My grandmother was a crier. She could, and would, cry over anything. A sappy love story, a broken dish, Mother’s Day flowers, you name it, she’d cry. She passed away when I was still in elementary school, but I can vividly remember asking her why she cried all the time. Her answer was to just cry, so I never did get a helpful retort. I have since learned that she couldn’t help it. I’m pretty sure it was just genetics and I, unfortunately, also have these particular genes.

I too cry over anything. It’s like some horrible defense mechanism when I feel too much. Super sad? I cry. Super mad? I cry. Happy? Cry. Stressed? Cry. Exhausted? Cry. It’s dumb. So, to say I cried while reading Pride of Baghdad doesn’t give it the credit it deserves.

I usually try to stay away from books that might make me cry, it becomes really difficult to read when you can’t see the words, and if I think I’m going to cry I’ll stop reading and wait to finish whatever until I’m alone. Unfortunately, I started to read Pride of Baghdad at the Geekhouse and even when I realized it was going to be a tear jerker, I couldn’t put it down.

I wholeheartedly apologize to whoever it was who asked me to get them a beer just as I finished it.

I have re-read it now four times and it has broken my heart every time. On the surface, this is a story based on real events in Baghdad, where a zoo was bombed, and the animals escaped. The story follows a small pride of lions as they roam the city. That’s what the story is about on the surface, but it’s about so much more when you dig deeper. It’s really about war. Why we go to war, why we stay in war, what atrocities happen to cause a war, and what atrocities happen during war. What happens to the bystanders and what happens to the soldiers. How war changes us, and how it forces us to remain the same.

Brian K. Vaughan, the same guy who brought you the crazy world of Saga, does an incredible job of touching on many different sides of such a controversial war in American History, without saying which side is right and which is wrong. He gives each point of view credence and I’m in awe of how he never tries to shove a message down his reader’s throats.

On top of this amazing story, Niko Henrichon’s illustrations are gorgeous, visceral and stomach turning at times.  It’s definitely not a kid’s book, but it could, and probably should, be studied in some upper level high school or college course.

Pride of Baghdad is my favorite “short story” of the graphic novel world and I cannot recommend it enough. But make sure you have a box of Kleenex handy.