Maus: A Survivor’s Tale, by Art Spiegelman. Pantheon, 1987/1992.
Maus I – My Father Bleeds History
Maus II – And Here My Troubles Began
This is a graphic novel – the first one I became aware of, though there were certainly predecessors. It tells two stories: The inner story is the story of the author’s father living as a Jew in Czechoslovakia and Germany during the Nazi era. It tells of his life in the early Nazi years and how he survived the concentration camps. The second story wraps the first, and is the story of the father’s current life and the author’s relationship to his father.
The story is compelling; the art is first-rate, with little touches of humor (Jews are mice, many non-Jews are pigs, Nazis are cats).