Review: Friends with Boys by Faith Erin Hicks

Friends with Boys--Faith Erin Hicks

February 2012 by First Second

220 pages--Goodreads

After years of homeschooling, Maggie is starting high school. It's pretty terrifying.

Maggie's big brothers are there to watch her back, but ever since Mom left it just hasn't been the same.

Besides her brothers, Maggie's never had any real friends before. Lucy and Alistair don't have lots of friends either. But they eat lunch with her at school and bring her along on their small-town adventures.

Missing mothers...distant brothers...high school...new friends... It's a lot to deal with. But there's just one more thing.

MAGGIE IS HAUNTED.

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Friends with Boys is an excellent graphic novel about growing up. I can't really narrow the subject down more than that; it deals with friends and crushes and enemies and fathers and siblings and twins and mothers and fitting in and standing out and moving on and dealing with loss and new beginnings. For such a short novel, there was so much going on. Hicks perfectly captured the feel of high school: the isolation, the friendships, the crap "friends" put each other through.

I loved the illustration style. It fit perfectly with the story Hicks told and was deceptively simple. The illustrations were fun and quirky sometimes and deep and poignant at others. Hicks says so much with so little.

The ghost story was weaved in well. It wasn't over the top, as it easily could have been. It served as a way for Maggie to process and cope with all the stuff going on in her life, particularly her mom's abandonment of the family.

I picked up <i>Friends with Boys</i> expecting a quick, fun, fluffy contemporary story. It was fun, but it was also surprisingly deep. And as a bonus, one of my most reluctant readers loved it.

Review: Page by Paige by Laura Lee Gulledge

Page by Paige--Laura Lee Gulledge
May 2011 by Henry N. Abrams
192 pages--Goodreads

Paige Turner has just moved to New York with her family, and she's having some trouble adjusting to the big city. In the pages of her sketchbook, she tries to make sense of her new life, including trying out her secret identity: artist. As she makes friends and starts to explore the city, she slowly brings her secret identity out into the open, a process that is equal parts terrifying and rewarding.

Laura Lee Gulledge crafts stories and panels with images that are thought-provoking, funny, and emotionally resonant. Teens struggling to find their place can see themselves in Paige's honest, heartfelt story.

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Page by Paige is an excellent coming of age story, applicable to all self-conscious teens, not just aspiring artists and writers.  While is fairly straightforward plot-wise (introverted girl learns confidence) it is emotionally and visually complex. The illustrations are fantastic.  They are deep and full of meaning, yet accessible to a casual glance.  Everything is in black and white, but it doesn't feel like we're missing anything because of the lack of color.  The illustrations perfectly capture Paige's insecurities, her aloneness, and her growing confidence.  I especially enjoy the duality between her cartoony outer self and the soft shading of her inner self.

I appreciate how much the book centered on friendship.  So many of these YA novels are fixated on romance as if it is the one sole goal of adolescence when there are so many other important things going on.  Yes there is a bit of romance in the book, but more important is her friendship with Jules, Longo, and Gabe.

Page by Paige is honest without being annoyingly angsty, which is another trap YA contemporary can fall into.  The book is genuine and I saw a lot of myself in Paige.  This is a book that will resonate with a lot of readers.

Review: Calamity Jack by Shannon and Dean Hale

Calamity Jack--Shannon and Dean Hale
Illustrated by Nathan Hale
January 2010 by Bloomsbury USA Children's
144 pages--Goodreads

Jack likes to think of himself as a criminal mastermind…with an unfortunate amount of bad luck. A schemer, plotter, planner, trickster, swindler...maybe even thief? One fine day Jack picks a target a little more giant than the usual, and one little bean turns into a great big building-destroying beanstalk.

With help from Rapunzel (and her trusty braids), a pixie from Jack’s past, and a man with inventions from the future, they just might out-swindle the evil giants and put his beloved city back in the hands of good people ....while catapulting themselves and readers into another fantastical adventure.

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I really enjoyed Rapunzel's Revenge.  While Calamity Jack isn't as great, it is still a lot of fun.  This is Jack's story and it's not a western, so there's a lot less of Rapunzel's spunky attitude and hair lassoing.  The steampunk aspect is neat, but the western vibe fit so well to the first book.  That perfect-fit feeling is missing in this book.  More lassoing may not fix that problem, but it would make me feel better. 

There is a cast of quirky characters, as always.  But in this book, Jack's character doesn't really go anywhere. Instead of going from lovable scoundrel to honest lovable scoundrel, he spends most of the book worrying about what will happen if Rapunzel finds out he was once a crook.  Rapunzel doesn't do much either.  I loved her no nonsense. round-up-the-bad-guys attitude in the first book, but in this, she's just a side character. The more I think about it, the more I am convinced that more hair lassoing would improve this book, even though it's supposed to be Jack's story.

The illustrations are as detailed and interesting as the first book.  The jabberwocky and bandersnatch are nice touches.  Calamity Jack is a fun, quick followup to Hale's first graphic novel.

Review: Robot Dreams by Sara Varon

Robot Dreams--Sara Varon
August 2007 by First Second
208 pages--Goodreads

Richly endearing and full of surprises, Robot Dreams follows an ill-fated friendship between a dog and robot. After a Labor Day jaunt to the beach leaves Robot rusty and immobilized in the sand, Dog, unsure what to do, abandons him. As the seasons pass, Dog tries to replace his friend, making and losing a series of new ones, from a melting snowman to epicurean anteaters. Meanwhile, Robot passes his time daydreaming, escaping to better places...Through interwoven journeys, the two characters long to recover from their day at the beach.

Although its adorable characters and playful charm will win over young readers, Robot Dreams speaks universally to the fragile nature of friendship, loss, and redemption.

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This was my first experience with an almost wordless graphic novel.  There is more text on the inside jacket flap than in the rest of the book.  I like that simplicity with the storytelling being carried by the illustrations alone.  Several times throughout the book, there is only one panel on an otherwise blank page spread.  The illustrations are simple, but carry a lot meaning and emotion, matching the thoughtful tone of the narrative.

Several other reviewers talked about the poignant tone capturing that feeling of drifting apart from an old friend.  Friends don't last forever so cherish them while you have them and similar themes.  But what I got out it, at least for the first half, is some people are jerks and leave you to rot in the sand. Or steal your foot.  I did enjoy the robot's dream sequences and the end of the novel, and I see the "moving on to new friends" and "you can never go back" stuff.  It just wasn't quite what I was expecting.

It's a super quick read with a bittersweet ending and on the whole I liked it.

Review: Rapunzel's Revenge by Shannon and Dean Hale

Rapunzel's Revenge--Shannon and Dean Hale
Illustrated by Nathan Hale
August 2008 by Bloomsbury USA Childrens
144 pages--Goodreads

Once upon a time, in a land you only think you know, lived a little girl and her mother . . . or the woman she thought was her mother.

Every day, when the little girl played in her pretty garden, she grew more curious about what lay on the other side of the garden wall . . . a rather enormous garden wall.

And every year, as she grew older, things seemed weirder and weirder, until the day she finally climbed to the top of the wall and looked over into the mines and desert beyond.

Newbery Honor-winning author Shannon Hale teams up with husband Dean Hale and brilliant artist Nathan Hale (no relation) to bring readers a swashbuckling and hilarious twist on the classic story as you’ve never seen it before. Watch as Rapunzel and her amazing hair team up with Jack (of beanstalk fame) to gallop around the wild and western landscape, changing lives, righting wrongs, and bringing joy to every soul they encounter.

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Rapunzel's Revenge is a lot of fun.  I love the western/fairytale mash up, though that setting takes a little getting used to.  Rapunzel is great.  No damsel in distress, she is proactive in rescuing herself from towers, sea serpents, and giant henchmen.  I love the little touches of tomboyishness the illustrations give her, like leaves in her hair after she has been climbing trees.  Jack is also a lot of fun.  He is shameless, but lovable.  He's a scoundrel and a thief without being a jerk.  Like Han Solo, but less rude.  He and Rapunzel play well off each other.

I love the little chunks of humor sprinkled here and ther, things like Jack saying, "We'll have to wait until nightfall," and in the next frame the narrator textbox says "Night fell."  Little quirky things like that make the book not take itself too seriously.

This is not the book you're looking for if you want a complex villain or developed relationship between Mother Gothel and Rapunzel.  I love the mother-daughter dynamic in Tangled, but that is not part of this book.  And I'm okay with that; it's out of the scope of this particular retelling.

Some reviewers have said the plot is too slow before Rapunzel escapes from her tower.  I can agree that the story picks up that once Jack comes in and Rapunzel starts lassoing things with her hair, but I liked the backstory.  Either way, it's a graphic novel, so it's a quick read.  The plot does feel a bit disconnected as we move from one adventure to the next, but it each adventure is still fun.

Rapunzel's Revenge is a fun, quick read, and I'm looking forward to reading the sequel.

Review: American Born Chinese by Gene Luen Yang

American Born Chinese--Gene Luen Yang
September 2006 by First Second
240--Goodreads

A tour-de-force by rising indy comics star Gene Yang, American Born Chinese tells the story of three apparently unrelated characters: Jin Wang, who moves to a new neighborhood with his family only to discover that he’s the only Chinese-American student at his new school; the powerful Monkey King, subject of one of the oldest and greatest Chinese fables; and Chin-Kee, a personification of the ultimate negative Chinese stereotype, who is ruining his cousin Danny’s life with his yearly visits. Their lives and stories come together with an unexpected twist in this action-packed modern fable. American Born Chinese is an amazing ride, all the way up to the astonishing climax.

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This was my second try with graphic novels, and this time it turned out quite well.  Balancing the themes of identity, isolation, assimilation, and friendship, Yang's graphic novel is split between three seemingly unrelated stories that come together in the end.  

What I loved most about the book was that this is not a story just for Chinese Americans or even just for recent immigrants.  Danny's and Jin's and even the Monkey King's stories are relate-to-able to anyone who has ever felt like they didn't fit in, which is pretty much everyone.  The whole point of the book is to be what you are, but that theme is not presented like a preachy self-confidence lesson.  The novel recognizes how hard it is to be yourself when yourself doesn't fit in.  It acknowledges that some people are and will always be jerks.  It captures awkward and sometimes rocky teenage friendships in such a way that we can all see something reflected from ourselves.

Yang's illustration style is a bit more comic-book-like than I am used to.  The characters are drawn with rounded edges, and the whole book uses a bright color palate.  However, the illustrations are deep in their simplicity.  They say a lot with few or no words.  

A few minor complaints.  I was annoyed by the body humor (fart jokes and the like), but the book is about teenage boys.  You can't teach Jr. High kids a lesson on onomatopoeia without "fart" and "burp" causing giggles.  Also, I think the Monkey King's reversal was too swift; we aren't prepared for his complete change in his personality.  I can see why it happened, given the ending, but I would have liked a bit more development in his change.

This book can be enjoyed on many different levels.  Some readers will pick up American Born Chines expecting a light, easy read, and I think they'll be surprised at how deep it is.  I liked it.  I can see why it won the Printz.

Review: Foiled by Jane Yolen and Mike Cavallaro

Foiled--Jane Yolen and Mike Cavallaro (Illustrator)
April 2010 by First Second
160 pages--Goodreads

Aliera Carstairs just doesn't fit in.

She's invisible at high school.

She's too visible at the fencing gym.

Aliera's starting to wonder...where does she belong?

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I love browsing shelves.  I always find books I never would have encountered otherwise.  This was the case with Foiled.  I was actually looking for American Born Chinese, which was not on the shelf despite the library catalog's insistence that it was checked-in.  Scouring the shelves, I discovered this book, which looked interesting enough to check out, so I did.  When you browse you find both jewels and duds, and as much as I didn't want it to be, I think this one was a dud.

This was my first real venture into graphic novels.  I'm not counting the time a couple years ago when I flipped through the Artemis Fowl graphic novel but figured it was only for those who couldn't finish the real book.  This year I was introduced to graphic novels as a different, completely valid, and vibrant form of story telling, so I was excited to give a graphic novel a try.

The illustrations are great.  Cavallaro focuses in on just the right images, images I wouldn't normally have considered such as shadowed silhouettes on the wall.  He captures the characters' personalities wonderfully.  He does some great things with color too.  The majority of the story is unexpectedly cast in two tones.  This is explained away by Aleira's colorblindness, but it was a very different choice that did some great things with the story.  The gray/brown tones make the rare colors significant.  Cavallaro even makes the publication information page look interesting.

I liked the graphic aspect of the book but had issues with the novel aspect.  It feels like the book just a set up for a longer series, but doesn't have a story of its own.  It's as if Harry Potter stopped after Hagrid announced "Yer a wizard, Harry."  What?  You can't sotp it there!  The plot that is present feels haphazardly thrown together.  This drives me insane because Aleira's character is awesome   She's snappy and strong and unsure of herself and exactly what a high school girl feels like, and the plot didn't do her justice; it didn't really let her do anything.  The conflict isn't introduced until the middle of the book, but then that's not the real climax, and we go through some tunnels and ...what?   Maybe the problem was that Yolen didn't introduce the fantastical elements early enough; they're sprung on us halfway through the book without any preparation, so it just feels clunky.  

I didn't even dislike the book. I wanted it to be good and I saw the potential for awesomeness.  The lack of awesomeness when such potential was there was frustrating.  I really wanted to like the book, but it just left me kind of meh.  Hopefully, my next try with a graphic novel will be better.

**Random notes that didn't fit with the rest of the review:  Avery is creepy and not in a masterful Ben-Linus-manipulative-awesomely-creepy way, just in an euhhh off-putting way.   I can see why he was characterized that way, but I didn't like it.  I liked the use of fencing throughout the book.  It's a sport not often used in books and I wish we could have seen more of it.