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'I was fifteen in 1942, and I was five foot three, which is the tallest I ever was. I had jet black hair and a smile as big as day.' Readers and moviegoers have read and seen many growing-up-in-the-big-city-then-being-drafted-into-World-War-II tales, both real and fictional, but none with the visual pizzazz and feisty humor of Lucky in Love. Co-created by George L. Chieffet (script) and veteran cartoonist and animator Stephen DeStefano (plot and art), Lucky in Love is almost the flipside to dramatic works on the same theme such as Alan's War and You'll Never Know. Elegantly drawn in a supremely confident, lively, cartoony black-and-white style that recalls Milt Gross as well as classic Disney animation and comics, Lucky in Love is a unique coming-of-age story that follows its lovable eponymous hero Lucky Testatuda from his rascally teen years in Hoboken, New Jersey's Little Italy to his induction into the air force and subsequent wartime experiences. Lucky in Love shows what happens when a feisty young man merges his erotic fantasies with 1940s film myths: Moving from the '40s to present day (from which an aged, present-day Lucky looks back on his life), the book contrasts Lucky's vivid fantasy life with the darker reality of World War II (including a masterful set-piece sequence that echoes Harvey Kurtzman's classic EC war comics) as well as his first fumbling, cash-on-the-barrelhead sexual experiences. Ultimately the poignant discoveries Lucky makes on his way to adulthood bestow upon him a very different kind of heroism than that of which he had dreamed... The second and concluding volume, Lucky in Love: Lucky for Life will be released in 2013.
