I’m never entirely certain how to review graphic novels and I tend to stray away from graphic novels and comics in reviews. Those are apparently just my recreational reading. Yet, I wanted to discuss M is for Monster by Talia Dutton in part because it is her first graphic novel and I think it ought to be celebrated and promoted.

An extended metaphor for accepting identity, a scientist attempts to bring her sister back to life following an accident, yet is repeatedly and vocally disappointed by the results; this causing her new creature to mask and question who she is in a world where she is not the person that everyone tells her to be. 

The art is comfy, possibly a strange description, but for a story which is Frankenstein-inspired some people might assume gore or graphic art. I find Dutton’s work to be beautiful and tasteful, as well as in line with a lot of other queer content I’ve seen that takes uncomfortable topics and twists them into elegant metaphor.