Cannon

by Kevin Wolf

I don’t normally begin a review with a recommendation, but I will this time, because I highly recommend Cannon by Lee Lai, for its amazingly real dialogue as the pressure builds on the protagonist until having their—I don’t actually know “their” or “her” pronoun—cathartic psychotic break. Dialogue is the author’s strength and leaves the reader to figure out what goes unsaid. Out-of-control situations (e.g. horror movies, the cover) are illustrated with a red wash in an otherwise black and white fictional graphic novel. Even before the book’s opening credits, we see the start of that psychotic break, before watching the actual buildup to the events happening about three-fourths (224 – 229 of 300 pages) the way through Cannon. “Cannon” is the nickname that Patricia (“Trish”) gives her high school best friend, Lucy—becoming “Luce,” then loose cannon becoming “Cannon” all in fun, right … until it’s not. Cannon (and Cannon) is filled with often underlying serious subjects, but casually presented in conversation (including the “Uh”s, “likes,” and … hesitations) between friends, relatives, sexual partners, employee/boss and workmates. All while Cannon’s seeming unflappable personality is surrounded by betrayals, sexual harassment, and grandfather’s deteriorating health undermining her real desires. If you haven’t figured it out already, Cannon means the book and Cannon means the protagonist. We readers, as outsiders, recognize that there are many off-panel events that occurred because in-panel conversations allude to earlier decisions that are now being undone.

Cannon, pre-break, is the type of person that goes along to get along by accepting other’s demands of her. Her elderly Grandfather (Gung Gung in Cantonese) is becoming harder to care for, while Cannon’s mother is estranged from him. Cannon’s high school friend (Trish) and new sexual partner (Char) will betray Cannon. Gung Gung’s home health aide gives a strong recommendation (“I’ll give you two weeks to find someone else [51]” to be an aide or he be moved into an assisted living facility. Cannon’s mother (his daughter) is no help. Cannon wants and needs time off from work, but her employer (Guy) takes away her/their days off Cannon had been promised.

With flashbacks to high school, we see how Cannon and Trish became best friends when Trish rescued Cannon from being bullied into a school project she didn’t want, but would’ve otherwise reluctantly accepted. Soon after this time, we see her grandmother’s funereal wake and how Gung Gung verbally abused his daughter, Jennifer (and Cannon’s mother), extending the father/daughter estrangement.

In the present and in their thirties, Trish, is working on getting a book published, but appears to be using Cannon’s life for a storyline. Cannon is caring for her grandfather and working as a cook full-time. Cannon gets sexually involved with a new co-worker, Char. Cannon is physically sexually harassed at work by the restaurant owner, Guy. Benji, another cook, complaining about his shift change asks Cannon to speak for him to Guy. Benji says Cannon keeps a “cool head” but she sees herself as a “pushover” (120). At this point Cannon questions her sanity (“When you get mad … do you ever see things, like, stuff … that isn’t actually there [121].” That “stuff” are black and white magpies that seem to “appear” in scenes, inside and outside, in Cannon’s presence, though no one else notices the birds. Pressure keeps building in Cannon only needing a fuse to blow (pun intended).

While trying to care for herself out jogging, Cannon listens to meditation recordings, which is almost ironic in that they reinforce the stress and pressures that are all around her. Even her jogs are physically harming her with blistering and inflamed feet and heel pain from plantar fasciitis. Cannon gets stretching exercises from a massage (or perhaps physical) therapist. Other than the meditation recordings, Cannon doesn’t seek care for her mental health. The irony abounds by either ignoring or doing the opposite of the recordings (e.g., hearing “that’s why I believe so wholeheartedly in the mindful breathing [161]” while huffing and puffing during a jog). The massage/physical therapist does offer some mental health advice (“… running allows our bodies to feel like we’re getting away from that metaphorical lion that’s chasing us. Right? But then when we’re running so much that the body starts breaking down, it really begs the question – what are we going to do about that metaphorical lion [166 – 167]?”

For the reader to get a feel for the dialogue in Cannon, here’s a sample of a realistic, extended conversation between Cannon and Trish as the pressure builds on Cannon.

Cannon: Things are changing with my Gung Gung. He’s needing more now.

Trish: [Insensitively,] You’re not tempted to just put him in a home

C: I don’t want to shove him in a home with a bunch of white people. That shit is, like, double his current rent. Plus I think I’d go to ancestor hell if I did that.

T: I mean, if you really wanted to do the perfect-grandchild right, you could move him in with you.

C: …

T: Yeah, I wasn’t really being serious, you’ve told me stories of what he’s like. What’s Jennifer doing

Cannon: Nothing yet. Anyway, this is my responsib [Trish interrupts]

T: [Angrily] SERIOUSLY? Come on!

C: What! She’s the one who actually had to be raised by him.

T: And she’s had a few good decades of avoiding the dude. But she’s a fucking adult now.

C: I’m an adu … [Trish interrupts]

T: You bought her, like, ten extra years. You’ve done your part.

C: [While we see a flashback of Jennifer with a bloodied nose—presumably from her father] It’s different for her. She … He’s … not like that with me. I can handle it. It’s not like I’m not telling her what’s going on. I’ve been asking to have a proper conversation to figure out— [Trish interrupts]

T: Ask for more, Cannon. Jennifer’s not the kind of person who … She needs pushing!!

C: I’m not going to push her, Trish! … I’m not like him.

…

[emphasis in original, 71 – 73]

Much later, Cannon has a panic attack at work. After being brought home, she screams into her bed blanket. Then she’s off to care of her grandfather who she finds has fallen and has labored breathing—requiring an ambulance trip to a hospital—all culminating with the Cannon’s psychotic break—the only real form of release that she has. Up until that break, no one in Cannon’s life will ease her burden or can be trusted to not betray her … at least on some level. So, the psychotic break—the destruction of her workplace—makes complete sense as her only release valve.

Here’s an aside that probably only means something to me and no other readers. I had initially mis-guessed the type of birds that only Cannon had noticed. From the cover, I had thought they were red-tailed black birds. At a recent book signing, I asked the author about the birds; and before I could say what I thought they were, she said they were magpies. However, from the twenty-some types of magpies there are some that are red-billed, but none (except the Sri Lanka blue magpie in southwestern Sri Lanka) have red feathers. But Cannon’s story takes place in Canada, not Sri Lanka. The black and white black-billed magpie (Pica hudsonis) is only found in Canada.  So, the bird isn’t actually red-feathered, but a black and white magpie and only “red” as symbolic of the anxiety building in Cannon. Though an author can imbibe a symbol with special meaning, Magpies historically have symbolized, intelligence, joy, deception, socializing, and illusion. Their meaning in Cannon is left to the reader or critic to decide. Because only Cannon slightly acknowledges the magpies’ presence out of the corner of her eye and in a few conversations with others, I see them as part of the slow build-up of pressure on Cannon to perform for others and not supporting Cannon’s own well-being. And the birds persist even after Cannon’s cathartic break. After the break, Cannon asks Trish “Do you see birds, ever [271]?”

Some relationships are broken in Cannon, but are they beyond repair? Some repairs are begun, but realistically not resolved because … aren’t we all a work in progress.

Stone Fruit, Lee Lai’s first graphic novel (Fantagraphics Books, 2021) won the Ignatz award for Outstanding Graphic Novel and Outstanding Artist in 2021 among other awards.