I devoured this graphic novel. Every once in a while I'll encounter a graphic novel that tugs me along until I am saddened to turn the last page. This is one of those experiences. I did not want it to end.

The story of a man who has lost a great love. He moves to a different city, New York City in fact, where he begins an experiment in social isolation. It is to become a piece in the magazine he cofounded with his best friend. The task: to spend a month in New York City without talking to anyone. The only exception is his partner, to home he has to give periodical updates. There are rules that make it more complicated, such as the fact that he cannot eat at the same restaurant twice. However, all in all, he is being successful at the task at hand.

This all changes when he picks up pictures he has just developed. a handful of those feature the same girl. The only reason he noticed is because the photos were in black-and-white and the girl was always in color. This leads him all around the city in a frantic search for the girl who has captured his attention. When he finds her he has to decide whether or not he wants his experiment to continue. What follows is a departure onto magical realism that was refreshing and welcoming.

I strongly recommend this book.

In New York in beautiful full color, dingy and glorious, a young man with a painful past embarks on a healing experiment. A photographic love song to New York, to solitude, to companionship, to the impact of a small movement on another's life, to the magic of human connection.

Good job. The illustration work and layout is cool. Story-wise, I think the author tries too hard to make a connection between NewYork as a city and its invisible call to the people - a hard sell. The good part is 38-year old Samuel Page’s self-discovery and healing process. His life as it appears in the beginning is not the truth and readers get to know about the origin of all of his hangups, OCD behavior, loneliness, sense of alienation and disillusionment at the end.

The story slacks between pgs 33 and 77 where it’s more repetitive than forward-moving.

Memorable lines:
‘His camera was latest generation reflex. He was not.’

‘Special Price menu: Marvin’s saddest burger’

‘O love jazz in summer. In madison square park, they often organise concerts in the centre of the park. But I never went because all I listen to is Chet Baker. In truth, I only know one Chet Baker song. In fact it is the only jazz song I know.’

‘I never believed in destiny, yet every second spent in that city gave me the impression of being exactly where everything happens because it’s meant to. An impression which, in a small apartment, came from my own culture, made of characters and stories set there. but people formed the greater part of it. The crowd of strangers I’d come across on the streets every day.’ (check out how many you’ve seen while in NY)

This graphic novel is about a dude named Samuel Page who is essentially trying to escape his problems by taking on a project in New York. For a month he isn't allowed to engage anyone in conversation beyond a simple written note and shoots photos of various public spaces. What he discovers through this project is more than he, and the reader apparently, expected.

This novel is very movie-like in the way it was drawn and written. There's a lot of deep meaning behind certain moments and the main character seems to contemplate life a lot. It's not one of those kinds of graphic novels that you'd pick up for a light read. I enjoyed the art style and the basic concept of the story, but I feel it was trying too hard to be philosophical. There were certain moments where I started to gloss over details and would end up getting lost and having to backtrack to fully understand what I was reading. This made the read less enjoyable for me and was the reason I gave it three stars, but please don't let that deter you from reading this book.

The only other thing that bothered me was the way Sam's hair was drawn. For some reason it reminded me of Unicorn Ryuji from "Kamikaze Girls." It made certain moments of the book less serious for me, but I'm lighthearted in nature and kind of liked that.

Perhaps a grudging four stars for this book, as it forced the reader to have issues with it, that might be ironed out when the text is finalised for the English language publication. It's a love story, one very cinematically set in and about New York, with a photographer doing some weird journalistic study of how the city copes with a silent man, not verbally communicating with anyone. The answer – it gives him his Miss Right, but not the ability to see that (or her). The artwork was good, but definitely not great. The storytelling was awkward to say the least at times, with multiple narrators, and what is the difference between the black on white pages and those that are white on black? Still, this has to go down as an intelligent graphic novel, one that probably comes closest to demanding a re-read and getting it, and a book that provides for some clumsy beats but a lot to engage with.

It's a bit meandering and does require an initial willingness to submit to the mystery, but the text imparts the feeling of heartbreak and loneliness with stunning efficacy and you very easily find yourself captivated as you move through the beautiful, colorful streets of New York.

I’d like to preface off this review by saying I am not deaf or hard of hearing. However, I have friends that are and it is the knowledge and experiences they have shared with me in previous situations that guided me as I read this novel.

The Sound of the World By Heart started off pleasantly enough with an interesting premise, decent art style, and enjoyable prose. I was thoroughly engaged and for the most part, enjoying, (there were a few confusing parts where it wasn’t clear who was speaking) but by the end of the novel I was feeling uncomfortable.

The graphic novel tells the story of Sam, a photojournalist, who decides to take on the challenge of not speaking to anyone for sixty days so that he can write an article about his experience. Sam’s experiment is mostly uneventful until one day after printing a stack of his photographs in black and white, he opens them to find one woman standing out in color. Sam meets this woman again but never engages in conversation with her as he’s still conducting his experiment. Eventually, Sam is able to communicate with this woman, through his mind. (Yes, you read that right.) It turns out that Sam is deaf and is able to hear this woman telepathically. What does this have to do with the photographs? Unclear. We never find that out. (There are a lot of things we never find out.) This is the part where I started feeling uncomfortable. Once again I’d like to reiterate that I am not deaf/hoh and do not speak for that community, but I personally felt that having a deaf character’s soulmate be the one person he could hear was ableist. It felt as though the only reason the love interest was the MC’s soulmate was because the MC could hear her. It also felt like the author were saying that the MC needed to hear (in whatever way) their love interest and a relationship between two deaf/hoh people isn’t as meaningful or real somehow. I’d suggest you’d look into reviews by people who are deaf/hoh for a more profound analysis. (I was unable to find any but if you know of some please don’t hesitate to let me know.)

There were a few enjoyable things about this book though. The art for one reflected the tone of the prose extremely well and the prose itself was nice. The best aspect of this book would have to be the setting. The prose and the art both read as a love letter to New York which seems to be what this graphic novel is underneath.

So, all in all, yes to the art, yes to the writing style, no to the ableism.

Interesting perspective, great structure and execution. Will be recommending.

This book touched my heart in so many ways. The art was beautiful the story was remarkable in that it had not only a beautiful meaning but you have the added joy of finding love for the characters and then being genuinely surprised at the end of the story. I think it is very important for everyone to read this story. Never judge a book by its cover. Never judge people, period.

Impressionistic watercolor scenes of Noo Yawk background a story of a photographer who plans to go sixty-two days with no verbal interaction. (As a fellow photographer I wish I could do that with the models I work with.)
Things are strange to start, as there’s an unseen narrator, rather than the guy we’re following actually doing the talking, or thinking. It’s not till page 43 that she introduces herself; up to then there was no idea if the voice was male or female. She claims to hear his thoughts; telepathy or imagination? Is it the famous lady from the painting? She does say she’s French, after all. At some point it changes to first person, and it works better, but then it switches back.
I was wondering how he communicated when needed; turns out he passes notes. Would have been easier to use his ubiquitous phone, but either way it feels like cheating.
The conceit of having a redhead who appears in the photos—in color, even though the shots are B&W—felt spooky at first, but at the same time intriguing. Not so the dream sequence; that was just disturbing.
I’m of the opinion this graphic novel was longer than it needed to be. There’s a lot of white empty space; the drawings don’t come close to taking up all the room on the page. There’s also far too many drawings of him drinking coffee while walking with his headphones, which makes things a bit boring. And the crashing marbles analogy was just silly.
Joan is smart; talking to the painting would be weird, but telepathy is normal? But then there are plenty of times when he does or says something that makes me think this is either all a dream or he really is crazy, and not just because of the voices in his head. And there’s no way I’m buying the city theory, but then I hate Noo Yawk.
Even though it did a good job at resolving some of the seeming inconsistencies at the end, I was still left far too confused. Couldn’t tell if it was real or not, if it actually happened at all, but I guess I wasn’t supposed to know; that wasn’t the point of the story.

I don't even know how to review this. I think it went way over my head, but I still really enjoyed it. It's compelling, I couldn't stop reading. But I honestly can't even tell you why. I'm definitely going to have to read it again.

Wonderful artwork but I found myself getting bored with the story.

Thanks to netgalley.com and Diamond Book Publishers for the advance PDF file for my honest review, but unfortunately the file doesn't run on the bluefire app and was unable to read what looked like a very interesting graphic novel.

The Sound of the World by Heart was a pretty fantastic tale! The illustration work, for one, is marvelous and pulls you right into the narrative. Anyone recovering from heart break or wanting to enjoy the seemingly peaceful experience of being an observer of urban life, should enjoy this. Mind you, surprises are abound in this story, as the main character finds out that you can't run too far away from serendipity without playing right into its hands. Highly enjoyable! Will definitely recommend!

This is a quick but interesting read. This graphic novel touches on our insecurities, our secrets, our pain and our loves. The illustrations are vivid and pleasing to look at. I was a bit confused by the story line at first but it did come together for me in the end.

I enjoyed this graphic novel and it has been a while since I was able to say that.

The Sound of the World by Heart has an interesting premise--can you live in one of the world's largest cities and not speak a word to anyone? The main character in this graphic novel takes on that task while exploring the New York and taking photographs.

I love the art in this book, even if the story seems a bit lacking. The art reminds me of many classic comics, which draws in the the reader. The story seemed to lose itself. It's a good attempt at showing there are other ways humans communicate, and that the act of communicating with each other is important for survival, but the story took a few turns off this road and didn't seem to bring it around to a cohesive end.

The lure of a social experiment in isolation, particularly in a city as bustling with life as New York City, made this book sound thought provoking and interesting. The art on the cover spoke to a certain level of depth as it was neither too cartoon-ish nor hyper realistic, finding just the right balance to tell the story.

It was here, however, that the positive aspects of the story began to wane and I fell out of love with The Sound of the World by Heart.

The story itself suffered from trying to be, what I feel, something too philosophical. It reached too far and by doing so lost any connection with the reader that would have made the journey of the main character meaningful. I didn't get a sense of what this experiment was actually doing for or to him, so it's purpose was ultimately meaningless.

There were points in the storytelling that didn't make much sense either, such as the mindreading that the main character initially thought was a painting speaking to him (which is a whole other oddity). This loose thread and others like it had me staring at the book at the end wondering, really, what had I just read?

A somewhat redeeming factor of the book was the art style. It really was very good and I hung on through the book because of it. I'd like to see the author do another graphic novel because of this kind of quality artwork, but maybe paired up with a storyteller who has a history of a more cohesive storytelling style.

what I loved about this is how the drawings are essential to the narrative in the story - and there are digressions that all make sense as we work out how the girl has appeared in his photographs, and yet he has no memory of photographing her - his particular set of internal compulsions, and his interaction with NYC are peculiar to him, and distinct - yet we find them familiar - those of us who have lived in cities, esp NYC! okay at times it drifts in directions I am not certain of but the artistry of the pictures more than makes up for it. I found myself scanning the pictures closely looking for clues as he is ... really surprising and unique!

The Sound of the World By Heart is an odd and fascinating comic about humanity, sorrow and growing out of it with the help of love. A photojournalist flees his life to New York to do a photo shoot in the city full of coincidences and people who are hard to miss even if you try. His aim is not to talk for the next sixty days, but the city has other plans and the most important one of those has orange hair. The pace is quite slow at first and it takes a lot of time before this gets going, but when it does? Wow. The revelations were interesting and refreshing, I didn't see them coming, no no. Basically the best part of the comic is the end, which could've been longer. The beginning is slightly boring too and seems to go nowhere and that's a bummer. It also bothered me how this was a love song to New York without a reason behind it. Why did the journalist go there? What was the point? The comic is very meaningful and has hidden agendas, so this lack of explanation felt weird.

The art is awesome as well as the composition of the panels. The view angles were great and breathed a distinct feeling to the whole thing. I liked the eerie feeling and hollowness in this comic. The colors are steady and compliment the art well, although the whole thing feels slightly artsy and perhaps too intended? A philosophical slap against your face that you saw coming. The slice of life attitude is still the best part, really and the way Bevilacqua moves this story, so those in love with New York can surely appreciate this.

The first thing that struck me about this graphic novel is how visually stunning it is. I don't normally start off a review talking about the artwork, but this book just blew me away with beauty. I loved how the colours were so vibrant, while also looking natural and realistic. Each page was a pleasure to look at, especially the pages which featured illustrated photographs of New York, which made me feel like I was actually there with the character.

So now for the plot, which at times confused me in the early stages. We follow a heartbroken young man, as he explores New York while conducting an experiment of not speaking to anyone for sixty days. He walks around with headphones on and documents his exploration with the photo's, yet something strange starts happening. I can't go into further details than that because of spoilers, but at times the plot did make me question what I thought was going on. It did all make sense in the end though, and made for a beautiful read.

What I enjoyed most about this graphic novel, was just how real it felt, whilst being so powerful and raw. It's impressive how something with so few words can leave such a lasting impression upon a reader. I highly recommend this to anyone who is looking for a more quiet graphic novel, something which is both stunning and has a message behind it.