Has a deceptively simple and interesting plot, but the sparse execution leaves the story unexplored. Not recommended The three sisters Clothilde, Ophile, and Bettine live together in peace until Bettine falls in love and conceives a child. Ophile's jealousy sparks tragedy, and Clothilde communes with the unborn baby, beginning a strange sort of family drama. Told in minimal prose with large, sparse line drawings, The Three Incestuous Sisters is an interesting concept with haunting execution, but it remains insubstantial. With so little prose, the story begs better or more complex drawings to bring the it to life; as it is, the book feels empty and unfinished. Not recommended.
The Three Incestuous Sisters is an visual novel with a deceptively simply plot, and it is clearly a labor of love for Niffenegger, who describes her artistic process in the afterword. The basis of the story is hard to summarize because it is so complex in its simplicity. The story is about how two sisters respond when their sister falls in love, but it is peppered by violent jealousy, psychic powers, and the mystery of all that goes unsaid--which is quite a lot, because the book is surprisingly sparse. The text is whittled down to simple sentences, and the art--Aquatint etched line drawings with select watercolors, reminiscent of Edward Gorey's style--is simple and unornamented. The artistic simplicity is also deceptive, because each illustration is labor intensive. This book is a cherished brain child and a labor of love; it does not have a wide appeal, and its meaning is hidden rather than revealed.
That is all well and good, but it isn't quite enough. The concept is interesting, but the book wants something more--more text, better illustrations, or a longer length--to flesh out that concept. Ideally, since it is a "visual novel," I wish the illustrations were more skillful and contained greater detail. Niffenegger's art style is somewhat crude (there's just no nice way to say it) and very sparse, and as a result there is no nuanced detail--in facial expressions, say, or in the setting. As a result, the story remains in its early stages of bizarre simplicity; it is empty and unexplored, and never comes to life. It's too bad, because I was intrigued by the concept of the book and I think that it has real potential--but as it stands, good intentions aren't enough: there just isn't enough story to make The Three Incestuous Sisters a worthwhile and enjoyable read. I wanted to like it, but I was disappointed. I don't recommend it.
Beautiful, but why not silent? Audrey Niffenegger, The Three Incestuous Sisters (Abrams, 2005)
Niffenegger's afterword for this "visual novel" (as she calls it, to make it distinct from a graphic novel; I fail to see the difference) says that she originally started with a full story and illustrations, and pared away bits of story until she got to where it is now-- essentially illustrations and captions (very little of the text that accompanies the illustrations runs more than one sentence). Which begs the question: why stop there? When you've got such expressive illustrations, do they need captioning at all? Perhaps part of the reason I got to thinking this way is because most of the captions that are here are of the "tell, don't show" variety, and it seems to me they take away from the story being told in the pictures; you'll be spending far more time drinking in the images than you will reading the captions, anyway.
A book like this demands excellent illustration, and Niffenegger has provided that in spades. (The description she gives of how the illustrations were made is truly daunting.) These are pictures that draw the attention like few others in recent graphic novels; they ignore current trends in graphic novel design, instead going for a modern-primitive approach. It's amateurism, but it's inspired amateurism (think Louis Wain here, perhaps), with spare, almost unformed human figures that play out the story against backgrounds that are richly-detailed and show great artistry. There is much to be said here about the juxtaposition; I am, however, not the person to say it.
If only the captions had gone away. ***
Beautiful pictures with very spare prose Audrey Niffenegger's The Time Traveler's Wife is one of the best time travel stories of recent years, and one of Tammie's favorite books. The Three Incestuous Sisters is Niffenegger's latest and, title aside, a very strange book. Two sisters, Bettine and Ophile, fall in love with Paris, the lighthouse keeper's son. Bettine and Paris conceive a child, and the third sister, Clothilde, begins to commune with the fetus. Ophile goes mad with jealousy and it all ends very badly. The beautiful pictures tell the story as much as the very spare prose. The closest thing to which I can compare it is the work of Edward Gorey.
Evocative art book "The Three Incestuous Sisters" is what author Audrey Niffenegger deems as "a novel in pictures." There is little text in the book, but every spread includes a beautiful full-page illustration that depicts the story of three grown sisters, Bettine, Clothilde, and Ophile. The sisters live together in a secluded house near the sea. When lightning kills the lighthouse keeper, his handsome young son, Paris, arrives to take his place. Paris and Bettine quickly fall in love and conceive a child. Psychic Clothilde communicates with the unborn child, while Ophile is jealous of the union and eventually drives Paris and Bettine out of the house. A confrontation ultimately occurs in the city, where tragedy ensues. Only one sister remains at the house in the end, and she is eventually able to set some things right.
I'm a huge fan of "The Time Traveler's Wife," which is why I was so interested in reading this book. "The Three Incestuous Sisters" is NOTHING like Niffenegger's full-length novel, but it stands alone as a beautiful, erotic, and tragic work of art. The illustrations are haunting and tell the story much more than the sparse narrative text. This is a unique art book and a very illuminating story, and I'm thrilled to finally own a copy!
Handsome Art Book This beautiful book looks like a limited edition artist's book, which is what it was originally. It's filled with large format aquatints (a form of etching) which are gracefully drawn and colored. One can tell from the quality of the lines how much she loved doing this. The publisher did a great job of reproduction, so important in a book of this kind. You can literally cut out the illustrations, frame them, and hang them on your walls as fine art, they're that good. As an illustrated novelist myself I found this book to be inspiring.
There is little text, but what there is is poetic and dreamlike, and tells a disturbing but haunting tale of sisterly love and jealousy. It's not a regular novel like her best-seller "The Time Traveler's Wife," which I also loved, but it tells its story mostly in pictures. I highly recommend this for lovers of book art.
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