Daddy’s Girl by Debbie Drechsler. Seattle, WA: Fantagraphics Books, 2008. ISBN: 9781560978947

  Annotation: Semi-autobiographical graphic novel recounting the continued sexual abuse of a young girl by her father, the resulting issues of weight, low self-esteem, desire for acceptance, and her attempts to cope   

  Media: pen and ink, chiefly b&w, one chapter in colour

  Rating: 5Q/5P

  Curricular connections: Social sciences, Self-esteem, Child abuse, Incest

  Grade level: Middle School, High School 

  Challenged book: The book is a collection of short stories in graphic novel format, chiefly in black and white, which in itself, illustrates a lack or suppression of emotion. The book could be challenged by parents or educators due to the subject matter and the graphic content both of the story and pictorial images. It describes the sexual, incestuous abuse of a young girl by her father from childhood through her teens. Some may feel it is too graphic for their readers.

On the second page of the book, as Lily is in bed, her father comes to the door, peeks in, and asks, as millions of father’s do, “Lily...Honey...are you awake?” In a balloon, Lily thinks, again, as millions of children pretending to be asleep would, “Please, please go away!” The next pane is shocking, as the father approaches the bed, his robe open with no other clothes under it, and his “surprise” held in his hand. He then stands over Lily, forcing his “surprise” in her mouth. When finished, he kisses her on the temple and says, “Good night my little darling, sleep tight.” Lily is a very young child at this point and her sister is in the next bed, pretending to be asleep but it is evident to the reader, from her facial expression, that she was aware of everything going on. Lily proceeds to the kitchen and cookies, alone in the dark, saying, “Ugh. Too many cookies but now I can’t taste daddy’s ucky junk.”

The stories demonstrate the author’s feelings of isolation and helplessness, her mother’s apparent lack of awareness of what is happening and her verbal abuse of Lily, already suffering from a lack of self-esteem and weight-gain. The abuse continues, with her father making her think she is at fault, saying, after breaking in on her in the bathroom and demanding she show herself to him, “You know only a tramp would throw herself at her own father this way, right, Lil?” At one point, she and a friend contemplate suicide. In her search for love and acceptance, the author, not always named Lily in the stories, does not know how to react to young men and finds herself assaulted, thinking it her fault for being in the wrong place.

I think this is an important book to include in the school or public library. The stories are told by an adolescent, in first-person narrative. They are told frankly which, together with the black and white images, adds to their power. There are many young people in the same position as the author was, feeling helpless, suicidal, that the abuse is their fault, and no-one would believe them. They may be able to relate to the girl in these stories, see they are not alone, break the feeling of isolation, and gain the courage to seek help and tell someone. The very graphic elements that some might challenge may be the images that shock an abuse victim into awareness and seeking help.

lss August/ 2009