Roughneck

Starred review from April 17, 2017
Lemire (Essex County) dives into the murkiest depths of addiction, abuse, and family trauma in this heartbreaking volume. Derek Ouellette’s glory days in the NHL are far behind—now, he’s known mostly for alcoholism, public urination, and bar fights. When his younger sister, Beth, arrives in town, addicted to Oxycontin and fleeing an abusive boyfriend, he finds he can no longer hide at the bottom of a bottle. The siblings take to the wilderness, in search of sobriety, solitude, and, possibly, a second chance. This is well-worn territory, even within Lemire’s oeuvre, but powerful nonetheless. Derek and Beth are trapped within the vicious cycle of abuse and addiction that plague so many like them—poor, First Nations, rural—but Lemire handles their struggles with grace and uncommon feeling. Every craggy furrow in Derek’s face, every wayward hair escaping Beth’s braids are imbued with thoughtfulness. It is a pleasure to watch Lemire explore the emotional landscape of lives many prefer to forget—and to demonstrate anew how valuable they are.

May 15, 2017
Even as a professional hockey player, Derek Ouelette was just a self-described thug. Now years past his peak, he washes dishes, gets drunk, and beats people up around Pimitamon, the worn-out Canadian town he grew up in. One day, though, his sister arrives, running from an OxyContin addiction and an abusive boyfriend. With Derek in hot water himself, the two retreat to the frozen forests up north. There may never have been a cartoonist whose art reflects his themes and narrative tone so flawlessly as Lemire's. His characters hunker under an ineffable weight, lines of a hard-lived life carved into their faces like scars, and even his landscapes seem afflicted with a weary anxiety. Nevertheless, there's beauty here, too, exemplified by an astonishing splash page where the vapor of his characters' breath mingles with the steam lifting from a recently hunted moose. Atypically, Lemire ends things hopefully and, while the sister's confrontation with an abusive father feels more authentic than Derek's showdown with the ex-boyfriend, the story overall offers tremendous emotional satisfaction.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2017, American Library Association.)

November 1, 2016

Comic books master Lemire here tips his hand as a New York Times best-selling and award-winning writer/artist of such literary graphic novels as Essex County. Derek Ouellette bemoans an ice hockey career lost to violence, wasting his life in drinking and fighting until sister Beth reappears, on the run from an abusive boyfriend.

Copyright 2016 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

June 1, 2017

Derek Ouellete is a disgraced former professional hockey player reduced to working in a diner and living above a skating rink in the remote northern Canadian town where he grew up. He's an alcoholic with a vicious temper and no hope for the future until his long-lost sister, Beth, suddenly reappears in his life. Suffering from an opioid addiction and on the run from a dangerous ex-boyfriend, Beth needs Derek at his best, but is he capable of letting go of old wounds in time to be her savior? Award-winning author/illustrator Lemire (Essex County; Black Hammer) exhibits deep empathy for his characters, a keen understanding of difficult family dynamics, and an eye for the way that moments of grace can emerge in the midst of brutality. Full-color flashback sequences interrupt the main story, which is presented in washes of black and blue that highlight the sad state of the characters' lives as well as the barren Canadian wilderness. VERDICT Prolific creator Lemire has written many superhero, sf, and slice-of-life stories, but this might be his most mature and accomplished work yet.--TB

Copyright 2017 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.