Growing up in a family of artists can bring a life of passion—with the freedom to express emotions and exposure to a wide range of creative mediums—but such a life is not always easy to navigate. Lily Kim Qian skillfully captures the tenderness and tumult of this type of childhood in her beautifully rendered graphic memoir Until We Meet Again. Born to Chinese immigrants in Canada, Qian experienced a childhood filled with the wonders of the visual arts: Her architect father and painter mother were both often at work on their respective canvases. That is, unless they were engaged in heated arguments, the fervor and fury of which would send young Lily into spirals. These moments, which will be familiar to those who grew up in unstable households, are masterfully captured, with dark blots of color interspersed with violent flashes of brightness or with abstract and surreal images of her parents entangled in an eternal brawl. Qian illustrates her childhood with such detail and heart that the resulting book is not only a catharsis but something close to a cure.
The main thread in this book is the disappearance and reappearance of Qian’s mother, whose undiagnosed mental illness leads to familial turbulence. After her parents’ divorce early in Lily’s childhood—an event which brings her much relief—Lily is forced to move back and forth between each parent’s house. While her father struggles financially, he is able to provide her with the emotional support that her mother cannot. Her mother, instead, grows increasingly paranoid, accusing friends and family of stalking or interfering in the divorce and custody proceedings, and has strange outbursts that the young Lily cannot comprehend. Eventually, she disappears without a word for several years. As Lily and her father move across Canada several times, already disrupting any semblance of a normal childhood, her mother sporadically reappears in their lives, bringing more chaos. Eventually, when Lily is in eighth grade, the three of them move to Shanghai, where Lily’s father hopes that proximity to his in-laws will bring more stability. The culture shock sends a puberty-addled Lily into deep insecurity, which she only manages to get through with the help of art. After returning to America, Lily discovers her voice, creating what eventually becomes this book.
By working through these wounds in Until We Meet Again, Qian delivers a memoir that feels like the first step in the lifelong process of healing.