Minoru Furuya of the west.

Although I'm not an avid graphic novel reader I think I still read more than my Asian peers.

I ate up all the commercialised bullcrap like Frank Miller and Alex Ross etc, but I'm still no expert in the new generation 'graphic novelists' as they call it nowadays.

When I stumbled across Adrian Tomine's book I realised how ordinary and depressing (result of ordinary) the stories are. You kinda forget about the 'graphic' part and focus on the 'novel' part.

I guess my surprise is that there is a niche in the comic industry with an absence of super heroes and action figures. And he does it so well.

Maybe because he's an Asian American, so he pulls the race stereotype card quite often. But who cares, I could relate. If you need some more credible reviews try here and here.