Colorful, about a married couple who travels from NYC to a small town in Mexico for work related/sabbatical reasons. The wife recalls a previous visit that did not go well and the husband takes photos and meets a photog. Swearing and bare skin/hook-up. Oh, and a monarch butterfly is a co-star.

I love knowing nothing about a graphic novel (or book or movie for that matter) and finding amazing little gems. That’s exactly what happened here. I just picked this up off the library shelf and flipped it open and thought “This looks interesting.” And it was. This is a personal journey and travelogue and family adventure roled into one. There were some things that you knew were going to happen, narratively speaking they were inevitable, and some things took me completely by surprise. But I thi...

I really liked this book, even with all of its faults. I particularly enjoy the breaking up of the book into parts, and how, with each segment, we see the migratory route of a single monarch butterfly. As both Jan and David note, the two main characters are not super likable or interesting, and their relationship struggles don't make sense as the central focus of this big, beautiful book. But the book's scope is both large and small. And while there are some frustratingly over-worn tropes about

Finally got around to finishing "Ruins" after having an on-and-off again reading relationship with it for a while. I think it was more of my own personal annoyance at the inherent pettiness that Samantha & George, two supposedly mature adults in a committed relationship, exhibited towards each other during the first half of the book that somehow prevented me from wanting to find out where their story goes as they tried to make something out of their stay in Oaxaca. The conflict escalation in the...

ExemplaryLet this graphic novel speak for itself. An American couple takes a sabbatical and a Monarch Butterfly takes wing on its round trip journey from Canada to Mexico. The title Ruins is metaphoric in many ways. Each reader will come to his or her own conclusions. At times lyrical, at others, harsh, the landscape and politics of Oaxaca come alive in the various mediums used. Based on the author’s experiences of living in Oaxaca during the 2006 Teacher’s Strike. Beautiful!

Bert bought me this when i was sick ! Thanks Bert. I love graphic novels and I love Mexico, so this was perfect. Initially I thought this was a memoir, but it's fiction but reads memoir style. The section with the butterflies is gorgeous. Loved the story and the artwork.xxx

Samantha and George, are an unhappy married couple, who decide to spend a year in Oaxaca, Mexico. They hope to use this time, so Sam can finish a book she is writing and George can rediscover his passion for painting. They also hope to mend a broken marriage.Paralleling, this story is the journey of a monarch butterfly, as it migrates, from Canada to Mexico.Wow! This was a terrific surprise and will end up being one of the best GNs I have read this year. It is well-written and it is gorgeously i...

Kuper Under the Mexican SunIt took me a while to get into this one. At first, relationship issues between Samantha and George take center stage, and I’m afraid I did not much care for those. Looking back, that was probably in part because I did not yet much care for Samantha and George.As soon as former photojournalist Alejandro arrives on the scene, however, the story, its characters, and its Mexican setting magically come to life. I suddenly started to notice the looseness and softness in Kupe...

Phenomenal. From the insects, to the style, to the politics, to the history, to the setting, to the complex realistic characters, to the relationship. Wow. Incredible.

RuinsPeter KuperJules Feiffer has this to say about Ruins: "Kuper's art is, page after page, astonishing."I agree. Yet it takes more than art for this story to jell. There are actually several different stories that do not significantly interact with one another.One story is about George and Samantha going to Oaxaca. Another is a teacher strike. Number three is Samantha's effort to get pregnant. Number four is the migration of the monarch butterflies. And on and on.None of it really reinforces t...

Kuper has really outdone himself here, methinks. I can't say that I'm well-versed in his work, but the general overall impression I've had from what I've read up to this point leans towards a sort of depressed cynicism laced with a sharp sense of humor. There's none of that here. It comes across pretty straightforwardly sincere and the colors and layouts and story communicate a genuine hopefulness despite the sad realities of life--ranging in impact and intensity from restlessness and miscommuni...

This is a swing-and-a-miss for me. Kuper attempts to interweave a lot of ambitious political, ecological, and personal themes, and he misses the mark (albeit in an admirable "noble failure" sort of way). Choosing to tell the story of Oaxaca and the 2006 teachers' strike massacre through the POV of two insufferable white New Yorkers puts Kuper at an incredible disadvantage, and he digs himself deeper by failing to effectively develop any characters except for George, one half of his ex-pat couple...

This was a lovely book! An American couple takes a sabbatical to Oaxaca, Mexico. Samantha wants to write and recapture something of her past. George has never been and is looking for a change. Their relationship morphs during their stay as each learns more about themselves and they get caught up in local politics. Chapters about them alternate with chapters showing a monarch butterfly on its migration. Peter Kuper's style has changed a bit over the years. He used to be all about stencils and har...

Jeff says:Alternating between following a monarch butterfly on its migration and a couple taking a year to live in Mexico, Ruins is a beautifully illustrated graphic novel featuring bugs, ruins, and the city of Oaxaca. George is an artist who just lost his job at a museum drawing bugs, and Samantha is a writer trying to finish a book. I really enjoyed the illustrations, especially of the butterfly’s travels and the landmarks in Mexico. The story of George and Sam is interesting but secondary to

Kuper's RUINS is a fictional travel diary/family drama of a couple's sabbatical in Oaxaca, Mexico. The story is juxtaposed with a single monarch butterfly's migration from New York to the butterfly reserve in Michoacán. The artwork was beautiful, and the story was well-done overall (the characters could have been developed a bit more), but overall this was a great combination of art and story. I really liked this one.4.5/5

A departure from Kuper's sort of alt/art comics style, his most accessible work to date. A big, ambitious book, but with softer lines than he usually uses, as he tries to tell a story more about humans than ideas. The story is about a couple traveling to Oaxaca, Mexico for the woman's, Sam's, sabbatical ostensibly so she can write a book. She also seems ready to have a baby. The guy, George, draws bugs for a living, or did--he just lost his job with a NYC museum, maybe the Natural History museum...

Oh man, this is a gorgeously produced work. The binding (there's a damn ribbon!), red edges, stunning end papers (bugs!), full color. Classy classy SelfMadeHero. I've read Kuper's more strictly autobiographical stuff ( ComicsTrips: A Journal of Travels Through Africa and Southeast Asia, Diario de Oaxaca: A Sketchbook Journal of Two Years in Mexico), and loved it.Here, he jumps off from that content, to create a more fully rounded (and fictional) story. A heterosexual amerikan couple follows the...

In the past few years I’ve made a conscious effort to get more into graphic novels. In that time I’ve discovered some real gems, and Ruins is among my favorites. It appealed to me because of its environmental theme, but I found so much more to love. For one thing, it’s a simply gorgeous book, what with the embossed title on the cover and spine, the red-edged pages, the built-in ribbon bookmark, and the entomological drawings on the endpapers. Luckily what’s inside is just as special as the packa...

In this gorgeous graphic novel we are treated to two parallel stories: the voyage of a butterfly on its long flight to Mexico, and the travels of a couple visiting Oaxaha. The main characters are a young couple: one of them is a writer, the other likes art, and together they navigate the beauty and perils of Mexico, experiencing heartbreak, joy and a bad tummy along the way. The artwork is simply beautiful. The plot itself was pretty good. I would recommend this to anyone who likes travel and a