Initially, I was excited to read an emotionally moving account of life in the NICU. Unfortunately, I was disappointed. The overall writing style and illustrations were quite dull. I just couldn’t get into it enough to emotionally connect, nor stay focused to read it. That was before getting to p. 74 when I felt shocked/confused about the "I love their fat little vaginas!" line. That little creeper appeared out of nowhere. Then there was p. 75. This just made me angry as an Autistic person. The anti-vaccine conspiracy about ASDs is scientifically unfounded. Its ignorant and dangerous, not to mention highly offensive to those of us actually on the spectrum. Maybe it’s hard for the author to understand but comparing someone's brain to "brain damage" and "diseases" is beyond insensitive. Further, it just plain inaccurate/wrong. And, saying that you don't want to vaccinate to prevent Autism, which vaccines don't even cause, sounds to an Autistic person like you are saying you hate them, their neurology, and their community so much you would rather your child suffer or even die from a preventable illness just so that your child wouldn't be like them. We deal with these and other harmful stereotypes and stigma every single day. Unfortunately, this one is now costing people, children, their lives. I had to stop and calm myself to the point where my anger was more annoyance to even continue the book. Though, it did create an emotional response. The rest of the book was much like the first part, un-intriguing. Also, in case the author cares Allah is just the Arabic word for God (literally ‘the God’ though in English instead of a definite article we just capitalize the G)) and Muslims worship the same God as Jews and Christians. It’s not a different deity. I can't really recommend it to anyone (even to my friends and family with connections to a NICU). On the positive side, Spoiler alert, I’m glad Asa is doing well.

This graphic novel / memoir tells the author's story of childbirth, complications, and an unexpected 5 months in the NICU in a Canadian hospital with her daughter Asa. The story is told frankly and emotionally, and Jaeckel doesn't sugarcoat her feelings of depression, exhaustion, and worry. There are also sparks of joy in this rough period, and those aren't ignored either. The drawings are done Maus-style, with animals representing the people. While some panels are really expressive and evocative, I found the drawings overall to be overwhelmed by the text and not as integrated as they could be. Jaeckel is very much writing in her own voice here, and the narrative has an honest, but unedited quality to it that wasn't always successful. I also could not get over her anti-vaccination stance, but that may not bother every reader as much as it did me. This book gives us a detailed look into a world that isn't often explored, and while the style didn't always work for me, it was still a worthwhile read. ( )

This didn't really work for me. It's not strong as a graphic novel and even though I felt sympathy for the family, the whole thing felt weak. I don't recommend it. ( )

I won an Advance Review Copy through a Goodreads Giveaway.

I really feel bad about the suffering endured by Jaeckel's daughter and the stress it put on her and her family. That said, I really didn't like the execution of this graphic novel because it wasn't really a graphic novel, it was more like a poorly illustrated text piece. Captions overwhelm the pages. Dialogue balloons were used on maybe three pages, and the rest of the time the reader is subjected to giant boxes of text. Layouts of the pages (and those few uses of word balloons) are sometimes poor, leading to confusion as to what should be read next. Most panels are devoid of backgrounds or feature one crude inanimate object and one or two characters, leaving us with a lot of mice floating in space. And the few poor attempts at full backgrounds show why Jaeckel avoids them whenever possible. The author chose to hide the identity of real people by replacing their names with distractingly stupid aliases like Nurse Chuckles, Doctor Eyes and Nurse Gentlediaper. And don't get me started on the big, black rabbit of depression. Again, I understand why Jaeckel wants to share her story, and I was interested in it, but it was a real chore for me to read it in this format. ( )

Having worked in healthcare, I winced when the author first mentions that she had midwives. Another comments she makes about vaccines causing autism are not even based on medical fact. The story is of her traumatic experience with having a baby in neonatal care for an birth defect that the child may not recover from. I did not enjoy the story, or reading about her mentally unwinding during the experience. If you are going through a traumatic medical experience, sharing the details of that experience is imposing trauma on your readers. The graphic novel format doesn't work for the story either. It may have worked if this was journalism like Joe Sacco's books, but it is told from the mothers point of view which is not objective at all. ( )