Persepolis
(Non-Fiction) Satrapi continues the story — begun in her graphic novel Persepolis — of growing up in Iran after the Islamic Revolution. In Persepolis 2 her family sends her to study in Austria, where she endures the trials of first love in the harsh surroundings of an alien culture. When she can stand life abroad no longer she returns to the oppressive atmosphere of Tehran, only to endure a different kind of challenge: parties and lipstick are forbidden, and even the models at her art school are completely veiled. Satrapi's deceptively simple black and white panels ache with tenderness and emotion, and crackle with righteous anger. Like all coming of age stories, Persepolis 2 is hilarious and heartbreaking; like very few, it is also a powerful social history of a terrifying time and place.