It’s a brilliant device that Lai weaves throughout the story to show the altered state when aunties Ray and Bron play with Ray’s niece Nessie out in the woods, which they frequent on their twice-a-week playdates. She fibs that they are at the mall, hangs up, and then rejoins the fray, her face returning to the joyous monster. Two appear to be adults and one a child.īut as one of the adults gets a cell phone call, she slows and she increasingly morphs into a human face as her voice on the line needs to sound like a responsible caretaker. They chatter and conspire in rhyme, their scuttling bodies arched forward and caked in mud. It looks like three monsters– or rather, dressed-as-people but faces-like-creatures– run wildly and euphorically in the woods in pursuit of a faun or some such prey.
“Stone Fruit” opens with a scene that’s paradigmatic throughout the book, and will burrow in your memories. Taking a leap of faith, each opens up and learns they have more in common with their siblings than they ever knew. As their emotional intimacy erodes, Ray and Bron isolate from each other and attempt to repair their broken family ties - Ray with her overworked, resentful single-mother sister and Bron with her religious teenage sister who doesn’t fully grasp the complexities of gender identity. Their playdates are little oases of wildness, joy, and ease in all three of their lives, which ping-pong between familial tensions and deep-seated personal stumbling blocks. An exhilarating and tender debut graphic novel that is an ode to the love and connection shared among three women and the child they all adore.īron and Ray are a queer couple who enjoy their role as the fun weirdo aunties to Ray’s niece, six-year-old Nessie.
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