Yummy

Review
By En/Sane World

Excellently illustrated in expressionistic, streaky-when-necessary inks by Randy DuBurke, this graphic novel enrages and saddens. . . . Yummy the victim; Yummy the victimizer: meet an 11 year old stone-cold killer and recoil when thinking about how he was one of hundreds of youngsters still doing the dirty work for America’s gangs. Wonder what it would take to offer these “shorties” a better alternative and gag yourself on the acidy realization that whatever that is, it might not ever be offered or accepted. The novel leaves one with a burning rage to retroactively make things right in Roger’s world and a gnawing frustration that Yummy’s life and neighborhood might have been too far gone for even the smallest bit of help to have mattered. . . . The ethical tensions in this text do not easily resolve. Yummy is a worthwhile read for all adolescents, with adult facilitation highly recommended. It may be especially poignant for those young people who have to make excruciating decisions at young ages regarding their safety and status in neighborhoods when it comes to gang life or the much less known and less comfortable something else. It is not a fun read. But, perhaps it should be a required read. . . . Yummy grabs at your chest with barbed-wired fingernails and won’t let you go easily. The more you thrash, the more it has got you. —En/Sane World