2009 (This is special. My review can be found on the LibraryThing post linked)
http://www.librarything.com/topic/ 68641#1500559 ( )

Gen and his mother must escape Hiroshima and try to continue their lives after the bomb. Gen has various adventures in the ruins while looking for food for his mother and baby sister. ( )

Barefoot Gen: The Day After, the second book in the Barefoot Gen series, picks up right where its predecessor left off. Nakazawa left many of the horrors of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima for this second volume. Though there are many journeys and themes in this volume, it seemed more cohesive than Volume 1. The severity of the situation has set in for both the reader and Gen, and this gives significance to every event, leaving little room for comic mischief. Though the two are very similar in style and story, I'd say The Day After is a slight improvement on the previous volume. ( )

The narrative is engaging, so the reader is encouraged to continue the story. But it is a sorrowful read in some ways. However, one takes comfort in the fact that Gen does not give up, despite the loss of loved ones and the cruelty of the war mongers and his fellow citizens. ( )

Mostly as good as the first, though feels weaker in some vague way. Maybe it's the lack of drama in knowing what's coming. It's tragic and powerful, but I hesitate to call it a good comic--the art feels stiff and the writing is forced in places; the whole comic feels like Nakazawa was holding his material--his personal tragedies--at arm's length while trying to humanize the experience. An important story to have read, but not the most enjoyable read. ( )

Continues the story of Gen from where the first volume left off and deals with the days after the dropping of the bomb. Some of the scenes he encounters are really harrowing and make for difficult reading. But beyond the devastating images this is a tale of courage and fortitude amidst great adversity. An excellent graphic novel and highly recommended. ( )

This, the second installment of Keiji Nakazawa's graphic novel about the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, focuses on the days immediately following 6 August 1945 and is truly horrifying. Gen, Nakazawa's young protagonist, his mother, and Gen's newborn sister struggle to find food, water, and shelter in the rubble of Hiroshima. Gen's mother is too malnourished to nurse her infant, so Gen embarks on a journey around the city to find rice. His journey brings him into contact with various survivors, many of whom are already nearly dead from radiation poisoning. These encounters are stomach-churning; the survivors are decaying ghouls, their flesh literally melting off of them. Perfectly healthy soldiers - who have been brought in to help rescue survivors and dispose of corpses - fall ill and die within days of entering Hiroshima, after going bald and vomiting blood.

Nakazawa also does not shy away from presenting more pyschologically-based horrors. Many of the victims of the bombing, most of whom are women and children, stoop to selfish and terrible lows in order to survive, stealing or withholding food from other survivors. Gen encounters old women clinging to the maggot-infested corpses of their loved ones; a woman's baby dies as she nurses it; Gen is attacked by a gang of orphaned boys and beaten unconscious. But there are also flickers of hope that hint at the author's fundamentally positive view of humanity in crisis.

Although this book was extremely grotesque - I had to put it down and walk away a number of times because I was actually nauseated - it is hard to argue that the author is using gore for shock value. And if he is, it is hard to argue that there is something wrong with that. The reality of Hiroshima is shocking and it is quite likely that too many Americans are insulated from that. ( )

Book 2 in the ten part series tells of the days following the bombing of Hiroshima. Not really a "stand alone" work, but still powerful. ( )