Fun home
a family tragicomic
by Alison Bechdel
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- 83 Have read
This book takes its place alongside the unnerving, memorable, darkly funny family memoirs of Augusten Burroughs and Mary Karr. It's a father-daughter tale perfectly suited to the graphic memoir form. Meet Alison's father, a historic preservation expert and obsessive restorer of the family's Victorian house, a third-generation funeral home director, a high school English teacher, an icily distant parent, and a closeted homosexual who, as it turns out, is involved with male students and a family babysitter. Through narrative that is alternately heartbreaking and fiercely funny, we are drawn into a daughter's complex yearning for her father. And yet, apart from assigned stints dusting caskets at the family-owned 'fun home, ' as Alison and her brothers call it, the relationship achieves its most intimate expression through the shared code of books. When Alison comes out as homosexual herself in late adolescence, the denouement is swift, graphic, and redemptive.--From publisher description.
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Subjects
Cartoonists, Graphic novels, Comic books, strips, Closeted gays, Homosexuality, Lesbians, Family relationships, Lesbian cartoonists, Biography, Novela gráfica, Novelas gráficas, Caricaturistas, Muñequitos, tiras cómicas, Reading Level-Grade 7, Reading Level-Grade 9, Reading Level-Grade 8, Reading Level-Grade 11, Reading Level-Grade 10, Reading Level-Grade 12, Comics & graphic novels, nonfiction, general, Lesbians, biography, LGBTQ biography and memoir, LGBTQ graphic novels, Stonewall Book Awards, Lambda Literary Awards, Lambda Literary Award Winner, nyt:paperback-graphic-books=2012-05-20, New York Times bestseller, New York Times reviewed, collection:judy_grahn_award=winner, collectionID:TexChallenge2021, Homosexualität, collectionID:KellerChallenge, Tecknade serier, Family Relations, SOCIAL SCIENCE, Lesbian Studies, Tochter, Comiczeichnerin, Serietecknare, Mishnah, collectionID:bannedbooks, Fathers and daughters, Fiction, collection:israel_fishman_non-fiction_award=winnerPeople
Alison Bechdel (1960-)Places
United StatesShowing 3 featured editions. View all 18 editions?
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Book Details
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- Scriblio MARC record
- Library of Congress MARC record
- Ithaca College Library MARC record
- Internet Archive item record
- marc_openlibraries_sanfranciscopubliclibrary MARC record
- Library of Congress MARC record
- marc_columbia MARC record
- marc_nuls MARC record
- Harvard University record
- Harvard University record
First Sentence
"LIKE MANY FATHERS, MINE COULD OCCASIONALLY BE PREVAILED ON FOR A SPOT OF "AIRPLANE.""
Work Description
A fresh and brilliantly told memoir from a cult favorite comic artist, marked by gothic twists, a family funeral home, sexual angst, and great books.
This breakout book by Alison Bechdel is a darkly funny family tale, pitch-perfectly illustrated with Bechdel's sweetly gothic drawings. Like Marjane Satrapi's Persepolis, it's a story exhilaratingly suited to graphic memoir form.
Meet Alison's father, a historic preservation expert and obsessive restorer of the family's Victorian home, a third-generation funeral home director, a high school English teacher, an icily distant parent, and a closeted homosexual who, as it turns out, is involved with his male students and a family babysitter. Through narrative that is alternately heartbreaking and fiercely funny, we are drawn into a daughter's complex yearning for her father. And yet, apart from assigned stints dusting caskets at the family-owned "fun home," as Alison and her brothers call it, the relationship achieves its most intimate expression through the shared code of books. When Alison comes out as homosexual herself in late adolescense, the denouement is swift, graphic -- and redemptive.
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| October 30, 2025 | Edited by bitnapper | Merge works (MRID: 248833) |
| October 27, 2025 | Edited by Erraticonteuse | Bulk tagging works |
| February 7, 2025 | Edited by MARC Bot | import existing book |
| December 11, 2024 | Edited by Markos | Edited without comment. |
| December 9, 2009 | Created by WorkBot | add works page |