Ninety Candlesby Suzette ChanReviews may contain information that could be considered 'spoilers'. Readers should proceed at their own risk. Publisher
Credits Grade: 7 Neil Kleid's Ninety Candles began as an improvisational exercise. Kleid drew a panel a day representing one year in the life of his everyperson protagonist, Kevin Hall. There was no script, no storyboard, just the spontaneous pursuit of the story itself.The book is half-page sized, opening lengthwise, like a book of postcards. Reinforcing the spectatorial aspect of the story, each page has two round panels, as if we are looking at Kevin's life through a lens. The one-colour book is printed in green ink, which offers opportunites for interesting shades of lightness, but Kleid's tendency to lay heavy crosshatching on the backgrounds often produces muddy results. The characters are round, malleable and wide-eyed, distant cousins to the children in Peanuts, and suitably so; Kevin begins as an unformed innocent, and his experiences shape his character to become quite different than the motivated dreamer he was as a child. We follow Kevin's developmental years from an uneventful gestation (that's in Year 0), to amusingly archetypal childhood curiosity (Year 2 Kevin chomps down on writing implements while the caption below reads: "Ned! Get those pencils out of his mouth!"), to experiences more familiar to comic readers (by Year 8, "He's locked away with that box of comic books you found!"). Kevin's childhood obsession develops into a celebrated but not exactly lucrative mainstream comics career. Although few people in real life follow this particular career path, Kevin's struggles to establish himself in his chosen field, his efforts to balance work and home life, and his successes and disappointments will touch a chord with anyone who has faced these issues, no matter their line of work. However when Kevin encounters legal battles over a blockbuster movie he's involved in, the story ventures into rarified experience that begs for more than one panel a year to explain. Kleid made a practical — and bold — decision to never allow us to hear Kevin directly. All the captions are lines that Kevin hears, comments directed at him or spoken about him in his presence. The strategy works as a matter of practicality, as the story begins when Kevin is still a fetus and ends after Kevin’s death, two states in which he cannot vocalize. As a matter of literary import, Kevin increasingly becomes a spectator in his own life, while others provide the color commentary. Eventually, he stops expressing himself, even through his chosen medium, comics. The story rings with pathos, but it is by no means tragic. Kevin leaves behind two great creations: a legendary comic book and a legacy of a son and grandson. These creations take on a life of their own, and escape Kevin's narrative even though Kevin could not. Through these creations, Kevin's work and life become sources of inspiration. The rewards of creation may sometimes be immediate, like that those first comics Kevin drew for himself as a child, or they may be long in coming, blossoming in future generations. Written: November 25, 2004
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