Carnet de Voyage

by Craig Thompson

Craig Thompson spent three months traveling through Barcelona, the Alps, and France, as well as Morocco, researching his next graphic novel, Habibi. Spontaneous sketches and a travelogue diary document his adventures and quiet moments, creating a raw and intimate portrait of countries, culture and the wandering artist.

Genres: Graphic Novels, Comics, Travel, Nonfiction, Memoir, Graphic Novels Comics, Art

224 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2002

About the author

Craig Ringwalt Thompson (b. September 21, 1975 in Traverse City, Michigan) is a graphic novelist best known for his 2003 work Blankets. Thompson has received four Harvey Awards, two Eisner Awards, and two Ignatz Awards. In 2007, his cover design for the Menomena album Friend and Foe received a Grammy nomination for Best Recording Package.

Reviews

[Nicolo · Rating 3 out of 5]

I saw that this book was done by Craig Thompson of Blankets fame. I have only read his Habibi and gave it a generous rating. It’s a travelogue, a rare genre nowadays given the proliferation of Instagram and YouTube travel videos.

On the tail end of my own European tour, I found this book in a Prague bookstore and looking for inspiration to start my own travel sketch book. Too bad I’m poor in drawing, but maybe this might just give me the impetus to invest time in improving my own sketching.

Thompson’s own travels took him to most of Western Europe on a book tour and a personal side trip to Morocco. The Europe phase of his travels reunite him with old friends. The Moroccan trip a part of his research for his next graphic novel (Habibi).

The book is loaded with beautiful sketches but peppered with a lot of his whiny self loathing text.
His art shows the best of his travels but his words, the worst of them.

Still, it is an entertaining read, and I just might start that travelogue. It’ll probably be in YouTube in a couple of months.

[notyourmonkey · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of those ratings that I fully admit may not be equally applicable to everyone picking up this book. Yes, it's very, very good, but what makes it a five star for me may not hold true for everyone else. But oh. For me? For me, this is the book I never knew I wanted to read until I held it in my hands, and once I did, I couldn't imagine not having read it before, much less not known about it before.

It's a graphic novel (check) slash travel journal (check) that's as much about a mental journey as a physical one (check) through France (check), Morocco (check), and Spain (check) among others, with a particular emphasis on what it's like to travel alone (check), the glories and the mundanities of being an American in Europe and North Africa (check), the amazing food (check), and cats (check). Seriously. This feels like a story I could have written, if, you know, I were a dude with artistic talent and a heartrending love back home.

I love this book because it rings so very true for me from some of the very similar adventures I have had. I love this book because it is the graphic art equivalent of so much that I've tried to do with the written journals and photography I've done during my travel. I love this book because of how much better (and shorter) it says things I've tried to capture for myself. I love this book for the sense of "I've been there! I've done that! So true! Sotruesotruesotrue!" it gives me.

It's raw and it's personal and it's not perfect, and even though it was composed (drawn? written? both?) knowing that there would be an audience in mind, it still feels a bit like rereading my own journals from Brussels, from Marrakesh, from Granada, from Dijon all those years ago.

And did I mention the food? The lovingly detailed drawings and descriptions of the food? Because yes.

[Rebecca · Rating 3 out of 5]

A sketchbook Thompson kept on his combined European book tour for Blankets and research trip for Habibi in March–May 2004. It doesn’t really work as a stand-alone graphic memoir because there isn’t much of a narrative, just a series of book signings, random encounters with friends and strangers, and tourism. My favorite two-page spread is about a camel ride he took into the Moroccan desert. I could also sympathize with his crippling hand pain (from all that drawing) and his “chaos tolerance” overload from the stress of travel.

[Dave Schaafsma · Rating 4 out of 5]

Joanne Rivoli likes this book as his masterpiece, more for adults than Blankets, and I do like it a lot, in all of its joy and anguish...

[Ma'Belle · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this not knowing what to expect, knowing that it would be a side project illustrated travel diary, and that the author has inserted a great, humble disclaimer as the introduction.

This would be the second book I'd read by Craig Thompson; the first was Blankets, which astounded me with its honest and affectionate autobiographical depictions of adolescence in Fundamentalist Evangelical American culture in the Midwest. More than anything, my jaw dropped and alternately lifted into a smile because of the similarities of the author's life to mine and the empathy subsequently evoked in me.

Once again, in Carnet de Voyage, I was blown away by Craig Thompson's introspective nature, his humility, and his ability to capture both people and the places that surround them. The brief experiences and consistent themes (the loneliness of traveling solo in foreign lands) that Thompson narrates flow with vulnerability, dry suspense, and subtlety.

I happened to be traveling Europe solo not too long before Thompson's own experience (Spring '04), so many nostalgic thoughts and emotions were stirred up in me by reading this.

All in all, I'm glad Craig put this out there for us to enjoy.

[Kristin]

I really loved this book. However, I still have critiques, so they must be of reality rather than the book, since it's REAL. So, while reading, I just kept thinking, Dude, you are a shameless womanizer. He's ostensibly in love with his ex-girlfriend, but he strikes up conversations with every pretty girl he sees and ends up in bed or something with a significant number of them (hard to tell sometimes because it's only implied, but still). Then, he proceeds to express how socially incompetent and lonesome he is, but the entire thing is about him spending time with people. Friends here, friends there, friends up the wazoo. If you're socially incompetent and lonesome, typically it fundamentally and inherently means that you don't have that many friends and don't make them that quickly. Next, non-French men who sprinkle French into their otherwise English vocabulary bother me, as do men who wear fashionable scarves, and as do Seattle people. It's purely personal, but still. This man exhibits all three traits, thus garnering less sympathy from me. Penultimately, this book detailed the stressful journey of his life doing book tours, interviews, and all manner of such things that you would think would be reserved for worldwide literary sensations like J.K. Rowling and Suzanne Collins. I mean, I had heard of Blankets even before I read it and knew that it was pretty popular among adult graphic novel people especially a few years ago, but somehow that translates into a life of extreme fame and hectic insanity for the author, and I'm not sure how or why. And finally, a huge part of the stress conveyed here was regarding the author's painful, rheumatoid hands. I looked him up at last because I was like, Okay, who is this guy? I wanted to see one of these famed interviews, see whether he was sad and clumsy in actuality (of course, in interviews he appears very professional, outgoing, and composed)-- and I came across a video on Youtube showing him actually drawing one of his lovely drawings. His drawings are truly great. However, when I witnessed how he held the pen to draw, I wished Sassy Gay Friend were there to say, "WHAT. WHAT. WHAT ARE YOU DOING." Who the fuck holds a pen like that???? THAT'S why the guy has painful hands! Seriously. WTF. If you want to keep your hands, you need to do the things you do with them ergonomically. Holy shit.

[Malvika · Rating 5 out of 5]

Confession: I am in love with Craig Thompson a bit too much, I think it's even getting unhealthy. (Kidding, love for art is never too much.)

I have loved Blankets and Habibi, each for different reasons, and also because they are stories told by Craig, who is a fabulous narrator along with being one of the best goddamned artists alive. So obviously, I loved poring over his travel journal. I envy the way Craig Thompson draws his emotions on the page, so simple, elegant, and intense. As always, an absolute pleasure to look at his sketches, especially his female forms (what are these fab skills even?) and the cats!

Thanks, CT. <3

[Shaya · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 Stars

[Rubi · Rating 2 out of 5]

Los dibujos son muy buenos; con ellos me he sentido como si estuviera en las ciudades que describen. Pero... una novela gráfica, es eso, una combinación de ambas cosas y desgraciadamente, la parte de novela se queda cortísima. Un diario monótono en el que el autor no deja de autocompadecerse y de quejarse. Sí, pobre, su amante pasó de él, pero no creo que sea como para que nos lo esté diciendo constantemente.
En fin, que vale como cuaderno de viaje porque los dibujos se salvan; pero desde luego, podría haber contado un millón de cosas y no lo ha hecho. Se queda con cosas muy mundanas... Un diario es algo más que eso (en mi opinión).

[Bandit · Rating 3 out of 5]

Random reading selection. I love both travelogues and graphic novels, though this was the first time I've come across of combination of the two in one book. Mixed results. The author does state that this is merely his travel journal and not really a book and it reads as such, as in not much of a story outside of a fairly reluctant traveler, encountering some civilized enjoyable locales and other much less so. Morroco is presented in a pretty bleak realistic way, it's refreshing to see someone not glorifying the eastern mystique and just seeing the place for what it is. Europe is...well, Europe. Not much of a story, really, though the black and white sketches are lovely.

[Sérgio · Rating 3 out of 5]

That was a really pleasant read, between sketchbook and auto-bio comic. Craig Thompson's art (Blutch influenced) is really beautiful and I liked his encounters with other cartoonists. It's a little bit too lightweight in my opinion, thought.

It's amazing that he did such a quality book during a couple of months while traveling.

[Vivek KuRa · Rating 3 out of 5]

Beautiful haphazard travel sketches. But I liked his Habbibi and Blankets better for its content .

[Hillary · Rating 4 out of 5]

I probably preferred this to Blankets, partially because of lowered expectations, due to the form, a loose travel journal/sketchbook. Also, it helps that Thompson seems to have become a little less uptight, and the whining tends to be undercut with self-conscious acknowledgment and mocking of it. That's not true, however, for his use of the term "lover" throughout, which makes me cringe, accurate or not. The art is pretty wonderful, though, and inspiring (it would be more so if I could or wanted to draw at all, but, as is, it does make me want to travel--not necessarily to the desert on a camel but at least to go eat delicious things), and the Lewis Trondheim cameo (they play laser tag and Trondheim draws himself) is wonderful and funny and makes me think of how much I love Trondheim. It's also wisely ended at the point it is. Much more complaining about his hands hurting and his homesickness and how much he misses his now ex-girlfriend would have countered its charms, swinging my overall impression of the book to negative rather than positive.

[Peacegal · Rating 3 out of 5]

This one isn't a graphic novel but an illustrated travelogue of the author's experiences travelling through a handful of world sites in the early 2000s. He decided to sketch his surroundings and interactions instead of snapping photos--and in the pre-smartphone era, this may have been less of a temptation.

I found my eyes glazing over with the number of mentions of an interaction with a cute girl, but I suppose given the author's status at the time as a young, newly-single man, it isn't shocking. Regarding other personal content from the author, I always struggle to understand how people can try eating vegan, decide it isn't for them, and then seemingly strive to cause as much needless suffering in their food choices as possible (Seriously--foie gras??)

Thompson has written a memoir of traveling through a variety of cultural settings and observing a wide swath of the human condition from crushing poverty to opulence, with frequent detours of his own thoughts about it all, emotions, and memories.

[Kavitha Sivakumar · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely marvelous and mesmerizing illustrations!!

[Fadilah · Rating 4 out of 5]

"As much as we are loved, one is still alone in certain decisions" - page 174, lucia

[Anjum Haz · Rating 5 out of 5]

Carnet de Voyage is the French for travelogue. This graphic novel is the travelogue of Craig Thompson while he was touring Morocco and some countries in Europe for researching his next book Habibi. The tone of the carnet is casual, you can feel that you are listening to your friend’s account of a tour. This informal and honest expression of Craig makes his works so loveable to me!

I always enjoy a memoir of my favorite author. You can see how the seed of the author’s great work was planted through the course of his daily life. Something ordinary turns into the inspirational point of a great creation. It’s like knowing the magician’s secret.

While we try to maximize our online impressions by posting the most alluring photographs of our tours with the most lyrical captions, Craig shared his experience through his sketches of ordinary scenes and plain words. Craig sketched the poverty in Morocco, the cold of a desert night, the exhilarating moment of skiing at Mont Blanc, the beauty of Gaudi’s art in Barcelona, the miserable pain of touring in a foreign land without a companion.

The immense mental pressure an artist has to deal with was not excluded from his account. In countless interviews he had to sign and portray countless times. Each night his right hand used to get numb. He missed his ex-girlfriend. Whenever there was nothing to do in a journey, his inner self would start to judge himself. He put this experience in his words-

Most often, I continue carnet out of fear of disappointment in myself if I stop.

At Lyon, Craig met Catherine who just returned from Cameroon, Africa where she worked to minimize the economic damage from the construction of a hydraulic dam. I think this ‘dam’ part would stay in Craig’s mind and come up again when he started writing Habibi.

Craig sketched the people he met throughout his tour. Each sketch exhibits the personality of that person. All these simple, discrete accounts made this book exceptionally beautiful. And it made me feel so connected with him.

[Alli · Rating 3 out of 5]

I struggled most of my life to get my journaling habit off the ground. For about 34 years it felt akin to trying to take off in an overweight 747 on an unpaved runway. In a hurricane. While I wanted to be the *type of person who writes in a journal*, my efforts always resulted in fits and starts. I’d write diligently (in my brand new notebook that was for sure going to be THE notebook to get me to write daily) for 3 days and then, like, nothing for a year. But now I’m happy to report that it’s simply a part of my life. I have been journaling the horrors of the decline of civilization almost daily for the last 2 1/2 years. Thanks pandemic!

ANYWAY. I was drawn to this book because it is a journal extraordinaire, composed by one of the greatest graphic novelists of our time while on a book tour for one book and research trip for another book. He traveled all around Europe and North Africa for a period of about 3 months doing all sorts of things.

The portraits he captures, both in words and sketches, are incredible. It was an interesting journey.

BUT. (And he says this clearly himself throughout the journal!) This was published in order to “hold his readership over” until the next major book release. My gripe and reason for 3 stars is that there isn’t a true driving force in this work. It is a stunning collection of drawings. It’s very cool to read an actual travel journal that captures a sense of place so deeply through masterful images. But it almost feels like he shrugs his shoulders as he hands off of this most intimate medium to the reader.

The fact that Thompson and his publisher decided to turn his private travel journal into a public work mid-trip, results in surprisingly unsettling shift in self-consciousness in the book for me. I don’t regret a moment I spent with it, but I wish the journal could have been one that was originally only created for himself, and then shared in retrospective.

[Arimo · Rating 4 out of 5]

It feels very strange to write a review of someone's travel diary. How many stars should I give to someone's thoughts, feelings and experiences? Well, I'll go with four stars, although it almost feels too little. Just as he did with his masterpiece Blankets, Craig Thompson once again captures something that resonates with me very deeply. Carnet de Voyage doesn't tell a coherent story, but I know parts of it will linger on my mind for a long, long time.

In case you don't know it yet, Carnet de Voyage is not a traditional graphic novel, but a travel diary presented in a visual format. And unlike Thompson's other works, Carnet de Voyage was done very quickly on the go. In a sense, this lack of editing and polishing just adds to to the charm of the book.

Although it's not as amazing as Blankets (which is my favourite piece of art of all time), Carnet de Voyage has enough magic and personality of its own. I especially recommend the new hardcover edition that adds 32 extra pages. Although not essential, the added epilogue brings more depth and context to the original work.

[Kirsten · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is really either for people who already love Craig Thompson's work, or for those who love travel writing. This is an illustrated travel diary of the several months Thompson spent in France and Morocco. He writes about his emotional state and about his impressions freely, and the illustrations are gorgeous and skillful, even when he admits that he's drawing with crappy felt-tip pens because his other supplies have disappeared. Some people might find his fits of depression and self-loathing tiresome, but for the most part I identified with his thoughts and fears and his sense of dislocation. Thompson describes this as a treat for his fans in between "real" books, and that's probably apt, but I really enjoyed this little book and I'm glad I picked it up.

[Kristen · Rating 2 out of 5]

I didn't love Blankets and reading this second book by Craig Thompson made it clear why:

1. He calls women, at least the attractive ones, "girls"

2. All of the "girls" he draws look alike

3. He whines a lot and even though he calls it what it is, it's still unpleasant.

I think he has a few issues to deal with on that front!

But it's still fun to be a fly on the wall on this trip through Morocco and Europe.

[Kristy · Rating 3 out of 5]

I didn't mean to read this loosely formatted travel journal of comic artist Craig Thompson's 2004 European book tour as quickly as I did, and honestly, I didn't expect it to be as engaging as it was. Thompson is such an emotionally touching artist -- his drawings of scenes in Morocco, Paris, Barcelona, and elsewhere are more real than any photograph, and his drawings of the friends and strangers he meets along the way give the reader an immediate sense of the real person behind the drawing. Having read Thompson's autobiographical Blankets, this is almost like a continuation of the "Thompson" character. Definitely worth a read for Thompson fans.

[Ginny · Rating 2 out of 5]

The sketches are gorgeous -- Thompson is clearly talented. This is his travel journal, so he's clearly allowed to feel how ever he wants to feel, but he's awfully whiny (on an amazing adventure traveling to amazing foreign countries!), and is self-aware enough to notice, but not enough to do anything about it. Odd. Also, I found it frustrating that he was only really happy traveling after he had hooked up with some girl. Relationships should help you be a happier person, that's true, but life's too short to be unhappy alone!

[Meg · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book. His art is amazing, his thoughts interesting....and as a fellow traveler I found myself agreeing with his search for isolation while not wanting to be lonely. Craig travels to France (Lyon! Tu me manques!), Spain and Morocco...and I ate this book up. I would love to record my travels with a pen and a ink....but alas, I do not have the same talent.
Read if you love to travel, or you yearn to travel....or just need a break from life.
2017 Reading Challenge: A book with pictures

[Nadine · Rating 3 out of 5]

Disons que ce carnet de voyage ne donne pas tellement le gout de voyager. On y apprend plus sur l'état âme de l'auteur que sur les endroits qu'il visite. Il est plutôt plaignard, et ça pourrait agacer ceux qui aimerait avoir sa chance.
En même temps, n'importe qui ayant eu une passe difficile pourra s'identifier à lui, et il est honnête et reconnait lui-même son état. Les dessins sont magnifiques et le récit quand même intéressant.
Ca vaut la peine d'être lu.

[Matt · Rating 2 out of 5]

The art was fantastic, but it just seemed like the guy travels just to get laid...Through my last stint in Thailand, I met several people like this, and (to be honest) were the kind of people I didn't much care to travel with. So reading this rubbed the wrong way (it just felt like all the women were objectified). Why not travel to embrace being by yourself and meditate on this notion? Why not travel to listen to people without having a desire to seduce them?

[Daniel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wonderfully enjoyable travelogue and an endearingly self-deprecating insight into Craig Thompson's mind.

[Nuno R. · Rating 4 out of 5]

The conception, the art, the commentary on every page of this book make it delightful and insightful.

[Sooraya Evans · Rating 1 out of 5]

Loved his work on Blankets.
That's why I decided to give this one a try.
Overall, disappointed.
It's just boring. Artwork still OK though...

[Chadi · Rating 3 out of 5]

Une bonne idée de mettre ses notes de voyages en bd ,c'était une BD "light" et peu enrichissante. La 3eme étoile ,c'est parce que Craig dessine bien sinon 2 étoiles :P