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Battle Born
Lapis Lazuli
Description
From the bestselling author of The White Donkey, a heartbreaking and visceral graphic novel set against the stark beauty of Afghanistan’s mountain villages that examines prejudice and the military remnants of colonialism.
In this hotly anticipatednew work from Maximilian Uriarte, creator of the popular Terminal Lance comics and The White Donkey, tells a “thrillingly cinematic” (Publishers Weekly) story of the personal cost of war and the power of human connection.
Lapis Lazuli is a rich blue semiprecious gemstone found deep in the Sar-i-sang mountains of Afghanistan’s Badakhshan province. For thousands of years it has sustained the nearby mining villages, whose inhabitants lived peacefully in the mountainous landscape–until the Taliban, known in the region as the Horsemen, came to seek the riches stored deep beneath the earth. Taliban rule has turned the stone into a conflict mineral, as they steal and sell it for their own gain.
At the behest of the fledgling Afghan government, seeking to wrest back control of the province, United States Marines are sent into the mountains. A platoon led by their eager and naive commander, First Lieutenant Roberts, and a stoic, fierce squad leader, Sergeant King, must overcome barriers of language and culture in this remote region to win the locals’ trust, and their freedom from Taliban rule. Along the way, they must also wrestle with their demons–and face unimaginably difficult choices.
A sweeping yet intimate story about brutality, kindness, and the remnants of colonialism, Battle Born: Lapis Lazuli is an epic saga from the voice of a new generation of military veterans.
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Praise
Praise for The Terminal Lance Ultimate Omnibus
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"Hilarious.... A winking self-awareness and compassion for the daily drudgery of the grunt's life make his collection more than a mere peek into a troop's insider experience--he's poised to become a Bill Maudlin for the social media generation."
—Publishers Weekly
—Publishers Weekly
"A clear-eyed view of life as a grunt.... The strips, drawn in a simple, unadorned style, sardonically depict the near-daily tribulations and occasional pleasures of military life.... A rare opportunity for those on the home front to get a sense of the true concerns and feelings of those deployed overseas."
—Booklist
—Booklist
Praise for White Donkey:
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"It was 2010 when Uriarte, a lance corporal in the Marine Corps, created the online comic 'Terminal Lance,' which swiftly developed a fan base. Using some of the same characters, he created a more serious and involved graphic novel, THE WHITE DONKEY, based on his 2007 deployment in Iraq."
—Carolyn Kellogg, The Los Angeles Times
—Carolyn Kellogg, The Los Angeles Times
"A masterpiece."
—Ray Olson, Booklist (starred review)
"In many ways, The White Donkey is one long illustrated deployment journal.... Yet, tucked into the panels and frames, are those singular moments that, like a rock cast into a pond, send their ripples out almost infinitely-altering lives and ending others. The White Donkey follows the tremors, backwards and forwards, and manages to illustrate what feels like a 'true' war story and a lonely chapter in a war our country is trying desperately to forget."
—The Washington Post
"In The White Donkey, a sense of alienation pervades Abe's experience. He endures the tedium of war, the yearning for action to gain legitimacy in the eyes of fellow Marines, and, finally, the horror of combat... all drawn with stylized realism."
—The Wall Street Journal