Decodependence

August 15, 2023
A cartoonist reflects on her struggles with codependency. Piecing together her life in cartoons and words, freelance cartoonist and regular New Yorker contributor Ash describes her mental health journey as a woman dealing repeatedly with codependency in romantic relationships. As the author shows, it can lead to being stuck in a cycle of abuse, and she does not sugarcoat issues such as depression and substance and domestic abuse. Ash writes about codependency as a part of her identity, something she will always have to live with and overcome, and her memoir reads as a psychologically informative text. Ash tackles these moments with humor and relatability, but it doesn't take away from the power of self-reclamation. The full-color illustrations are simple and clear, as the author leads us through her parents' divorce, a poignant summer camp trip, old boyfriends, art school, therapy, the pandemic, and recovery. Ash pairs each chapter with facts and statistics about codependents, ending with material for getting help. The sincere moments of life and the complex dynamics of growing into your best self are the tenets of this "tragi-comedy," which acts as a therapeutic output for both reader and writer. Ash's humor is a shrug after a tragic fall, comforting readers as they, too, seek to investigate difficult periods in their lives, and the book serves as a tender confession of something that the majority of Americans will experience at some point in their lives. The cartoons themselves aren't exceptionally beautiful, and one can assume Ash was going more for a jocular approach to balance out the subject matter. The author breaks the fourth wall plenty of times, and the resulting feeling is that she is not so much guiding us through her memoir as giving a class on it. A quirky graphic memoir sheds light on an overlooked mental health issue.

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August 18, 2023

New Yorker cartoonist and illustrator Ash decodes a behavioral pattern termed "codependence" in this humorous yet raw account of her decades-long struggle. Growing up arty but not popular with boys, and coping with divorced parents, she has sex with casual partners and then clings desperately to the first guy who seems to actually love her. But trying to keep him around by making his life easier ultimately drives him off, since she constantly overdoes it--finding him jobs, handling financial and medical details, attempting to fix everything. Ultimately, she learns her behavior is destructive and unproductive, identifying herself as "codependent": compulsively sacrificing her own emotions and needs to accommodate or fix her boyfriend's problems, plus confusing sex for love. Indeed, he rebels by behaving badly and pulling away. Her realistic, subdued color art shows a grimy uncertainty that works well for the story, and a list of resources appears at the end. Readers may feel as unsettled about Ash as she herself feels after gaining more insight into her own self-sabotaging behavior. VERDICT Those looking to better understand codependent behavior will benefit from Ash's story and enjoy wry chuckles along the way.--Martha Cornog

Copyright 2023 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

October 9, 2023
New Yorker cartoonist Ash looks back on her relationships with men and the origins and repercussions of her codependency in this candid if at times lackluster graphic memoir debut. The volume is divided into 10 chapters, each prefaced with a well-meaning but clichéd platitude (“Codependents accept sex in place of love,” “Codependents want to fix the people they love”). The 29-year-old Ash lays out a happy middle-class suburban childhood upended by the messy dissolution of her parents’ marriage. What follows is a series of moves, between Georgia, New York, and California, as well as “deep insecurity” and unfulfilled relationships. These early sexual and emotional incursions eventually lead to a long-term relationship with a man who turns abusive, and Ash unpacks the factors that led her to stay with him and overlook warning signs. The drawings are attractive and skillfully employ visual metaphors—red flags demarcate a partner’s violent and controlling behavior; poor boundary setting is literalized by loopy marks on a page—but the script tends toward an overinvestment in therapy speak. The result is a model of one young person’s commitment to understanding her own—as yet unfulfilled—road to satisfying romantic partnership. As a memoir, it’s uneven, but this holds appeal to readers who are going through their own therapeutic journey. Agent: Kathy Schneider, Jane Rotrosen Agency.