Barking

by Lucy Sullivan

Overview

Loopy . . . cuckoo . . . stark raving. . . .
When the depression and grief Alix feels over the death of her friend overwhelm her, she’s institutionalized. But inside a psychiatric ward, things don’t get better for her – now she has nowhere to get away from her rapidly-spiraling thoughts. As Alix navigates disinterested attendants, group therapy, and isolation, she must build herself a new equilibrium and tame the black dog of her depression.

Inspired by her own struggles with mental health, Lucy Sullivan tells a powerful, emotional story about the problems that sometimes overwhelm us all – and the failures in the mental health system we depend on.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781910395769
Publisher:	Avery Hill Publishing
Publication date:	02/27/2024
Pages:	124
Sales rank:	280,559
Product dimensions:	6.70(w) x 9.50(h) x 0.60(d)

About the Author

Lucy Sullivan is a writer/artist from London. After graduating from Kingston School of Art she specialized in hand-drawn animation before moving her practice into comics. Alongside her critically acclaimed comics Lucy has created commissions for Razorblades, Black Hammer, Yoshin10 and more. She mentors aspiring graphic novelists for LDComics and regularly tutors Illustration & Animation at universities in London.

Editorial Reviews

01/08/2024

In fierce slashes and splashes of ink, the raw, haunting debut from Sullivan depicts the inner depths of a person struggling with mental illness. Alix, a young woman with vacant eyes and a spray of freckles, is picked up by police on a bridge as she contemplates suicide (“it will be a bit messy... but quick, at least”). She winds up committed to a psychiatric hospital nicknamed the “rot box,” where she’s consumed by voices of doubt. An orderly warns ominously of her fellow inmates: “Some’s bad for themselves, but some’s bad for everyone.” Alix comes to know the stories of how they were institutionalized, acquaints herself with the doctors and staff, and navigates treatments she’s pushed into, including medications and group therapy (“Angry girl, you got a problem,” quips another patient). Ultimately, she faces the fear that she’s inherited a fatal streak of madness, and seeks to discern whether she’s “safer in here or out there.” Sullivan’s bold, liquid inks, suggestive of Bill Sienkiewicz, evoke Alix’s disorienting inner world in constantly shifting visuals: her mental illness takes the form of a wolf that follows her, muttering intrusive thoughts; her head sometimes dissolves into a trailing black cloud; and words and figures fight their way out of puddles of ink. It’s a terrifying glimpse into a disturbed mind. (Feb.)

Publishers Weekly

"Barking is everything comics should strive to be . . . a powerful and haunting metaphor for mental health, and the human condition, that you'll never forget." —Jeff Lemire, Essex County, Sweet Tooth

“Sullivan’s Barking is tangible and filled with profound empathy. It’s a labor of love, a years-long effort to render those complicated tangles of pain and loss into something shareable, understandable — not just clinically but in a visceral, deeply felt way.” — Kate Kowalski, Doomrocket

“This is an incredibly dark story, beautifully told. From the tumultuous opening scene to the last splash page, authentic, raw emotion jumps off the pages, offering a small glimpse into a very personal struggle.” — Comicon

From the Publisher