Canadian story ( Lemire being Canadian). The art style is interesting - simple yet complex - and I have to admit it took me some time to get used to it. But those black and white drawings , especially the crow and those closeups of the

Essex County (2011) is a collection of three linked graphic short stories set in Essex County, Ontario by Jeff Lemire. The three short stories are published separately as "Tales from the Farm (2008)," "Ghost Stories (2008)," and "The Country Nurse (2009)," but make sense as a graphic novel. Two other shorter stories titled "The Essex County Boxing Club" and "The Sad and Lonely Life of Eddie Elephant Ears" are also included in the collection, and they are part of the world, but not directly part

wow! So much of life, heart and depth...Jeff Lemire's Essex County is more like a bunch of sketches when compared to all these other modern colorful graphic novels. But, from a value perspective, Essex County has so much of depth, meaning, heart and emotion, which most of these colorful and bright graphic novels do not exhibit even at a minimum level. This trilogy of graphic novels is a must-read. Essex County can be considered as an example of a meaningful and influential graphic novel. The cha...

This is kind of story Lemire excels at. Slow, atmospheric and with carefully dosed pathos.Couple of reasons why I'm not giving it 5 stars.First, I didn't care much illustrations. They are really basic and characters where hard to differentiate at times. I did like color pallet though.Second, last story isn't on par with first two. It's still good but definitively weak link in this series.And third, this is personal story and I think it would have greater impact if I grew in similar environment,

4.0 StarsThis was a wonderful graphic novel, which perfectly captured life in rural Canada. I'm not sure if I would have connected with this book as much as I did if I wasn't a Canadian. Of the stories, the first was my favourite and alone would have gotten 5 stars. I loved the unlikely friendship between Lester and Jimmy. The other stories were still well written, but didn't affect me on the same emotional level. The art was a little simplistic and rough for my tastes, but it grew on me through...

Astonishing is the word that fits to the review of it.It was beautiful. Poignant narration. The pictures are heart-breaking. They will stay in your mind for a long time.Such strong impact they will have.Do read this comic series when you find time.

A collection of three graphic short stories set in Essex County, Ontario. Also, a terrific read. It's one of the best graphic novels I've ever read.

I so expected this to be one of my favorite graphic novels of all time. A deep, emotional, powerful story + Jeff Lemire's writing + Dark and twisted art. But...What I liked: The three separate stories made it fresh to go through a 500+ page book. I also liked some of the imagery. Dark and lost, deep and sad, you really felt the emotion from the characters. I also liked how the lives all intertwined with each of them. The ending result was also sweet, bitter, and left unfinished but not in a bad