But the point I was trying to make in my review is that, choosing a non-fiction, serious subject matter is not in itself sufficient. Katrina or the Holocaust alone won’t necessarily make a work of art compelling. I think the artist or writer still has to tell a good story, and that means using techniques normally employed by fictional novelists to translate a historical event into concrete, immediate experience. Maus proves that the graphic medium is a powerful tool because Spiegelman used an emotionally effective technique to tell his own story. Spiegelman’s “mice” work as a deeply trenchant metaphor for the human condition. I think Josh Neufeld’s work could have been more gripping if he had allowed himself more freedom to explore comic’s limitless possibilities.