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Is there such a thing as a normal teenager?

There's something unreal about Jamie McKelvie's artwork.  Beginning with last year's Phonogram, McKelvie's comics have this near perfect feeling of some other imaginary world.  His solid line drawings and knack for just a certain amount of detail create a realistic image but it's not quite of the real world.  There's an emptiness (but the good kind) and desire for definition but he doesn't make it easy for his reader.  Look at the cover of the Suburban Glamour graphic novel, featuring the main character Astrid.  Off center, she seems in a relaxed mode but she sees something just to the side of the image, something we the view can't see.  Multicolored lines emanate from her but, other than that, it's mostly a white background with a bit of trade dressing.  It's a very reflective image that's rather haunting.

What does the girl see?  What, if anything, do the multicolored lines represent?  The drawing itself is very simple as well.  McKelvie would rather use color to help define shadows and shapes than fill the image up with cross hatching or heavy black shadows.  His line weight varies only slightly, giving his images a solid yet open feeling.  And he manages to make something alluring about this character.  We want to see what she sees and know why her face has that melancholy expression.  And we see a girl facing a decision and possible changes.

Astrid is a typical teenager, not satisfied with life in suburbia.  She wants to go different places and see different things.  She thinks she's unpopular and an outcast even though she's got a couple of close friends.  It's like I said, she's a typical teenager.  Her typical teenage life begins turning strange when she's attacked by monsters and her childhood imaginary friends come back to pay her a visit.  Within her normal, boring little life, greater forces are at work and let her to realize that she's special after all.  With a description like this, this could easily descend into the realm of After School Special territory but McKelvie keeps the story light enough that it remains entertaining without turning sappy.  His story is light and breezy but has enough chills and danger to keep it an engaging read.

McKelvie's artwork was bold and strong in Phonogram but with the addition of color, it takes on a different life.  Matthew Wilson's colors adds a different characteristic to McKelvie's linework.  Actually, the use of color gives McKelvie the opportunity not to try and do much shading or definition through line weight, cross hatching or any tricks that artists use to make a picture look dimensional.  I wonder how dimensional the artwork would actually look in black and white.  McKelvie's artwork is made brighter and more lively by the colors and gives McKelvie a chance to focus on the part of the figure he does best; his character's faces.  McKelvie tells the story as much through his character's faces and eyes as he does through plot and dialogue.  There are many images where I could just get lost in Astrid's defiant, scared and happy eyes. 

Suburban Glamour is a story about growing up.  It's an adolescent story but not a childish one.  Take equal parts of John Hughes (the good John Hughes movies,) Disney and throw in some British mythology and you'll understand what Suburban Glamour is about. 

Suburban Glamour
Written and Drawn by: Jamie McKelvie
Colored by: Matthew Wilson
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