Poppies of Iraq

Nominated for YALSA's 2018 Great Graphic Novels for Teens list!
Nominated for the Kirkus Prize!

"Poignant and powerful... a meditation on the ache and longing for a place you can no longer return."—Boston Globe

"Small in size but large in impact, this intimate memoir is a highly relevant and compassionate story of family, community, prejudice, and the struggle to love when the forces of the world push groups apart."—Kirkus, Best Teen Non-fiction of 2017

"[Poppies of Iraq's] power lies in the contrast between the matter-of-fact nature of the text and visuals, and the dread and horror of the backdrop... there is also hope to be found here — the hope that, no matter what befalls a nation, there will always be individuals who can craft something beautiful by virtue of their survival."—Vulture, Best Comics of 2017

"The rich effect of Poppies of Iraq... comes from the manner in which the sweet and domestic rests alongside horror."—Los Angeles Review of Books

"A plainly stated, emotionally devastating memoir... Throughout this bittersweet book, Findakly and Trondheim interweave the political and personal in a way that mirrors and heightens real life. Poppies of Iraq is about big events as seen through small eyes: there’s a universalness underneath the specificity. Anyone, even with a boring childhood, should find something to relate to here... an unforgettable, devastating, sweet book."—Salon

"Wise, touching and wonderfully vivid... Findakly’s memoir covers an extended period in Iraq’s recent history... yet the half century ticks by with amazing ease, its author managing to tell both the story of a (complicated, fearful) nation, and that of one family of exiles coping with a new life in Paris."—Guardian, Graphic Novel of the Month

"An Iraqi childhood is cherished, examined, and let go in this tender look at youth amid upheaval... an ode to a lost era, to be sure, but one with its feet planted securely in the present."—Publishers Weekly, Starred Review

"[Poppies of Iraq describes] a childhood caught between cultures [and] vividly capture[s] an oppressive regime as seen from a kid's guileless point of view."—Reader's Digest

"The personal and political interweave in this sad yet charming memoir... Like snapshots, ­Findakly’s story toggles back and forth in time, depicting memories mixed with historical background and “In Iraq” vignettes about customs in that country."—Library Journal

"This absorbing graphic memoir offers an insider’s view of the rapid cultural changes that beset Iraq in the latter half of the 20th century... Short vignettes about her family, school, and local customs are alternately bittersweet, funny, and affecting as a series of military and political coups impact her family’s life in Iraq... A moving, thought-provoking title for all collections."—School Library Journal, Starred Review

"Poppies of Iraq is a beautiful portrait of a life lived in cultural translation, its pages filled with humor and a nostalgia made complicated with age."—Bomb Magazine

"What is it like to grow up in Iraq? That’s the question at the heart of Poppies of Iraq... a beautifully drawn graphic novel that shows how growing up in Iraq is more complicated than it seems."—Bitch Magazine