Minneapolis cartoonist planned to treat himself with latest book

Being a Vietnamese American led directly to Trung Le Nguyen becoming a cartoonist.

“When you don’t speak the language with the level of acuity that your peers do, you find other ways to communicate,“ said Nguyen, 35, who was born in a refugee camp in the Philippines and came to this country when he was 2 (his parents were Vietnamese boat people). ”So I’ve always doodled.“

Nguyen, whose graphic novel “Angelica and the Bear Prince” is out this week, wasn’t necessarily thinking those doodles would support him, as they now do. In fact, he sidelined his cartoons as something that was fun to do, rather than a way to make money. After he graduated from Totino-Grace High School, he studied art history at Hamline University, thinking he could keep art in his life that way but not have to rely on his own output to do it.

“Because I am the oldest child of an immigrant family, I felt like I needed to be super-responsible — none of which my parents actually foisted on me, by the way," said Nguyen, whose plan was to work in academia or at a museum. “Being near art, not actually making the art, seemed more responsible. That was the compromise. Then, I fell into cartooning almost by accident.”

Nguyen says his clear, detail-rich work is heavily influenced by magazine illustrations from the late 1800s and early 1900s, as well as childhood favorites like “Garfield” and the “Tintin” books.

Little projects led to bigger projects and, almost before he knew it, the south Minneapolis resident had produced a book, “The Magic Fish,” an autobiographical, fairy tale-inspired story about a Vietnamese American coming out and helping his parents learn English. The 2020 book was nominated for cartooning’s highest honor, the Eisner Award. It took a lot out of Nguyen, who also is gay and is married to social worker J Capecchi (the two met in high school).

“I don’t think about the emotional gravity of the subject when I tackle it. It’s just whatever is woven into the lives of my characters. But I got a little weary, after a while, of talking to people about my first book because it deals with immigration and queerness and coming out — heavy, heavy topics. You start to feel sad after you talk to 25 classrooms about that stuff,“ said Nguyen.

“Angelica” is about a teenager who is realizing that, like Nguyen when he was in high school, she’s spreading herself thin with too many activities. One of them is working on the school play, which stars her best friend and a mysterious student named Gable. Angelica develops a crush on Gable while also fending off her worried parents and grandmother. There’s definitely a romcom element to “Angelica” but it’s a lot more than that.

“Halfway through the book, I realized that it was about grief,” said Nguyen. “So the shape of it is a little unexpected, but it’s still aesthetically and thematically warm.”

It also includes matter-of-fact representation of a character who is nonbinary. Early in the book, readers, like Angelica, may have a hard time getting a bead on the character, who would likely use they/them pronouns. “Angelica” doesn’t make a big deal of this, though — an instinct that comes from Nguyen’s real life, which is filled with nonbinary folks.

“In my drawing, I do want the reader to identify the characters’ traits: their faces, their freckles and hair and clothes. But I feel like pronouns are something I wanted the characters to take charge of expressing. You might guess that this character appears to be gender-fluid,” said Nguyen. “You might not be able to identify their pronouns just by looking at them, and that mirrors the way we understand people’s pronouns when we meet them, when we don’t know and don’t want to assume.”

The impulse dates back to his time at Hamline, when Nguyen remembers a transgender friend worrying that no one would ever find them attractive. The cartoonist wanted “Angelica,” in which lots of people are into Gable, to show that there are many different ways to be a heartthrob.

Although the book is being marketed to young adults, Nguyen’s hope is that it crosses generations. Angelica’s relationship with her grandmother is bound to melt hearts, including well-observed details such as the granny’s remark that she leaves TV commercials on when she goes to get a snack, because the ad noises help make silence less lonely.

That’s a sad little detail, inspired by the fact that Capecchi works in eldercare, but it also sheds light on the specific ways that Nguyen’s characters misunderstand, learn from and love each other. In the end, the author/artist knows he has to leave it up to readers to determine how frothy or sad or painful his work his.

“Whenever anyone asks me what I want readers to take away from a story, I’m at a loss. I don’t think that way,” said Nguyen. “What I want is for the story to be a conversation.”

Angelica and the Bear Prince

By: Trung Le Nguyen.