Pink Monsters

Herrmann makes his English-language debut with a tender coming-out story. Frank, a 14-year-old with a talent for drawing, lives with his sensible librarian mother, Sandra, and his severely depressed father, George. To help with George’s deteriorating mental condition, Sandra hires an alternative healer named Thea, whose arsenal of new age techniques are punctuated with Christian rhetoric. To purge the family of “negative energies,” she instructs each member to carry around their own crystal and avoid screen time (she sticks a rose quartz on the desktop computer). Meanwhile, Frank grapples with his same-sex attractions and feeling out of step at school. He finds he can curry favor with his classmates by drawing monsters—particularly for his crush, jock and jokester Michael. Thea discovers and disapproves of his art, implying that the monstrous images are impeding his father’s healing, and leads the family in a ritual of painting them over in pink. She then senses Frank’s queerness in “a dark premonition,” and tries to intervene. What she doesn’t count on is Frank’s strong sense of self—and the unwavering support of his mother. The storytelling is straightforward, while Herrmann’s fluid, softly sketched grey pencil character designs are dotted resonantly with spots of pink. This clear-eyed tale charms and empowers in equal measure. (May)