Justine
Forsyth Harmon
Reviewed by Lucy Shapiro
Justine, an illustrated novel written and drawn by Forsyth Harmon, is an intimate, little thing meant to be swallowed whole. We meet Ali just as she falls into the cavern that is Justine, the girl behind the counter at the Stop & Shop. Throughout Justine, Ali intensely studies the titular character’s embodied chaos through the lens of longing, and while this is the engine of the book, it is a quiet one, because this isn’t just a story about the sexuality of a teenage girl: it is about all the forces leaning in on her, bending her toward self-destruction.
Though Justine seems to envelop this story, it is Ali who we know intimately, whose supremely adolescent existence burns quietly on the page, while Justine remains something akin to a spiteful phantom, thrashing around and breaking things, but doing little to prove her existence. For Ali, though, the slightest contact with Justine leaves a deep impression, evidenced by a rapidly-developing eating disorder and a newfound penchant for shoplifting.
Forsyth Harmon’s sweet illustrations lend a strangely immediate nostalgia to the experience of reading—as though we’re looking through the scrapbook of a life, simple objects and small moments gleaming with importance. It is fitting, then, how defined this book is by its era, the 90’s serving as just as much a setting as Long Island for these teens.
I’ll forgive Harmon the rude punch that ends the book (no spoilers) for the charm that emanates from its pages and for my satisfaction with the way it is cut off right at the moment where many storytellers would lean in. Harmon is not concerned with punchy plot points, sentimentality, or wise commentary. The result is a book so intimate it feels wrong to read—something deeply honest, and painfully relatable.