Gemma Bovery HC (2005 Pantheon) comic books

1st printing. Story and art by Posy Simmond. Gemma is the bored, pretty second wife of Charlie Bovery, the relunctant stepmother of his children and the bete-noire of his ex-wife. Gemma's sudden windfall and distaste for London take them across the Channel to Normandy, where the charms of French country living soon wear off. Is it a coincidence that Gemma Bovery has a name rather like Flaubert's notorious heroine? Is it by chance that, like Madam Bovary, Gemma is bored, adulterous, and a bad credit risk? Is this inevitably doomed? These questions consume Gemma's neighbor, the intellectual baker, Joubert. Denying voyeurism, but nevertheless nothing every change in the fit of her jeans, every addition in Gemma's wardrobe, her love-bites and lovers, Joubert, with the help of the heroine's diaries, follows her path toward ruin. Adultery and its consequences. Disappointment and deception. The English in France. Fat and slim. Then and now. Many familiar ingredients of the novel are given new life in Gemma Bovery's unique graphic form. Hardcover, 9-in. x 12-in., 106 pages, B&W. Cover price $19.95.