Black Hole is a coming-of-age/body horror graphic novel written and illustrated by American cartoonist Charles Burns. Black Hole was originally published as a limited comic book series that ran between 1995 and 2004. It was subsequently collected and published as a single volume in 2005. Burns won several Harvey Awards during Black Hole’s limited series run. In 2006, the collected edition received the Harvey Award for Best Graphic Album of Previously Published Work, as well as the Ignatz Award for Outstanding Anthology or Collection and the Eisner Award for Best Graphic Album: Reprint.

The novel employs a nonlinear structure and follows two teens in 1970s Washington as they deal with the repercussions of a sexually transmitted infection known as the Bug. The Bug causes physical mutations among people who have the illness, causing them to experience alienation in their social circles. Burns uses their stories to explore The Adolescent Fear of Change, Developing Healthy Attitudes Toward Sex and Intimacy, and The Violence of Stigmatization.

This study guide refers to the paperback reprint of the collected edition, published by Pantheon Books in 2008.

Content Warning: The source material and guide feature depictions of sexual content, sexual violence and harassment, gender discrimination, rape, illness, antigay bias, racism, death, substance use, addiction, emotional abuse, graphic violence, cursing, suicidal ideation, death by suicide, bullying, ableism, mental illness, physical abuse, child death, and animal cruelty and death.

Plot Summary

The graphic novel takes place in a Washington suburb outside Seattle and is set in the 1970s. High school students Keith Pearson and Chris Rhodes are paired up as lab partners for a frog dissection activity in biology class. Keith has a crush on Chris and is nervous around her. He suddenly experiences a portentous vision that leaves him floating in the darkness. He is embarrassed when he regains consciousness, as his peers make fun of him.

One night at a house party, Chris becomes enamored of one of her schoolmates, Rob Facincani, and invites him to have sex with her in a graveyard. Rob tries to warn her about something, but Chris pushes his caution aside. During sex, Chris discovers that Rob has a second mouth under his throat, which suggests that he has an illness called the Bug. The Bug is known to cause physical mutations within people and is transmitted through the exchange of bodily fluids. Chris becomes nervous that she has the Bug as well. She tries to confront Rob about what happened, but Rob avoids her, causing her to worry more about what will happen to her. She inadvertently reveals her mutation at a lake keg party when she decides to go swimming in her underwear, exposing a large gash down her back.

Meanwhile, Keith becomes increasingly overwhelmed with a sense of alienation that he is unable to share with his friends, Todd and Dee. When Keith’s friends reveal that Chris has the Bug, he becomes embarrassed about telling them about his crush on her. He encounters Chris after she accidentally wounds her foot on broken glass and convinces himself that he is destined to be with her. Todd takes Keith to meet his drug dealer, Burt, but Keith is too distracted by his fantasies of Chris to enjoy the drugs they are using. He stumbles upon Burt’s female housemate, who has a tail; Keith becomes attracted to the tail. The woman invites Keith to look at her artwork, which moves him. The encounter nearly results in an intimate moment, but Burt interrupts them.

Rob’s girlfriend, Lisa, breaks up with him when Rob’s second mouth calls out Chris’s name while he is sleeping. Rob then reconciles with Chris, who has started shedding her skin as part of her symptomatic mutation. They console each other over the isolation their illnesses cause them to experience. During a trip to a beach Chris frequently visited during her childhood, they profess their love for each other. Chris is soon grounded by her parents for skipping school, though she refuses to tell them the truth about her illness. When her parents schedule an appointment with the gynecologist, Chris asks for Rob’s help running away. He brings her to a camp in the woods inhabited by people who have the Bug, including Dave, a former schoolmate of theirs. Chris is terrified during her first days in the woods, especially after she discovers disturbing sculptures that someone has placed near her campsite. It is strongly implied that an outsider is killing people in the woods, leaving amputated body parts in the woods for others to find. Chris relies heavily on Rob for consolation and purpose.

Keith becomes increasingly disillusioned with his friends. One night, they take a psychedelic drug called Windowpane, which causes Keith to retreat into the woods. He finds consolation in the company of the camp residents, whom he finds while stumbling through the woods in escape. During the summer, Keith gets a job and cleans up his appearance. He re-encounters the woman from Burt’s house and learns that her name is Eliza. He also learns that Burt and his friends are frequently abusive, bullying her over her tail by calling her the “Lizard Queen.” During this encounter, Keith has sex with Eliza. 

One night, as Rob leaves Chris’s tent to go home, he is ambushed by a stranger, who kills him with a pipe. Chris worries when Rob fails to return to her and becomes convinced that something bad happened to him. In the wake of Rob’s prolonged absence, Chris experiences suicidal ideation. She reunites with Keith, who has started visiting the camp frequently to provide residents with food supplies. Because he still has a crush on Chris, Keith begins doing her special favors to prove his affection for her. This culminates in an offer to let her stay in the house he is minding for family friends, the McCroskys. On their first night in the house, Chris gets drunk and rambles about her estrangement from her best friend, Marci, and the challenges of living in the woods without Rob. Keith helps Chris into bed but becomes disillusioned with her when Chris calls out Rob’s name in her sleep. Keith is also terrified when he sees the impact of Chris’s mutation on her skin for the first time, and he falls out of touch with her when the other camp residents start showing up at the McCrosky residence. Around this time, Keith also begins to experience the first symptoms of the Bug as tadpole extensions begin growing out of his midsection.

Dave also has an obsessive crush on Chris and uses Rob’s absence as an opportunity to gain her trust, causing her to reveal her living situation at the McCrosky residence. Chris sequesters herself in her room, only allowing Dave inside to keep her company. There, Dave gradually opens up about his experiences as a survivor of bullying in school. One evening, Dave brings a bottle of vodka to Chris and gets drunk so that he can reveal his feelings for her. Dave tries to kiss Chris and is promptly rejected. He soon returns with the gun he recovered from Chris’s tent, which Rob gave Chris to protect herself in the woods. Dave’s possessiveness causes Chris to realize that he was involved in Rob’s disappearance, and she runs away from the McCrosky residence. Spurned, Dave kills most of the other camp residents, including his friend “Rick the Dick” Halstrom, the person who ambushed Rob. Dave dies by suicide, resenting his lifelong rejection.

Keith reconnects with Eliza after she moves out of Burt’s house. When Keith discovers the murders at the McCrosky residence, he invites Eliza to leave town with him. They help some of the surviving camp residents to escape and then proceed toward Monument Valley. On the road, Eliza reveals that Burt and his friends sexually abused her during a house party, causing her to discard all of her artwork and move out. Keith reassures her by imagining the life they can live together somewhere new. As they continue on their journey, they profess their love for each other. 

Meanwhile, Chris hitchhikes away from her hometown, eventually returning to the beach she visited with Rob. Chris considers the possibility of returning home and resuming her old life. When she encounters a kind stranger on the beach, Chris nearly accepts their offer of food but ultimately declines, remaining alone on the beach. Chris finds consolation in the idea that while Rob is gone and she may eventually forget him, she will always remember the day they spent at the beach together. The novel ends with Chris swimming out into the water, where she determines that she doesn’t want to let go of her life yet.