REVIEW | ‘IMAGINE WANTING ONLY THIS’

'Imagine Wanting Only This” is a beautifully written and drawn book. Kristen Radtke, a graduate of the University of Iowa's Nonfiction Writing Program, has crafted a memoir that is both deeply personal and compellingly expansive. She explores the nature of decay and disaster on individual and societal levels.

Radtke's time in Iowa City figures prominently in 'Imagine Wanting Only This,” and the city serves as something of an oasis from the loss she encounters elsewhere. The author arrived in Iowa City in 2009, a year after devastating flooding in the community, and while she mentions the flood, she doesn't incorporate it into her larger narrative of things and places lost and abandoned.

The drawings in the book - all rendered in black and white - reveal and obscure by turns. Radtke is skilled at depicting the degeneration of a place and at unveiling the full scope of a situation or location patiently and in pieces. She uses panels creatively, providing unusual points of view to the reader. Many of her panels are richly detailed, but she also recognizes the ways in which white space can lend power to a moment.

'Imagine Wanting Only This” is contemplative and often sad. The pace is deliberate, but the memoir seldom drags, except perhaps in a lengthy passage about the Peshtigo Fire of 1871 in Wisconsin. But Radtke's investigation of the fire - which unfolds on the page as she describes the deadliest forest fire in North American history - is in keeping with the rest of her story. Her fascination with destruction is communicated to the reader through her words and images. Once you've explored dark places with Radtke, it's hard to imagine you'll forget the experience.