Steve Jobs

August 6, 2012
Unlike so many of the nation’s great innovative businessmen of the past (Edison, Ford), Steve Jobs’ wall of hagiography was barely left standing by the time of his death. At first, writer Quinn’s slim YA graphic biography of the technological visionary follows in much the same glowing and worshipful light that shone on Jobs during his feted career; one of Taval’s first full-page panels even shows Jobs reclining on a cloud (in heaven?) toying with an iPad. Once Quinn starts grinding through the details of Jobs’s initially scattershot and then almost frighteningly focused life, a darker view emerges that will be familiar to readers of Walter Isaacson’s biography. All of his bruising interpersonal habits (calling everyone in earshot “bozos,” indulging in temper tantrums and manipulative tears at the drop of a hat, abandoning his first child) are here. It’s the story of a snarky rebel who (in Taval’s bright and sketchy style) is always either sneering in disdain or gesticulating in excitement. The final period in Jobs’s life, when he introduced so many of his signature creations, passes quickly, but this is a decent brief sketch of a man whose frequent lack of humanity was almost as jaw-dropping as the intensity of his ambitions.

August 1, 2012
An unsparing yet also very human graphic depiction of Steve Jobs' life. It is no secret that Jobs was a hard case, but Quinn's work displays him in all his tempestuousness: as extreme and antagonistic as he was meticulous and inspired. Tayal's smartly paced, round-edged, clean panels convey the tension and urgency Jobs brought to his projects, his brash and abrasive exterior balanced by thought bubbles that reveal even rawer emotions and a drive that feels combustible. What is particularly effective here is the creation of the Apple world, one in which Jobs would be pivotal, but with other significant players, many of whom get the full-flesh treatment from Quinn, such as uber-geek Steve Wozniak and design whiz Jony Ive, and the business guys Mike Scott and John Sculley. Jobs' family is gradually brought into the fold, as are his fascinations with diet and Zen Buddhism and the unfortunate notion he held that he didn't have to bathe but once a week thanks to his mucusless eating habits. By the end of the story, it is clear where Jobs fit into the Apple picture, with all his imperfections amid the perfectionism. Jobs was a difficult character, but it was his very restlessness, which Quinn plays like a fiddle, that helped change how we live in the world. (Graphic novel. 10 & up)

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September 15, 2012

Everyone's favorite iGuy changed the world with Apple computers and their electronic relatives, and people growing up since the iPod (2001) can't imagine a world without such small, smart machines. This overview of Jobs's life and career itself resembles Apple products in its concise accessibility, showing how one person could envision what was possible but could also strip out the "unimportant stuff" to keep Apple products simple and accessible. And like Apple products, the drawings are slightly stylized and nicely designed. It's no fan polemic, though, and includes Jobs's bad temper, "reality distortion" problem that eventually led to his early death, checkered reputation as a father, and (yes) body odor. VERDICT Campfire's extensive line of all-age graphic novels began with adaptations of classic adventure stories and has expanded into quality biographies. This one will help show younger people how the devices as they know them came to be, created by a real, flawed, yet admirable human like themselves. It's also ideal for those not up to the 600-plus pages of Walter Isaacson's best-selling biography. See also The Zen of Steve Jobs (LJ 3/15/12).--M.C.

Copyright 2012 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

October 15, 2012
This cleverly designed volume provides a concise but well-balanced view of Steve Jobs the wunderkind, including his difficult personality and complex genius. Full-color panels provide flat but engaging images of Jobs from infancy to his introduction of the iPad, along with how his adoptive parents, birth parents, spouses and children, boyhood friends, coworkers, and business associates appear in essential physical detail, including postures, but without much facial expression. This design method seems effective here as it emphasizes Jobs' energetic but often misfired enthusiasms, bullying, and self-promotion, as well as his quieter moments of reflection and the effects his ideas had on industry developments. Tayal allows his own cultural perceptions of ethnicities to underscore Jobs' genetic makeup as the happily raised genius looks for his birth parents and learns how to be a better parent and partner himself. With its attention to both the personal and the public, this is an excellent starting place to find a concise overview of a complex man's influences and influence.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2012, American Library Association.)