Beirut

Lebanese artist Rima makes her English-language debut with this robust mix of memoir, history, and magical realism, which gathers her graphic novel trilogy into one volume. Rima’s nonlinear narratives zigzag through a period of relative peace and prosperity in the first installment, “Beirut,” which takes place in 1995. In “Beirut Bye Bye,” she captures the scene in 2015, when a waste management crisis overtook the city, igniting protests against an ineffective and corrupt government. In the final section, “Beirut Rewind,” Rima returns to the city in 2017 to publicize her latest book and reunites with the spirit of her mother, who briefly takes her back to 1967, when “socialism, Arab unity, anti-imperialism, and Palestine inflamed passions among Arab youth.” In response to the dizzying swirl of political strife, Rima expresses mostly ambivalence about her troubled hometown, lamenting, “Each time I appear in the story it’s to say, ‘Quick, let’s run away!’ ” Conversely, she also confesses, “I long to look back.” Rima nimbly handles the shifts in time with evocative, gestural drawings that capture how sociopolitical upheavals reverberate across generations. Throughout, her restless blend of the personal and the political thrums with urgency. Readers will have a tough time putting this one down. (Sept.)