Thursday Comic

Solanin - Inio Asano

Solanin is the story of a group of disaffected twenty-somethings muddling through life and practising for a band that never goes anywhere. Although they're always messing around, there's also an ever-present tension between their childhood dreams and the drudgery of adult life - something that's brought into stark relief when tragedy strikes.

This is hardly untrodden territory, but Asano has a keen eye for realism in his scripting and artwork, and his characters are both flawed and likeable. Above all what Asano gave this book that I loved was a real sense of place and ambience. I feel like I know what it would be like to hang out with these characters - although I suppose a big part of it might well be that I'm a twenty-something myself, also struggling to figure out how to mix the things you want to do and the things you need to...