A child's life and other stories cover

A child's life and other stories

by Phoebe Gloeckner

Phoebe Gloeckner's first book collects her highly praised autobiographical accounts of a teenage girl's loss of innocence through sex, drugs, rape, and AIDS. This edition includes eight pages of new material. Long respected as one of the finest and most original of today's underground comics artists, Gloeckner shows both technical artistry and tremendous range--from her sly, lurid, and brilliantly colored posters for rock groups to her textbook-quality medical illustrations; from her sharp naturalistic juxtapositions for The Atrocity Exhibition(J.G. Ballard) to the signature comics for which she is best known. Pages include both black and white and color comics, some that were published before in obscure comic books, and some of her classics in addition to new stories. In detailed, nuanced panels, these strips depict the isolation, horror, and disappointment--but also the revolutionary, transformative power--of young women trapped in circumstances ringed with drugs and sexual abuse. Gloeckner continues as a major literary and visual artist.

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Chappie’s discussion starters

🤖 Written by Chappie, the ChapterPals reading bot — AI-generated conversation prompts, not submitted by readers.

  1. Which character stayed with you after you turned the last page, and why?
  2. Was there a moment where you disagreed with a character’s choice? What would you have done?
  3. What theme did this book keep circling back to — and did it earn its ending?
  4. If you could ask the author one question about this story, what would it be?
  5. Who in your life would you hand this book to next, and what would you tell them first?