PERSEPOLIS 2 THE STORY OF A RETURN - Pantheon

In Persepolis, heralded by the Los Angeles Times as ?one of the freshest and most original memoris of our day,? Marjane Satrapi dazzled us with her heartrending memori-in-comic-strips about growing up in Iran during the Islamic Revolution. Here is the continuation of her fascinating story.

In 1984, Marjane flees fundamentalism and the war with Iraq to attend high school in Vienna, where she faces the trials of adolescence far from her friends and family. While she soon carves out a place for herself among a group of fellow outsiders, she continues to miss her friends and family. While she soon carves out a place for herself among a group of fellow outsiders, she continues to miss her home desperately. After graduation, Marjabe returns to Iran. Her difficult homecoming forces her to confront the changes both she and her country have undergone in her absence, and her shameat what she perceives as her failure in Austria. Life begins to look brighter once Marjane finds a group of like-minded friends, falls in love, and begins studying art at a university until the repression and state-sanctioned chauvinism lead her to question whether she can have a future in Iran.

As funny and poignant as its predecessor, Persepolis 2 is another clear-eyed and searing condemnation of the human cost of fundamentalism. In its depiction of the struggles of growing up ? here compounded by Marjane's status as an outsider both abroad and at home ? it's raw, honest and incredibly illuminating.