Irish Examiner on Bumperhead

The elder Hernandez brother’s career has been defined by his depiction of the comings and goings of the fictional Latin American town of Palomar, in the long-running comic, Love and Rockets.

Recently, he has turned his attention to a landscape more familiar to those portrayed by his younger brother, Jaime.

Last year’s Marble Season was a memoir, set in a similar Californian landscape to his home, and it was an affectionate tribute to a 1960s childhood fuelled by comics.

His latest, Bumperhead, is located in the same milieu, but this time the protagonist is a disaffected adolescent in the 1970s and the cosy childhood is replaced by uncertainty. It’s a more downbeat work, but it’s a warning against complacency that comes from a good place.