Written by: Ray Fawkes
Art by: Ray Fawkes
Publisher: ONI Press
In how many ways can you deal with love and loneliness? The People Within, a graphic novel written and illustrated by Ray Fawkes, explores this question as twenty four people go through various stages in their relationships including love and loneliness.
The People Within is a poetic story of the lives of twenty four people whom are going through a new stage in their relationships. Each couple is shown at different moments in their relationships, which are either love, exploring new ways to enjoy each others company, or finding a new path with someone else. Fawke’s black and white imagery helps the reader follow the panels of the story. It was best that this graphic novel doesn’t have color, or else it would’ve been too busy. The colors would have also taken away from the dark aspects in the novel.
I enjoyed the poetic storytelling as well as the art. Each couple has something unique that they share and as their panels reflect that, it also reflects how the relationship plays out over time. The panels in this graphic novel were hard to follow at times due to the quick change in scenes, due to this, some of the parts of the book didn’t keep my interest.
This graphic novels dark aspects remind me of the graphic novel Ghost, published by Dark Horse Comics. In Ghost, a young woman named Elisa searches to find the truth about her death. Her journey takes a few dark turns as the story progresses, which is similar to the darker side of the couple’s nature in The People Inside and how it is brought out in their interactions with others as well as within personal relationships. It’s similar to the dark times that several couples shared in The People Inside, including an unlikely and unforgivable moments that can’t be controlled.
