The guy has problems relating to people, doesn't know how to have conversations that get beyond the surface level, but he really wants to. I am told this is semi-autobiographical, as it features a guy who does illustration/art for a living. One of my top ten graphic novels of the year, In, a first graphic novel by Will McPhail, whose work is best known in the US through his New Yorker cartoons, maybe. Illustrated in both color and black-and-white in McPhail’s instantly recognizable style, In elevates the graphic novel genre it captures his trademark humor and compassion with a semi-autobiographical tale that is equal parts hilarious and heart-wrenching-uncannily appropriate for our isolated times. Nick’s journey occurs alongside the beginnings of a relationship with Wren, a wry, spirited oncologist at a nearby hospital, whose work and life becomes painfully tangled with Nick’s. But it isn’t until he learns to speak from the heart that he begins to find authentic human connections and is let in-to the worlds of the people he meets.

He haunts lookalike fussy, silly, coffee shops, listens to old Joni Mitchell albums too loudly, and stares at his navel in the hope that he will find it in there. Nick, a young illustrator, can’t shake the feeling that there is some hidden realm of human interaction beyond his reach.

A poignant and witty graphic novel by a leading New Yorker cartoonist, following a millennial's journey from performing his life to truly connecting with people

In the graphic novel will mcphail