The illustrations are stunning and the story itself is haunting. It will leave you with a lot of questions, but it will be worth it!

'Tears of An Afghan Warlord' is a true story by Pascale Bourgaux and co-written by Vincent Zabus with art by Thomas Campi. It details a trip to Afghanistan in the early 2010s.

Pascale Borgaux is a Belgian journalist who has been travelling to Afghanistan for years. She has been there when things are more prosperous, but this time, there is some poverty and belt tightening. Her host is a resistance fighter named Mamour Hasan who is feeling the pressure from those around him to let the Taliban regain control. It seems that much of the aid money hasn't made it to his province. Pascale and those helping her document their trip find themselves in a bit of danger and have to leave the country.

The art is quite good and fairly colorful. The story is compelling and shows what can happen after your country has a war and some of the combatants leave. It's an ongoing story, so there is no resolution here, but I found it very interesting.

I received a review copy of this graphic novel from Europe Comics and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Thank you for allowing me to review this graphic novel.

the archive date for this title was originally set as 'not set'. however,after some days when I returned to download this book.,it was already archived. If this book was made available to me in any way, I would still love to read and review it on my blog

This was an excellent book and it really provided a wonderful clear viewpoint on a different culture. The art was also wonderful. I would recommend this to anyone who wants to read about a different land and people, but perhaps does not enjoy reading traditional non-fiction.

With careful and outstanding illustrations that give a weight to the setting and characters, this story of a Belgian journalist gives the story of Afghanistan from a non-US point of view. The encroaching of the Taliban at the withdrawal of the western forces echoes books like Malala's biography and show how little was really accomplished. As a way to bring this real-life tragedy to a different readership is a needed thing, well done to the writers and artist.

A very interesting story. I loved how the images are creating the basis for the story. A good background for the action and events taking place.

I had big hopes for this work. I have recently had the pleasure of reading non-fiction graphic novels and Tears of an Afghan Warlord looked like it was going to be informative, thought-provoking, and an easy-to-recommend work. This, however, was not to be. At. All. The work is confusing, unprofessional, poorly laid out, and if I’m perfectly honest, aggravating!

Allow me to explain.

As I started reading the work, I tried desperately to determine why this woman, Pascale Bourgaux, was traveling to Afghanistan. I knew she was a reporter but I had no clue as to what she wanted to report on. Once Pascale and her cameraman actually get to Afghanistan, we discover that the warlord, Mamour Hasan has invited her. But wait! In the next page, they’re trying to film a gathering of government officials and start chasing after Mamour as if they’ve never seen him before.

Huh.

Another scene that left me scratching my head was when Pascale is waiting to collect her bags at the Afghan airport. She spies a woman wearing a mini skirt and quickly runs over to her to tell her she shouldn’t be wearing an outfit like that and that the woman should come with her immediately to avoid getting in trouble. But in the very next panel, it appears that Pascale has climbed into a car and has left the poor woman standing alone on the sidewalk, still in her mini skirt.

What?!

Unfortunately, this would only be the beginning of poor layouts and artistic representation of the story. For example, at one point we see Pascale getting homesick. She begins to start tearing up and instead of the artist drawing a close-up of her face with tears running down her cheeks and a cleverly placed speech bubble with the word “sniff,” they decide instead to write “BOO HOO HOO.” This doesn’t happen once, dear readers, but twice. In a work that’s trying to discuss women’s rights and empowerment, these scenes totally detracted from that message. Have we not gotten past that very dated phrase to represent a woman’s sadness? Especially in graphic novels? The artist could have very tastefully shown Pascale was crying without reverting to a ridiculous phrase that cheapens the message the authors are trying to portray.

Another detrimental aspect of this work is how unprofessional the reporters are. I was absolutely floored when Pascale literally says, “Hey, you look like a Taliban with that turban on!” In a country where the majority of locals live in fear of the Taliban (which Pascale is well aware of), saying that they look like one is an incredibly ignorant thing to say. What’s more, we know this is actually what she said as this is her story and she is the author of the script. Readers, prepare to bury your face in your hands in exasperation.

It gets worse.

As I mentioned earlier, one of the aspects of the village that Pascale wants to film (which we figure out three-quarters of the way into the work) are the women. Pascale is well-aware of the traditions and culture and should be able to navigate these interactions properly. Right? WRONG. Oh dear reader…when Pascale asks to film one of the women, Nadiah, running errands in the bazaar, Nadiah says she can’t because she is worried about who will see them and worries for their safety. Pascale’s answer? “I insist.”

Yikes.

Nadiah eventually agrees and they enter a clothing shop. Pascale tries to get her to remove her burka in order to try on a scarf and starts preaching to the woman that the Americans fought the Taliban off so that she could be free of these “old traditionalist laws.” Nadiah fires back (thankfully) that if the burka was Afghanistan’s biggest problem, she would be very happy. She then tells Pascale that their village has greater things to worry about such as hunger, access to medicine, and educating their children. Nadiah also reminds Pascale that in her culture, the only man that can see her face is her fiancé. Once more, Pascale’s interactions are extremely disappointing because as a journalist and woman who has been in and out of Afghanistan for the past 10 years, she should KNOW this. And yet, here she is consistently demonstrating her ignorance and how little respect she has for the country, the culture, and the women that she apparently wants so desperately to represent.

I finished my reading with the back cover of the work which states that it will look at the “complex situation in a small Afghan village” and that this was once a place of fierce anti-Taliban action. I can honestly say now that I had no idea that this was what the book was showing. The novel never once says that the village was anti-Taliban. Further, the “complex situation” is just continually made worse by Pascale’s words and actions. In fact, there are several occasions when her cameraman has to tell her to stop as she is escalating the problem at hand.

Because the novel was contextually confusing and because Pascale’s actions were so aggravating, this is not a work I would recommend. Perhaps the documentary itself is clearer but the novelization is just a huge disappointment.

Wow - interesting to see a modern perspective of Afghanistan from the inside. This kind of reading is important because it gives you insights to the real situation that you might not be getting just from the media. It’s always way more complicated than you think - more complicated than anyone involved wants to let on. Whether its the difficulty in us helping the Afghan people because of corruption in Afghan leadership, or mistakes made by allies that make the Afghan people distrustful of the west as a whole. Take a look at this if you want some insight from the people themselves who are fighting insurgents.

<i>Thanks to NetGalley and Europe Comics for a copy in return for an honest review.</i>

An interesting read that offers insight into what Afghanistan is like from a non-U.S. perspective (the author is a Belgian journalist) and how the Taliban is still to this day a major force in the country.

The artwork in this book is beautiful, vivid and colourful. The book tells the true story of the Belgian journalist Pascale Bourgaux, who travels to a small village in the north of Afghanistan. It is a place that she has been visiting regularly for ten years.

When she gets there she finds that despite the presence of troops from US and Europe things havent changed. The village is controlled by the warlord and resistance fighter Mamour Hasan. He has done his best to develop a thriving local community, but their village is poor. Millions of dollars provided by the UN has been circumvented by Afghan politicians and the fledgling Afghan democracy is corrupt and inefficient.

Pascale is there to produce a documentary showing what life is like in Afghanistan. It is very dangerous for her and her fellow journalist, women still wear the burqa and young Afghan men are supporting the Taliban. It all seems hopeless.

Pascale is forced to reckon with reality. The Afghans have different priorities to the West. The burqa is not a major issue for the Afghan people, poverty is. Opium is still being produced and the villages are still run by warlords or by supporters of the Taliban. The presence of troops from the global North hasn't really changed lives for the Afghan people.

This is an interesting book with excellent art but I came away wondering what the book is trying to convey. I think the aim of the book is to raise questions about war and intervention and about whether it can really bring about social change and economic development. Or perhaps I read it too deeply and it is simply about the challenges facing Afghanistan.

Copy provided by publishers via Netgalley in exchange for an unbiased review.

A BIG Thank You to NetGalley for providing me a complimentary copy of “Tears of an Afghan Warlord” by Pascale Bourgaux in exchange for my honest review.

I had mixed feelings about this book and am going to just dive in to the pros and cons.

What really attracted me to this novel was the illustrations. Oh my God! The illustrations are simply breathtaking!! Every frame feels like a beautiful work of art done through watercolors. The way the characters are portrayed, and the majestic landscape is shown made me feel like I was enjoying the details of the graphics more than the story itself (which is actually true). Kudos to the talented Thomas Campi for his wonderful artwork skills.

The main problem I had with this story was in its focus. When I first started reading this novel, I had high expectations. I felt that it would be somewhat similar to the Ben Affleck movie “Argo”. However, the way the story was told was just out of place at times for me to get immersed in it. In the beginning, Pascale, the main character, goes to meet her friend Mamour, who is the Afghan warlord of his village, and the story focuses on how she sees his village succumb to the Taliban. Then, the story suddenly shifts focus to her interviewing the woman doctor of the town, and then again re-shifts to her wanting to suddenly escape the country, but not before doing a random side investigation on how 6 men are killed on an army jeep between the Germans and the Afghans. I realize that are all based on true facts, and I am not making light of the situation. However, it is really hard to get invested in the characters and the story when the plot just randomly shifts from one incident to another, without providing any kind of closure to them. At the end, I felt like I just read random incidents that the protagonist went through, which makes me a bit sad, because this is one of those books that has SO much potential to be better.

Having said that, I appreciate the author and team for their efforts in capturing the real live events that took place during their time in Afghanistan. While I may have mixed feelings about this book, it does open my eyes to appreciate how lucky we are as compared to those who are suffering in these economically poor countries. I really hope that there are more stories like this out there, where we get to read about real heroes who take the extra steps to get their stories told and educate the world.

Overall, I am giving this book a 4 out of 5 rating, 3 of which are mainly for the illustration and artwork.

An attractive, intelligent yet slightly naive European journalist gets back in touch with some Afghan sources, and finds them returning to the ways of the Taliban and their burka-heavy, sexist, racist, drug-growing, violent and Muslim ways. It's probably a narrative more suited to those with specialist interest - especially for the layman the book suffers as, for example, while it hinges so much on her making a film, we never find out the success, intended audience or nature of said reportage.

This graphic novel was unlike anything I've ever read before and for that, I have to give it credit. There were moments that I was completely pulled into the story, but at times I found myself less interested. It was good but not amazing.