Anya's Ghost

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Heel Realization: Anya slowly comes to realize she's been a Jerkass to Emily when, after knowing Emily for two days and having her help with school and her crush, she doesn't even know her name yet. Much later, after Sean, and then Emily, shows their true colors, Anya realizes what a jerk she's been to everyone else too because of her poor attitude. This finishes out in the climax, where she at first denies being anything like Emily before admitting that, while she's not murderous, she's at least enough like Emily to understand her. Gender-Blender Name: Sasha, Anya's little brother. Their family is Russian, where "Sasha" is usually a short form of "Alexander". Clingy Jealous Girl: Emily was this when she was alive. It's not clarified if she was even dating the boy that she murdered, but seeing him with another girl led her to kill them both. She also becomes clingy towards Anya in a platonic sense. I'm not feeling very eloquent today, so I thought I'd post a transcript of how I sounded as I read Anya's Ghost: Weight Woe: Despite not being particularly overweight and even considered pretty by some characters, Anya sees herself as fat and refuses to eat her mother's homemade cheese dumplings because they're too greasy, even though she loved them when she was a little girl. Some of her dialogue implies that this is the result of being bullied as a child, as well as the elders at her church telling her she's too fat "while their ankles are spilling over their orthopedic shoes."

a b Ceceri, Kathy (May 31, 2011). "Review: Anya's Ghost". Wired. San Francisco: Condé Nast. ISSN 1059-1028. OCLC 24479723. Archived from the original on March 6, 2016 . Retrieved August 8, 2017. Dima, a little Russian boy whose family is friends with Anya's mother, was always friendly with Anya and appears to think they're friends. In fact, Anya hates him and tries to ignore him, believing he deserves to be bullied for being a "fobby creep". Later in the story, when Anya realizes how unfair and judgmental she has been, she starts to be nicer to Dima. She opens up to him on how she was also bullied as a child, telling him not to worry about impressing his schoolmates because being popular isn't really that important. Expository Hairstyle Change: Emily learns to flatten her hair to create a more modern look, showing how she's becoming stronger in what she can do as a ghost and how her relationship with Anya is changing.One-Winged Angel: A mild form of this at the climax, when Emily hauls her bones up from the well in a last-ditch attempt to kill Anya. She looks like a ghostly silhouette with a tangible skeleton underneath. Tampering with Food and Drink: With her growing strength, Emily puts rat poison in the dinner Anya's mother was cooking. Anya saves them by "accidentally" dropping the food. A girl who falls down a well and becomes a ghost. Sounds familiar. The reference is made pretty explicit when at the end, Emily claws her way up the well and crawls out of it, head slumped downwards. Its revealed that Emily also played this trope straight. She burnt down the house of the boy she liked while he and his girlfriend, were inside. All because he rejected her feelings for him. Anya's Ghost took four years from inception to publication, and is drawn predominantly in hues of violet. Well received by critics, Anya's Ghost is the recipient of Cyblis, Harvey, and Eisner awards. Production on a film adaptation of the novel was supposed to begin by the end of 2017.

As I mentioned, it's the Friday of a three day weekend so I'll keep this short, but Anya's Ghost is a real keeper. Brosgol deftly accomplishes so much in so little space. There is an economy of text but an abundance of meaning. The message is wonderful. The illustrations are engaging. The heroine is spectacular. The more I learned about Anya the more I celebrated the differences she despised. I really enjoyed and highly recommend this book.

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Hollywood Pudgy: Invoked: Anya is of average weight, but diets stubbornly and sees herself as obese, with one panel having her picture herself as much heavier than she really is when she looks in the mirror. Creepy Gym Coach: Anya hates doing the bleep test because she thinks the male gym teacher "just likes seeing [the girls] run around in those stupid skirts."