Little White Duck
A Childhood in China

A graphic memoir for tweens (and perhaps somewhat younger children) by a wife and husband team, Na Liu and illustrator Andres Vera Martinez. Liu grew up in Hubei Province of China and helps me learn of a world I knew little about, from a child’s perspective. We learn of life in rural China after the......more

It's funny to think about, but the fact of the matter is that we're still in the early days of the graphic novel memoir for children. Adult graphic novel memoirs are capable of winning top literary awards, like the Pulitzer or the National Book Award. On the kid side of things the options are far mo......more

Little White Duck: A Childhood in China, by Na Liu (text) and her husband Andrés Vera Martínez (art), is a collection of seven vignettes, done graphic-novel style, from the author's childhood. She was born in 1973 in Wuhan, China. Eventually she came to the United States, and now she's a doctor of h......more

This is a really hard book to review. On the one hand the author is to be lauded for bringing her growing up to a wider and younger audience, on the other.... I know too many adult Chinese - perhaps of a generation older than her who suffered terribly under Mao. The saying "ren shi ren" arose in the......more