Aaron and Ahmed: A Love Story

The war on terror is transmuted into a quasi-mystical odyssey in this hardheaded, thoughtful collaboration between novelist Cantor (Krazy Kat) and artist Romberger (Seven Miles a Second). Narrator Aaron Goodman is a therapist who lost his wife on 9/11, and in trying to avenge her death, ends up dispiritedly helping to torture Guant%C3%A1namo detainees. There, in a place of brutal and randomly improvised experimental interrogations, he connects with one thoughtful prisoner, Ahmed, ultimately hatching an undercover scheme that will take the two of them back to Pakistan. Cantor's tragic narrator becomes subsumed in self-doubt once he's in Ahmed's hands, worrying if he's being played for a sucker even while his fate and heart become inextricably intertwined with Ahmed's. The narrative spins off down a line of historical and philosophical inquiry about words and beliefs as dangerous viruses that evokes everything from The Manchurian Candidate to the novels of Neal Stephenson. While the story is, on the surface, a dramatic piece of post-9/11 paranoia and espionage game playing (Cantor's vibrantly dark text delivering more potently than Romberger's jagged, somewhat generic art), it turns into a brave, occasionally frightening investigation of the very nature of belief. (Apr.)