{"id":29852,"date":"2024-05-21T08:00:43","date_gmt":"2024-05-21T08:00:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/?p=29852"},"modified":"2024-05-20T16:32:21","modified_gmt":"2024-05-20T16:32:21","slug":"frank-the-incredible-story-of-a-forgotten-dictatorship-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/2024\/05\/21\/frank-the-incredible-story-of-a-forgotten-dictatorship-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Frank: The Incredible Story of a Forgotten Dictatorship"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\nBy Ximo Abad\u00eda<\/strong>, translated by Esther Villard\u00f3n Grande<\/strong> (Europe Comics)
\nNo ISBN (digital-only edition)<\/p>\n

In these days of escalating crisis, relentless harrowing of democratic principles and the seeming triumph of imbecilic venality, it\u2019s perhaps of some comfort to realise that, in so many ways, it\u2019s always been like this…<\/p>\n

On view today is another digital-only edition from pan-continental collective imprint Europe Comics, which has brought a wealth of fresh and sublimely innovative material to English-speaking fans – at least those in the know. Moreover, if you like your books solid and substantial, it\u2019s a happy note to discover many adventures are being picked for English translation by companies like Cinebook, Top Shelf and IDW.<\/p>\n

Not this one, though. At least not yet…<\/p>\n

Illustrator Ximo Abad\u00eda<\/strong> P\u00e9rez was born in Alicante in 1983, and reared in both that bucolic countryside rural idyll and the (seasonally) cosmopolitan resort metropolis of Benidorm. Upon reaching 18 years of age, Abad\u00eda<\/strong> migrated to Madrid for his further education. His first graphic novel – Cartulinas de colores<\/em><\/strong> – was published in 2009. Two years later follow-up CLONK <\/em><\/strong>saw him nominated for the Best New Author Prize at the Barcelona Comics Festival. That was topped a year later by La Bipolaridad del chocolate<\/strong><\/em>…<\/p>\n

In 2018, he turned his masterful eye for stunning visuals and compelling symbolic design onto a period in his ancient country\u2019s recent history that seems to have been carefully, wilfully and voluntarily whitewashed from history. That book earned Abad\u00eda<\/strong> the Best Illustrated Album award at the 2018 Heroes Comic Con.<\/p>\n

Feeling like a seditiously subtle and subversive children\u2019s primer, Frank: La incre<\/strong><\/em>d\u00ed<\/em><\/strong>ble historia de una dictadura olvidada <\/strong><\/em>examines with garish glee and irresistible simplicity, the rise and demise of General\u00ed<\/strong>ssimo Francisco Franco Bahamonde<\/em> and his Nazi\/Italian National Fascist Party-backed totalitarian reign as \u201cCaudillo of Spain\u201d from 1939-1945. In strident imagery the author also asks why nobody in the country today is willing to or even comfortable about discussing those lost years when the country seemingly vanished from the wider world…
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\nStunningly evocative, and brain-blasting potent, the parade of iconic images deftly presents events and synthesises opinion: making no judgements but nevertheless delivering shattering testimony and an awe-inspiring appraisal of the depths some men may descend to, and how entire populations and nations can be complicit in cover-ups in the name of an easy life…<\/p>\n

This not a history book. It\u2019s a giant, irritant question mark no one should be comfortable acknowledging. And as we all know: things left to fester don\u2019t get better, they erupt in poison and spread further…
\n\u00a9 2019 DIBBUKS EDICIONE – Abad\u00eda<\/strong>. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Ximo Abad\u00eda, translated by Esther Villard\u00f3n Grande (Europe Comics) No ISBN (digital-only edition) In these days of escalating crisis, relentless harrowing of democratic principles and the seeming triumph of imbecilic venality, it\u2019s perhaps of some comfort to realise that, in so many ways, it\u2019s always been like this… On view today is another digital-only … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Frank: The Incredible Story of a Forgotten Dictatorship”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[81,63,122,111],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-29852","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-art-books","category-european-classics","category-historical","category-satirepolitics"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4AFj-7Lu","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29852","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29852"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29852\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29855,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29852\/revisions\/29855"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29852"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29852"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29852"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}