Puerto Rico Strong by various contributors

Rating: WARTY!

This is from an advance review copy for which I thank the publisher.

This comic collection of shorts was put together quickly with the intention of raising money to aid victims of Hurricane Maria, which hit In late September 2017, and from which Puerto Rico is still recovering, hampered by failure to get the same rapid response that Texas got after Hurricane Harvey hit just a month before.

Texas is back on its feet. No one talks about the hurricane any more. But where is Puerto Rico? Still mired. Why? Puerto Ricans are American citizens, but Puerto Rico is poor and has no voting rights. The response to their plight has been nothing short of shameful, and my feeling is that this comic doesn't help because it's just as much of a mess as Puerto Rico is right now. In this case it's not due to a hurricane, shameful mismanagement, a clueless president, and a poor response from the US government; it's due to poor editing and an indifferent selection of stories which could have been better presented.

Puerto Rico is a commonwealth territory of the United States of America, and to describe it as the poor cousin is about as on-target as you can get. Unemployment is double what it is in the rest of the US, which is why people leave Puerto Rico to move to the mainland, and this out-flux of population reduces the tax base and contributed somewhat to throwing the island further into debt. Poverty there is rife and the USA has treated this territory, gained after the American Spanish war of 1898, shabbily to say the least.

The problems are not all because of Maria though. Puerto Rico was poor and in debt to the tune of seventy billion dollars before Maria hit because its own government has mismanaged everything, but it's not all on that government. Puerto Rico is also strapped by an act of Congress that will not let foreign ships deliver goods directly to Puerto Rico. This is the act that the president had to waive for a period after Maria came roaring through, in order to maximize the aid that could be brought in. That waiver was short though, and arguably ineffective.

Why this insanity hasn't been overturned is as much a mystery as it is a tragedy, but since Puerto Rico has no say in its own destiny, due to being very effectively a vassal "state" of the US, things aren't likely to improve until Congress and the Senate both are cleansed of special interests and those members owned by big business, the oil companies, the NRA and so on, are tossed out on their bribed ears and Puerto Rico is either admitted to statehood or granted independence and full self-determination whichever its population wants.

It has a population higher than thirty of the fifty US states, and that's with the majority of Puerto Ricans now living outside of Puerto Rico. If they all lived on the island, and it was a state, it would be the thirteenth most populous state while having by far the lowest median household income. But you won't read that in this comic.

Puerto Rico is so badly-off that it has also been getting about two billion dollars yearly through the Nutrition Assistance Program since the early nineteen-eighties. Complaints are that this assistance has been flat, but Puerto Rico's population has shrunk a lot, too, so maybe it's not so flat? But you won't read anything about that here either.

You'll also learn very little of the history of Puerto Rico from this graphic novel. Yes, there is a lot of history shown, but it's a very biased and repetitive history showing stories of the Taíno people and little else. The contributors ought to have collaborated more so that instead of a dozen stories of the Taíno, we got one or two of those and more stories of other aspects of Puerto Rico's history which, as the name suggests, is very rich, unlike the financial circumstances of the people who live there, especially post-hurricane when more than fifty percent of Puerto Ricans were left in Poverty. But you won't read of that in this comic book either. Again, a better spread of information, and a move diverse subject matter would have made for a better comic.

The problem with the stories of Puerto Rico's history is that they all tell the same stories mostly of older history and nothing recently. There are too many stories of of the Taino for example, and of Puerto Ricans serving in the US military from World War One onwards, and these stories leave little room for anything else to be told. I believe one story even suggested that Puerto Rico was granted the status it has so that the US could draft troops during World War One, but that seems unlikely given the facts and how Puerto Rico was viewed back then by the US government (as primitive, backward and substandard).

What's missing is recent history. What's too often missing is the rich culture. What's missing is geography and wildlife. One glaring example of omission is the onslaught of the Zika virus which ran from 2015 well into 2017, causing 8,000 cases per month for a while. It was declared over (in that cases had dropped to very low levels) only three months before Maria hit. Maria probably killed off the last of it by destroying the mosquitoes which carried it, but they'll be back. There's not one mention of the Zika virus epidemic. Has the Puerto Rican diaspora forgotten about that already? Or where they never aware of it?

The Taíno were the original inhabitants of the island which have largely been wiped-out, or subsumed over the last five hundred years through inter-marriage with the Spanish invaders and the African slaves. They spoke an Arawakan language. Smallpox killed ninety percent of these people, but you won't read that in this graphic novel, although there is a brief mention, if I recall, of the depredations of 'imported' diseases. In 2010, less than one tenth of one percent of the island's population self-identified as native American although you won't read that in this graphic novel. All you;ll read about is how many have "Taíno blood." The representation of the Taíno in these stories makes it look like everyone in Puerto Rico is Taíno, but that's very misleading.

There are 41 stories here in 190 pages (excluding additional material), which means that they are all short, some of them very much so, and once again I have to take the editors to task because sometimes it's really hard to tell where one story ends and the next starts. Some of the stories were really good, but most of them were average to very poor, and this assessment includes both writing and artwork, so the consistency is really patchy. Note that the contents page has the page numbering wrong (nor is it clickable/tappable to jump to a given story or to return to the contents page), and one story "From Within" is not evident in the actual content without a search. Here's a brief mention of each:

• Hereby Ronnie Garcia told a story bemoaning Puerto Rico's fate, but telling us little else. While it was well-drawn, the text was almost illegible in parts, so the story was significantly diminished and it was not that impressive to begin with.
• Madre de Dios by Daniel Irrizarri Oquendo is a single image and a poem incorrectly telling us that juracán was the Taíno god of chaos. In truth, it was the goddess, Guabancex (aka Gua Ban Ceh) who was of chaos - or more specifically of earthquakes, storms, and volcanoes. Juracán was merely the name of the winds she spawned from time to time.
• Helping Hands written by Alan Medina, art by Ariela Kristantina. It was only the change in artwork which announced this since the title was nowhere in evidence on the first page of the story. It shows up on page three which is the last page of the story. The artwork had a scrappy look to it, and I rather liked it, but I had no good idea what this story was about.
• Pasitos Grandes written by Tristan J Tarwater, art by Cynthia Santos. Pasitos means little steps, so this title is a contradiction in terms: Big Little Steps. It's set in 2062 and looks back over Puerto Rican history, but it says barely a word about Hurricane Maria. the artwork is abysmal.
• Areytos written by Vita Ayala, art by Jamie Jones. Areyto or areíto refers to a religious song/dance which the Taínos enter-Taín-ed themselves with. This story has interesting, moody art and tells of the resistance, led by Agüeybaná Segundo, aka El Bravo to Spanish depredations in the early sixteenth century.
• Gods of Borikén by Sabrina Cintron. Borikén is another name for Puerto Rico. This is just a very average one page image.
• Stories from my Father written by Adam Lance Garcia, art by Heidi Black. This tells of a young girl visiting Puerto Rico. It's nicely drawn and colored, but it really doesn't say anything. It's trying to say that people who have ancestry in a certain location ought to try to reconnect to that location, but there is absolutely no good rationale as to why anyone should do this, and there's certainly no point in trying to make people feel guilty if they don't! Way to domineer!
  If they want to, then fine, but it's every individual's choice and there's no obligation whatsoever on anyone to connect with or even acknowledge your roots. To portray a young girl as somehow lacking something because she can't connect with Puerto Rico is an abuse as far as I'm concerned and the author should be ashamed. For goodness sakes, we all come from Africa originally, so there is as much of a 'call' to reconnect there as there is anywhere else, so why not tell that story? This one made no sense whatsoever!
• Resiliance (sic) by Lamplight written by Aldo Alvarez, art by Sofia Davila. The word is actually Resilience, editors! The Spanish word for it is resistencia, so this is simply a case of misspelling. It appears to be only a two page non-story consisting of a title page and a pointless drawing of two people's heads as light bulbs. I assume it has to do with the sluggish return of electricity to the island, but who knows?
• From Within by Nicole Goux. This was in the contents, but I could not find it in the actual stories unless it is the untitled and unattributed pastel-shaded story that actually precedes Resilience by Lamplight. It was not of interest to me.
• A Broken PROMESA by Rosa Colón. PROMESA is the acronym for the Puerto Rico Oversight, Management, and Economic Stability Act. This story, more text than art, is one of the few which actually makes a coherent, worthwhile, informative, and educational contribution, but it's not a story, merely a five-page précis of the comedy of errors in governing Puerto Rico. It's one of the few which blames the island for at least a part of the post-Maria woes. I liked this one very much.
• Thanks for Nothing by Tom Beland. Simplistically drawn and sarcastic, this is an entertaining view of the mismanagement of aid post-Maria.
• La Casita of American Heroes written by Anthony Otero, art by Charles Ugas. This is another story which has no title at the beginning. The thing that looks like a title is 'Fajardo', which is actually the name of a small town in eastern Puerto Rico, but it's not the title of the story! We don't see that until nine pages later, on the last page of the story. Is this a manga that I should read it backwards?! This story has very average art work and starts out well enough, but then it dives headlong into another tale of how many Puerto Ricans fought in how many US wars. It tells us not a single thing about the ravages of Maria. You now, the wars are history, I've never understood the morbid American obsession with them. The problems with Maria are now! Can we deal with those, please?
• Yúcahu and the Creation of the First Man by Little Corvus. Yúcahu (known by several similar names) is the of fertility in Taíno mythology. This is simply a one-page illustration that shows two near-naked guys together in a pond. Fine if that's how two guys want to spend their time! I have no problem with that per se, but neither of them look Puerto Rican or Taíno, so what, exactly, does this have to do with anything?
• A Taíno's Tale written by Shariff Musalam, art by Alejandro Rosado. This is another poorly illustrated history. Didn't like it.
• Of Myth and Monsters written by Marco Lopez and Derek Ruiz, art by Jamie Jones. This was a mildly amusing and amusingly illustrated story about the Chupa Cabra which is typically taken to mean 'goat eater', but which actually means 'sucks goat' which could have led to an interesting and amusingly perverse story, but this wasn't it; however, it was better than too many of the other stories here.
• El Vampiro de Moca by Leonardo Gonzalez is a really scrappy one page image which ought to have been left out of this collection.
• Family Ends with Me written by Lilliam Rivera, art by Allison Strejlau is a tale of how women were sterilized but it places the story in 1969 long after these sterilizations ended - unless the author knows something I don't. When I say ended, I mean in Puerto Rico - they were still going on for Latina wimen in the sixties and seventies in California, believe it or not. American Nazism has never died out.
• La Operación by Ally Schwed is also the name of a documentary film by Ana María García on the same topic. While sterilization had been instituted many times in Puerto Rico, the only one that really succeeded in its evil aim was begun on May 13, 1937 and ran unhindered until the law was overturned as late as June 8, 1960! This story has the sterilizations going on into the 1970s, but I cannot find independent documentation of that. However, it doesn't matter when they ended, because they should never have begun and the people who did this should be in jail.
  No matter how long it actually lasted, in the end about a third of women of childbearing age had been sterilized in Puerto Rico. How is the US government any better than the Nazis in this regard? Seriously? This was an important story, but I would have liked it better had it delivered more information in a less sensational manner. The story implies that no one was informed about the permanence of tubal ligation, which cannot be guaranteed to be successfully reversed by any means.
  There was a study in the mid-sixties which indicated that only a third of the subjects/victims did not know it was permanent, which is a nauseating number admittedly, but I don't know if that means that the other two-thirds learned of this beforehand (or figured it out for themselves) or if some or all of them did not know this until later. I don't believe Puerto Rican women are completely stupid or gullible. They can be misled as anyone can, but do we know if any elected to have this operation as a deliberate and deliberative choice to take charge of their own family size - or were they all duped as this story implies?
  I find that latter option rather insulting to Puerto Rican women and their intelligence. Is it possible that some women, even if it was a small percentage, knew what this was all about from the off and chose it as a means of birth control? I believe it is, but there seems to be no readily available information one way or the other about this, which is concerning, but not as concerning as this whole affair is, let's face it.
• The Puerto Rican Birth Control Trials by Ally Schwed. This is a sort of sequel to this author's previous story, and this one is about the testing of the birth control pill on Puerto Rican women - a pill which contained significantly more medication than is considered appropriate now. Women got sick, a handful died.
  The artwork is equally as simplistic as it was in the previous story (and has the same color scheme), but that's acceptable to me because this story is an important one and needs to be widely known. It's yet one more inexcusable abuse.
• Breaking Bread written by Tara Martinez, art by Rod Espinoza. This was a breath of fresh air. It was a beautifully written and gorgeously illustrated story and my favorite of the whole collection. It tells a simple but important story of keeping hold of the little things and the simple pleasures in life no matter what. All of us need that.
• The Dragon of Bayamón written by Jeff Goez and Fabian Nicieza, art by Adriana Melo. Bayamón is a city just south of Puerto Rico's capital of San Juan and this tells of a young kid visiting this area where he's never been before and knows nothing about. He fears his father of whom he has little and not good recollection, but his mother sent him to Puerto Rico, so he has to put up with it. It's a little predictable in that you know from the start that he's going to start feeling at home there, so there were no surprises, but the story was decent and the artwork pleasant.
• On Traditions & Being Homesick by Jesenia Santana wasn't of interest to me at all, but the art was not bad. And she has a very cool name! And it was short!
• Con Amor LES by Kat Fajardo was an uninteresting one page postcard of an illustration. Com Amor means with Love, but I have no idea what LES stands for.
• Cocinar written by Vito Delsante, art by Yehudi Mercado was yet another one which had no title at the beginning (it was at the end again). It looked like Kat Fajardo's one page illustration was the opening page for this story! Bad editing. The story is about a cook (which is what the title means) who is starting a new job and pleasing the restaurant's owner by turning out a family treat which she happened to like, but I have to ask if she wants Puerto Rican cooking so badly, then why not go back and live in Puerto Rico? I don't have any time for whining and nostalgia. Deal with where you are, or go back home!
• Family written by Grant Alter, art by Manuel Preitano. Having one family title after another (especially one that's also about food, at least in part) I think is another example of bad editing. Maybe if certain editors had quit trading Voltron GIFs and spent more time focused on their job, this would have been better put together? That's not this author's fault though. The problem here is that this story really doesn't tell us anything except to help with hurricane relief any way we can. One page would have sufficed for that, although it's actually self-evident.
• Dreamer by Kristin Van Dam was an untitled, unattributed, unsigned single page. The art was not bad, but I don't see what it had to do with anything else where. It's a pity the editors didn't wake up and credit her for this contribution though, but these guys are the worst editors I've ever encountered. Always sign your work, Kristin!
• Taíno Online by Joamette Gil. Yet another story on Taíno ancestry. Yawn. Joamette is a cool name though.
• Knowledge of Self by Javier Cruz Winnik. Yet another story on Taíno ancestry, but better illustrated than the last one. Yawn.
• Blame it on 'Rico by Alberto Serrano. This was an amusing story about a Puerto Rican muralist who is constantly questioned about his ancestry. I can relate. I liked this one.
• Macondo, Puerto Rico written by Javier Morillo, art by Dan Méndez Moore. Another Puerto Rican history telling the same story over again, but with indifferent art and way too much text. Yawn.
• Faceless by Matt Belisle was a misleading one page illustration that preceded yet another story which had no titles at the beginning, Really getting annoyed by this crap by this point. What's the Spanish for 'the editing sucks'? Chupa Editando?
• I Dream of Home written by Greg Anderson-Elysee, art by Dennis Calero. This was a weird story which I did not get, but the art was excellent.
• Hope written by Neil Schwarz, art by Ramón Sierra. This is a story about a guy who takes his kid to Puerto Rico. Nothing special. Predictable. Art not bad.
• Puerto Rico Strong by Alejandra Quintas is a simple on page illustration of some exploitatively scantily-clad Puerto Rican woman holding the Puerto Rican flag (which was actually banned at one point a half century or so ago, believe it or not). Not impressed.
• Reality Check written by Tony Bedard, art by John R Holmes. This was a nicely drawn ironic look at Puerto Rican history and it made a pleasant change from what had gone before. I liked this one.
• Heroes of Our Own by Marco Lopez and Derek Ruiz, art by Brett Booth. Yet again a single page illustration indifferently drawn right before yet another story where the title page was the last page. Really pissed off wit the editors by this point. Ready to tell them where they can shove Voltron. Why did a single page need two writers? Was there something missing from my copy? Who knows.
• The Last Pirate in the Caribbean written by Mina Elwell, art by TE Lawrence. The title page was the last page. I got nothing from this story. The artwork so bland as to be almost impressionistic in style.
• Todavia Tengo Puerto Rico en Mi Corazon written by Eugene Selassie, art by Orlando Baez. The title means "I still have Puerto Rico in my hear, and this was a clumsily illustrated futuristic story of robots, which I skimmed because it held no interest for me. It's yet another of those where you want to say, if you love it so much, quit whining about it and go home!
• The Heart of Puerto Rico written by Alexis Sergio, art by Jules Rivera was a nicely illustrated and welcome story. It was teasing and playful, and it was about a young queer couple who had a sense of adventure and a love of Puerto Rico such that they actually lived there! I liked it.
• Ojala by Mike Hawthorne was the only one page illustration I actually liked. Beautifully done. Ojalá, pronounced 'Ohall-a' (slight emphasis on the last letter) means 'hopefully'. It was perfect and should have been the first illustration in the collection, Another bad editing choice.
• What Remains in the Dark by Amparo Ortiz, art by Eliana Falcón-Dvorsky was about Julia Constanza Burgos García, better known as Julia de Burgos. She was a nationalist, a teacher, a civil rights activist, a poet, and an advocate of Puerto Rican independence. She died a tragic death in that she collapsed and died in a place in New York City where no one knew her, and her body went unidentified and unclaimed, so was buried in a 'potter's field' until some people heroically tracked her down and had her remains repatriated. This was a story worth telling, and a very different approach from the others.
  It made me wonder why there were not more stories about such Puerto Ricans and somewhat fewer about soldiers? There are renowned Puerto Ricans from all walks of life. Don't go by the 'famous Puerto Rican' lists on the web. Yes, these people have Puerto Rican ancestry, but very few of them were actually born in Puerto Rico, so I certainly would not classify them as "Puerto Rican" without qualifying it. That's cheating!

You know, comic book writers and illustrators can work anywhere! Not that there's an abundance of electricity in Puerto Rico right now, but there is sunshine and solar panels are relatively cheap these days, This is golden opportunity for Puerto Rico to shine - literally. Why was there no story about that? About rebuilding? About hope? The stories seemed to be all downers about nostalgia and loss. I refuse to believe that the Puerto Ricans - at least those who actually live there - are like that. Why were there no stories about Puerto Rican diaspora returning to help their island by living there and bringing their relatively rich US income with them? Now that would have been something different, something worth writing about, something worth reading.

I was very disappointed and disillusioned by this graphic collection. I admire and respect the desire to put something out there to aid the hurricane victims, but I can't help but feel in this case that contributing the price of the comic (and then some if you can afford it) directly to a hurricane victim charity will do more good than buying this comic. There is nothing in the comic that I saw, which indicates how much of the sale price goes directly to the needs of Puerto Ricans, which seemed very strange to me. If you love comics, then by all means buy this one as opposed to some other, but I cannot recommend it based on my reading of it.