The Heart That Fed, (Gallery, 2023)

A graphic memoir debut, R.E.M.F. is a loving son’s exploration of his relationship with his father, told through the lens of his father’s experiences in Vietnam and their long-lasting after-effects. Carl’s father, David Sciacchitano, decided to enlist in the Air Force and volunteered to be sent to Vietnam. As an aircraft mechanic he was considered a R.E.M.F. (Rear-Echelon Mother-Fucker, a pejorative term in the military for anyone not on the front lines), but he nevertheless experienced the war up close. After the war ended, he stayed and worked in Southeast Asia, on a constant quest for the adrenaline high of war. He eventually returned home. Thanks to his experiences in the war and his knowledge of the region and language, he was posted to the one place he had hoped to escape: Vietnam. And so he bore witness to the bitter last days of the war, and to the evacuation in 1975, when the South fell to the North. Set against one of the most tumultuous events of the 20th century, R.E.M.F. will speak to any child whose parent has participated in a war and come home somehow changed--and to any child who has sought to understand a parent, and that parent’s past, in an effort to strengthen their relationship.