'Striped Pajamas' with story and art by Firat Yasa is a surreal graphic novel about an odd fellow with no memory.

A man with no memory is fished out of the Bosporus and is now in a strange land full of moles and odd creatures. There is a recurring dream he has with a cat and an owl that may be the key to unlocking who he is.

This was a pretty surreal read both in story and strange art. I knew there must be more to the story and as it filters in, it actually changes the tone of the story. That's not bad, but I still felt like something might have gotten lost in translation.

I received a review copy of this graphic novel from Europe Comics and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Thank you for allowing me to review this graphic novel.

Fell in love with this because of the art style, it is absolutely beautiful, however, I found the story to be very hard to follow. I was left with a lot of questions about what led Striped Pajamas to get to where he was and I didn't like that the ending was unclear. Its possible things were lost in translation.

This story is about a boy who is fished out of the River Bosporus with no memory of what happened or how he got into the river. Having nothing on him to identify himself other than his striped pajamas, he sets off to try and find out what happened.
I'm not really sure what I thought of this book. I think something may have gotten lost in the translation. The story kind of meandered and was hard to follow at times. I did enjoy the art though, it was kind of weird in a great way. Defintely something different than I am used to for sure. I do think that there are certain people out there that would enjoy this kind of book. Maybe if you are fan of more free form type comics you would like this. I wouldn't recommend this for people just starting out reading comics though, I think it would turn them off of the genre altogether. But, if you are willing to put aside your preconceived notions of what a comic is supposed to be then you may enjoy this! I would give it a try because I think most reading depends person to person.

After being fished out from the cold currents of the Bosporus, an enigmatic young man barely hangs onto both life and reality. Having lost all memory of who he is, he comes to be identified by his outfit: Striped Pajamas. As he embarks on an insightful quest to discover himself, his consciousness gets entangled in a love story that sways between fantasy and reality—a story that steadily approaches the truth.

Super bizarre read. The pdf wasn't the best quality so reading it was difficult to do and didn't help with my experience with it. The storyline was a tad bit confusing for me and it took me a while to get through it. I think this graphic novel just wasn't for me but if you are into a dark, unique adventure--then this is for you.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for allowing me to read an e-arc and give my honest review.

This was a slog to get through. It was boring with a strange stream of conscious type story that got stranger and harder to follow the further it went. The art was odd as well.

** spoiler alert ** I....
What....
?????
This is hands down the weirdest thing I have read this year and possibly EVER.
Nothing makes any sense because well, it's literally a coma patient's fever dream, so it's not SUPPOSED to make any sense I guess, but there are anthropomorphic animals, and stove-pipe people and moles and weird almost Arabian Nights looking dudes who may also be cigarettes or something and some REALLY disturbing panels of an implied rape and just... what the actual FUCK is this????

The art style in the book was beautiful. I was just a little confused reading it and I feel like I never really understood what was happening. I don't think this was the right graphic novel for me.

Although it was a bit confusing in the beginning, after a second reading everything makes way more sense, and it's impossible not to love this twisted tale of dreams! Stripped Pajamas has a blacker than black sense of humor.

Full review published in my blog (Oct 17): https://tintanocturna.blogspot.com/2019/10/comic-stripped-pajamas.html

I appreciate having had an opportunity to read and review this book. The appeal of this particular book was not evident to me, and if I cannot file a generally positive review I prefer simply to advise the publisher to that effect and file no review at all.

Certainly compared to this author's Nhun the Huntress, this book was a big let-down. It's a wacky fantasy, with anthropomorphised characters, and something about mole men wanting to attack a city, and The Guild wanting other things, including a girl, and a young lad rescued from the sea who is caught in the muddle. Middle – I meant middle. With dream sequences, and so much more that did not help clarify anything it soon proved to be a case of too odd for odd's sake. The nine years of wait for it to be translated shows the rush with which this should be bought.

This book was so interesting and confusing at the same time. The concept behind this was very sci fi, but not very well explained. It was like a fever dream during some scenes, which was quite fitting for this book. Somehow, I was reminded of Little Nemo in Slumberland, I wonder if that was an inspiration for this comic? There is so much in this comic that is barely explained. Quite a bit of the explanation is done by images, which is interesting and works for this comic. I think the author/artist could have been even more chaotic with the storytelling if they wanted. All in all, this was quite good.

3.5/5

I enjoyed this book although I am not sure I full understood the story. It had a very surreal feel to it and the illustrations also felt the same. It is the kind of story that you just have to let wash over you.

A young man is rescued from the sea but he doesn't know who he is or how he got there. He is called 'Striped Pajamas' because he was wearing striped pajama bottoms when he was rescued. Immediately he is thrust into adventure. There are mysterious soldiers who seem to know who he is and town gangsters who want to get rid of him. There are the good guys of the story who team up with him and a love interest who he meets and then has to rescue from the town gangsters. In the midst of all of this the young man discovers he has powers which might help him recover his memories.

When he does find out who he is the reader is left as perplexed as they were at the beginning of the story but having gone through a really wild and surreal ride! The characters are a weird mix of cartoons and anthropomorphic characters and the artwork is great.

I did enjoy reading this and I enjoyed the adventure but don't ask me to explain it to you because that part of the story has lost me. Very enjoyble though with great characters.

Copy provided by Europe Comics via Netgalley in exchange for an unbiased review.

Really did not enjoy this graphic novel. It was very weird and I didn't even like the illustrations. Fans of Asterix and similar comics may enjoy this illustration style. However, I found it too crowded. I also thought it was aimed at children and young people but there's a very strange illustration of a large busted lady handcuffed to a wall at one point...

As for the plot... I still can't figure it out.

Honestly, I don't know what to think of<em> Striped Pajamas</em> by Firat Yasa. In fact, that's basically what my reaction to the whole story was: what did I just read? After a little thought about it, some extra scanning of the story, and reading through a few reviews I must admit that I still feel somewhat baffled as to how I could possibly answer that question. And I guess it all just comes down to the fact that I couldn't quite figure out what the purpose or the plot was? It seemed like an incoherent dream that a person tried to pen to paper; ultimately, as the story appears to be detailing a dream-world, I found this rather ironic. Though it's perhaps not quite as clever as it could have been, since I'm not entirely sure that was the author's intention.

I'll be frank here; I didn't like <em>Striped Pajamas</em>. The art style was definitely not for me, having a rather creepy or gross vibe throughout. The main character was unappealing in <em>many </em>ways and therefore it was somewhat difficult to root for him. Personality wise, he was okay, but I couldn't quite understand what his connection was to anything and the confusion only made the story worse. Especially as there was so much going on and everything was just jumbled together.

From kidnapping plots, to using someone's brain to power a machine--this is the only intriguing aspect that I liked, as it references the dream-world--nothing really seemed to add up. In one respect, this could be a result of the disjointed way that many of us experience our dreams in general. And that alone makes for a clever commentary. I do not believe this portrayal was executed very well, though perhaps that is the point after all? I was baffled by the inclusion of moles and the overall disturbing nature of the events as a whole.

In the end, while I can respect and appreciate aspects of this graphic novel as it relates to the ideas behind it, I couldn't quite get past feeling grossed out by the artwork and the world. There was a strangeness to the moles searching for the main character that just didn't quite mesh well with everything else that was going on and not a single character within the story appealed to me or made me feel anything other than disgust. Even the love interest bothered me.

I don't inherently hate the story since I do genuinely think it had potential, but I can't see myself wanting to read this particular one again.

<em>I was provided a free copy of this book via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.</em>

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Read this in one sitting during lunch break and now having a damn headache. What did I just read? I’m giving this the benefit of doubt that this novel was badly mistranslated as I felt very Lost in Translation. Either that or there’s some back story or local lore which I’m not aware of that would have explained why I’m utterly lost.

I’m sad to say I didn’t love this one. I wonder if something was lost in the translation from the Turkish. The story follows a boy who is plucked from the bay and is now experiencing amnesia. There are mole-people after him and honestly, I still don’t understand exactly why. Then there’s the Guild, which is another nefarious group who is after him for his powers. There’s more to the story than that, but I don’t want to give away a ton. I will say there is a reason for the weird dreamlike aspects of the story, but all in all, I just wasn’t for me.

Spoilers ahead!!!

A boy (Striped Pajamas) is plucked from the sea and doesn't know who he is. For some unknown reason, an army of moles are after him (apparently his mind can power some mystery machine?) While on the run from the moles, he rescues a girl (Nhi) from a boy whose father is the leader of The Guild (a group of half man, half monsters? whose motives are dictated by three identical Nutcracker soldier looking men.) Eventually the moles become allies with the Striped Pajamas when the Guild captures Nhi and turns her into a sex slave.

It is revealed that Striped Pajamas is actually the subconscious of a man in a coma. In a series of flashbacks, you see that when he was a younger man, he either joined the military or went to prison (the illustrations are unclear) only to come back with some type of mental issues, which lead to substance abuse and the end of his relationship with a woman. As a result, he gets drunk and drives his motorbike into a vehicle, resulting in the coma. A few of the characters in his dream state, figure out that their "world" isn't real, and one decides to kill himself (in a rather graphic way.) The leader of the Guild wants to destroy Striped Pajamas in an attempt to save the dream world. He pushes Striped Pajamas off a cliff, which doesn't destroy him. He comes back and saves Nhi, then runs. Nhi finds him and convinces him to stay because she loves him. The story ends with Striped Pajamas by himself in a cloud of smoke.

This graphic novel was just plain weird. Not only was the story confusing (though I eventually understood what was going on, at least partially, a lot of it was very vague.) the illustrations were strange. The moles reminded me of Nazis, the men of the Guild looked like pervert skinheads, and Striped Pajamas himself was often portrayed in such a way that he looked like he was riddled with some flesh eating virus. It was just yucky. That being said, I understand why they were that way. They were supposed to be a dream, and as we all know, dreams can be weird AF. Still, it made me uncomfortable. I was also left with a lot of questions, like what exactly happened in the real world to make Striped Pajamas become an alcoholic? The ending was also very vague. Does he come out of the coma or not?

So, it wasn't amazing, it wasn't even great, but it was interesting and held my attention.

I was thoroughly confused throughout this whole thing. I believe this is a translated work but still.
The art work has two styles and changes between the two for seemingly no reason.
Just not for me.

A beautiful graphic novel that was really enhanced by its strong narrative. I could not think of a single improvement while I was reading it.

Honestly speaking I couldn’t enjoy this book. The illustrations were all over each other it seems and a little too congested. This made the reading a bit difficult to follow. It ended well and I am happy about that at least. But I seriously tried my best to like the story and connect with the characters but somehow I couldn’t. Thanks #NetGalley for the book #Stripedpyjamas