Josh Neufeld, A.D. New Orleans: After the Deluge
Plot Overview of A.D. New Orleans: After the Deluge
A.D. New Orleans: After the Deluge is a graphic novel about seven real people from New Orleans before, during, and after Hurricane Katrina. The narrative is divided into five parts: "The Storm," "The City," "The Flood," "The Diaspora," and "The Return." It follows the characters during the chaos and destruction caused by the hurricane as they try to survive and cope with the overwhelming loss. Some are forced to relocate, while others remain in the devastated city. The story highlights the emotional toll of the disaster, focusing on loss, survival, and the struggle to regain a sense of safety and peace in a post-Katrina world.
About the Author
Josh Neufeld
Josh Neufeld was born on August 9, 1967, in New York but has lived in various parts of the United States, including California, Ohio, and Massachusetts, as well as Canada, London, and Prague. He attended the High School of Music & Art in New York City, now known as La Guardia High School. Neufeld spent one semester studying History of Art at University College, London, but earned his BA in Art History from Oberlin College. Neufeld now resides in Brooklyn, New York, with his wife and daughter, where he is a nonfiction cartoonist. His work is characterized as journalistic comics intended to share different outlooks on social and political issues. Neufeld is the author of the New York Times-bestselling nonfiction graphic novel A.D.: New Orleans After the Deluge, which was serialized as a webcomic from 2007 to 2008 and released in print in 2010. Neufeld is the illustrator of the New York Times-bestselling graphic nonfiction book The Influencing Machine: Brooke Gladstone on the Media (2011). Some of his work has been published in Columbia Journalism Review, Foreign Policy, The Journalist’s Resource, Al Jazeera America, the Boston Globe, and the Chicago Sun-Times, in addition to others. Several of his illustrations have been printed in the New York Times, the Washington Post, and the Wall Street Journal. Throughout his career, he has been awarded the Graphic Medicine Award, Xeric Award, and named a Atlantic Center for the Arts Master Artist, along with being nominated for the Eisner Award, Harvey Award, and Ignatz Award.
Author’s Connection to New Orleans
Josh Neufeld had never seen or visited New Orleans until 2003. It was not until he
volunteered with the American Red Cross after Katrina that he became more familiar with the area and what had happened. Neufeld worked three weeks in Biloxi, MS, as a disaster response worker in October of 2005. While volunteering, he did blog entries about what was going on around him. These blog entries would later turn into Katrina Came Calling, which in turn helped lead to A.D.: New Orleans After the Deluge. During this time, he followed six New Orleanians and wrote about each of their experiences. He asked them questions about how New Orleans was and what their lives were like before, during, and after Katrina. Neufeld traveled numerous times to New Orleans to meet face-to-face with each individual for interviews and photo sessions. He has mentioned in interviews that he still keeps up with the individuals that he interviewed and has grown to have a relationship with all of them.
Tom Spurgeon Interviews Josh Neufeld
"Was there a part of volunteering, an orientation, say, that you think had an effect onAD in the sense that you might have created a different work if you hadn't gone to Mississippi?"- Tom Spurgeon
"I think if I hadn't been down there to see what the hurricane did, and developed a spiritual relationship, I guess, with New Orleans and the people that went through the hurricane, I wouldn't have known where to start"- Josh Neufeld
Further Readings
Maus: A Survivor's Tale by Art Spiegelman (1986, 1991)
"Maus combines, for the first time, Maus I: A Survivor’s Tale and Maus II to encompass the complete story of Vladek Spiegelman and his wife, living and surviving in Hitler’s Europe. It tells the story of their lives starting at their courtship in Poland and ending with Vladek’s death in Queens, New York. This encompasses the Holocaust as well as their time in Auschwitz."
Both share very similar themes of destruction and loss between the main characters. Though in different eras, both share the rich feelings of sorrow and loss.
Dark Rain: A New Orleans Story by Mat Johnson is a graphic novel thriller set after Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans. Two ex-cons, Emmit and Dabney, plan to rob a bank, but Dabney wants to help others while Emmit is solely focused on the money. As they navigate the chaos and suffering following the hurricane, they encounter a rogue commander of a private security firm, "Dark Rain," who also has his sights on the same bank.
Both stories explore the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans and its inhabitants. Mass chaos ensues when people believe their entire lives have changed; it is a common theme between the two novels.
Exhibit page by
MADISON HOLCOMB
KAHLIE MCNEIL
PEYTON PULLIAM