Graphic Medicine Books on Chronic Illness
Mis(h)adra by
College student Isaac struggles to manage his epilepsy and his day-to-day life. His medication does not seem to work, the doctors won't listen, the schoolwork keeps piling up, his family is in denial about his condition, and his social life falls apart as he feels isolated by his illness. Even with an unexpected new friend by his side, so much is up against him that Isaac is starting to think his epilepsy might be unbeatable.
ISBN: 9781501162107Publication Date: 2017-10-03
The Infinite Wait and Other Stories by
Three autobiographical graphic novels. The stories in this collection contain Julia Wertz's signature acerbic wit, ribald humor, and keen eye for the everyday, but they also find the cartoonist delving more deeply into the personal. "Industry" catalogues 25 years of alternately terrible and terrific jobs. "A Strange and Curious Place" is a love letter to Wertz's hometown library. "The Infinite Wait,'" chronicles Wertz's move from her small hometown to San Francisco, her diagnosis with an incurable, auto-immune disease and her subsequent discovery of comics and comic making. Wertz details her struggles with Lupus a chronic disease that has 1.5 to 2 million patients in the United States alone. Wertz's honest portrayal of the disease and her diagnosis will appeal to those familiar with it, but also to anyone interested and inspired by an individual learning to deal with an illness and finding her life's work in the process.
ISBN: 9780987963024Publication Date: 2012-09-15
My Degeneration by
A narrative of the author's battle with Parkinson's disease. Traces the author's journey through depression, the disease symptoms, the medication and its side effects, the author's interactions with family, and the mental and physical changes caused by the disease.
ISBN: 9780271071022Publication Date: 2015-11-15
Epileptic by
David B. spent an idyllic early childhood in a small town near Orléans, France, but the family's life changed abruptly when his big brother Jean-Christophe was struck with epilepsy at age eleven. In search of a cure, their parents dragged the family to acupuncturists and magnetic therapists, to mediums and macrobiotic communes, but every new cure ended in disappointment. Angry at his brother for "abandoning" him and at all the quacks who offered them false hope, the author learned to cope by drawing fantastically elaborate battle scenes, creating images that provide a window into his interior life, as well as reliving his grandfathers' experiences in both World Wars through flashbacks. An honest and horrifying portrait of the disease and of the pain and fear it sowed in the family, this graphic autobiography is also a moving depiction of one family's intricate history.
ISBN: 9780375714689Publication Date: 2006-07-04
Parenthesis by
This graphic memoir narrates the author's experience with tumor-related epilepsy: losing herself, and finding herself again. Judith is barely out of her teens when a tumor begins pressing on her brain, ushering in a new world of seizures, memory gaps, and loss of self. Suddenly, the sentence of her normal life has been interrupted by the opening of a parenthesis that may never close. Based on the real experiences of cartoonist Élodie Durand, "Parenthesis" is a gripping testament of struggle, fragility, acceptance, and transformation.
ISBN: 9781603094818Publication Date: 2021-02-09
Pedro and Me by
In graphic format, this book describes the friendship between two roommates on the MTV show The Real World, one of whom died of AIDS"--Title page verso.
Told entirely in sequential art, here is the story of the life-changing friendship between the author, a cartoonist from Long Island, and Pedro Zamora, an HIV-positive AIDS activist, which was filmed day by day on MTV's Real World San Francisco. As a speaker and educator, a guest on many talk shows (including Oprah), and when his tragic death received front-page coverage in the press, Pedro taught a generation that AIDS was not a punishment for moral defects or a mere killer that reduced humans to wraiths. Rather, he showed how those afflicted with the disease could live and love nobly with intelligence, humor and great humanity. Judd Winick's compelling memoir allows each of us to experience the vitally important message Pedro brought us. Inspiring, moving, informative, and instantly accessible, Pedro and Me could become one of the books that defines a generation.
ISBN: 9780805089646Publication Date: 2009-03-31
Last Things by
After returning home from a year abroad, Marissa's husband, Harvey was diagnosed with ALS. The disease progressed quickly and Marissa was soon consumed with caring for Harvey while trying to keep life as normal as possible for their children. This is not a story about the redemptive power of terminal illness.
ISBN: 9781573246989Publication Date: 2017-05-01
My Begging Chart by
Keiler Roberts mines the passing moments of family life to deliver an affecting and funny account of what it means to simultaneously exist as a mother, daughter, wife, and artist. Drawn in an unassuming yet charming staccato that mimics the awkward rhythm of life, no one's foibles are left unspared, most often the author's own....Roberts can get lost in the rewarding melodrama of playing Barbies with her daughter and will momentarily snap out of her depression. Her harmless fibs to get through the moment are brought up by her daughter a year or two later, yet without hesitation Roberts will request that her daughter's imaginary friend not visit when she is around. Her MS diagnosis lingers in the background, never taking center stage.
ISBN: 9781770464582Publication Date: 2021-05-25
