The Heart That Fed

April 1, 2024
A writer and illustrator explores his veteran father's life and the bond the Vietnam War created between them. From an early age, stories from the war formed a significant part of the relationship between Sciacchitano and his father, David. Hungry for context to understand those stories, the author immersed himself in Vietnam books and war documentaries throughout his youth. Eventually, all that material, along with his father's letters, photographs, and written remembrances, became Sciacchitano's inspiration for this graphic memoir and biography. Weaving images and stories from past and near present, the author creates a meticulously crafted narrative--illustrated with evocatively nostalgic black-and-white or sepia-colored pencil images--about a war that psychologically devastated his father and also helped define their relationship. In 1965, David joined the Air Force as a mechanic, hoping to settle into a "comfortable enlistment before the draft board came knocking." Rather than remain stateside, however, he volunteered for a post in Vietnam where he eventually trained as a part-time soldier. His tour of duty included involvement in the deadly Tet Offensive and later--as a State Department employee--the U.S. evacuation of Saigon. The brutality of that war and its aftermath left David with a case of PTSD that his son brilliantly evokes by juxtaposing searing battle images with those of postwar activities, such as visiting the Vietnam War Memorial or going to a fireworks show. What makes this book an especially satisfying read is Sciacchitano's compassion for his father's guilt for taking part in an unjust war ("We made big mistakes. A lot of people died. It was all pointless. All politicians. Now it's like it never happened") and support of David's struggle to come to terms with being as much a broken "son of war" as his former enemies. A powerful and quietly poignant memoir and tribute.

COPYRIGHT(2024) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

May 15, 2024
Sciacchitano's powerful memoir explores how his father's unresolved PTSD impacts their relationship. Carl grew up well versed in the Vietnam war stories of his father, David, but did not connect the angry outbursts--such as at a fireworks celebration--to David's 18-month deployment. As an adult, Carl seeks to understand why. A naive college dropout, David enlists in the Air Force to avoid the draft and, he hopes, Vietnam. Instead, David is stationed at Quảng Tri as an aircraft mechanic, where he witnesses such cruelty and dehumanization that he questions the war's purpose. A 21-page sequence contrasts David's sepia-colored present with the black-and-white past as he observes two events off-panel. First, an uneasy outing at the shooting range turns to panic when David watches a young Carl run toward the line of fire. David simultaneously flashes back to the confusion and fear he experiences defending the base at the Tet Offensive. The delayed response in both events highlights David's psychological trauma. The portrait that emerges of David is compassionate and sympathetic, moving father and son toward forgiveness and reconciliation.

COPYRIGHT(2024) Booklist, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

Starred review from May 27, 2024
In this potent graphic novel, cartoonist Sciacchitano (The Army of Dr. Moreau) unpacks his father’s war stories. After signing up for the Air Force in 1965, college dropout David Sciacchitano was sent to Vietnam, where he witnessed enough horrors—Viet Cong prisoners left to die in the sun, U.S. advisers tortured and executed—to cause nightmares that he half-jokes are so constant “you almost miss them when they don’t show up.” Sciacchitano takes an open, curious approach to digging into the origins of his father’s rage, which his dad insists is not PTSD (“Enough of this Oliver Stone shit,” David snaps at Carl’s mother). Unlike many children of Vietnam veterans, Sciacchitano heard plenty (“It’s hard to remember a weekend with my dad that didn’t revolve around bowls of pho and war stories,” he writes), but the narrative is still structured as an investigation, with Sciacchitano interviewing David, conducting research, and reconstructing his father’s memories. Subtly sketched, with pops of emotive rawness in dialogue and evocative drawings, the book elegantly braids David’s professional arc (military, Foreign Service, war victims’ NGO work) with his psychological journey. The result is a complex and empathetic portrait of war and its consequences. Agent: Anjali Singh, Anjali Singh Agency.