A Few Perfect Hours
Booklist (September 15, 2004, p. 217)
by Ray Olson

Travel sometimes figures in other autobiographical comics, but Neufeld, with a few written contributions by his companion, Sari Wilson, here pioneers the travel book in comics. In the early 1990s, when he and Wilson were in their mid-twenties, they backpacked in Southeast Asia and later, during a year in Prague, in central Europe. Although Neufeld offers some illustrated "travel tips" — on such nitty-gritty topics as "Bathing in the Tropics" and "Gynecology on the Go" (a Wilson piece) — the book is far more valuable as a memoir than for its tourist information. Unencumbered by group-travel agendas and timetables, the couple had genuine adventures. They spelunked, dangerously, and overnighted with Baptist missionaries (Neufeld and Wilson are very secular Jews) in Thailand; farm-labored for an evening in Malaysia; were extras in a Singapore TV show; and served as English-practice-givers for an ice-cream man on a hot train laid over in Belgrade. Neufeld's comics style is straightforwardly presentational, with few odd angles and broad variation in the amount of detail rendered, which seems perfect for this material.

YA/M: Older teens contemplating their own backpacking adventures may be fascinated, especially if they also dream of traveling with close companions. RO.