Graphic novels | Page 2 of 10

Gird your loins for The Gland Factory, you’ll wish it was twice as long

Have you seen Inside Out or Inside Out 2? Both of those movies did a fabulous job in explaining emotions. They were especially effective with those complicated ones, like anxiety and jealousy. The Gland Factory: A Tour of Your Body’s Goops, Juices and Hormones is the literary sibling by another mother to those movies. This is a book that’s funny, legitimately LOL funny on so many levels that you’ll begrudgingly find yourself learning something in-between a chuckle, grin, guffaw or laugh. Author Rachel Poliquin proves that she knows her audience because The Gland Factory is sufficiently gross enough to attract upper-elementary through middle school readers.

The Gland Factory straddles the line between reference book and graphic novel in a funny, LOL, and educational way that kids will want to experience.

You’ll want to go back to your 10 YO self and read this

The Five Wolves, a graphic novel that you’ll love or won’t understand.

The Five Wolves by Peter McCarty is unlike any book we’ve seen before. It’s a wordless book, but presented at a very high level and is 285 pages long, so it’s not for the very young. The narrative is grand and has more in common with Beowulf or The Odyssey, than a graphic novel. However, one could categorize The Five Wolves as a graphic novel, albeit one that’s unlike anything they’ve ever seen. It’s also not entirely a wordless book. There are pages with words on them, but they’re pages with only words, hundreds of words, symbols or numbers with the phrases that are relevant to the story that are bolded. I tried to read The Five Wolves one time and got too frustrated with it. And while that’s not a good first impression for a book, I rebounded, took my time with The Five Wolves, looked over all of it and have a better impression.

The Five Wolves is a graphic novel that’s heavy on art an interpretation and very light on words.

You’ll love it/you’ll be confused by it

The Avengers in The Veracity Trap, a great self-aware, multi-verse story

This is a great comic book that I forgot I had read before, it’s what you might be thinking as you’re digging into The Avengers in The Veracity Trap!. The heroes on the book’s cover have their classic 60’s era appearance. Hulk’s pants are a deep-hued purple. Captain America has his wings on his cowl, evident for everyone to see. Iron Man’s mask is obvious, not melding into his suit and its colors are a very pure yellow and red. But the book’s format is larger than most graphic novels and the story breaks the fourth wall. This is an original graphic novel that old-school comic fans will embrace. It will also give next-generation fans a glimpse at seeing why these comics were so awesome, without worrying about damaging those golden age gems.

The Avengers in The Veracity Trap is a new graphic novel with a multi-verse tale and one you will want to read.

IT’s a throwback spirit in a modern day package, built to love to read

Deeply Dave: A fabulous, unusual graphic novel adventure

You have never read any book, much less a graphic novel, like Deeply Dave. It is a graphic novel, but it operates in such a unique fashion that it’s like comparing an apple to an orange. The two have one thing in common, but they are so utterly different that it does one of them a major disservice to group them close to one another. Deeply Dave is a graphic novel about a boy whose mother goes missing. She was in a spaceship, but it crashed in the bottom of the sea, and now Dave is going out there to rescue her. That’s the very basic plot, but you can throw out any ideas or preconceived notions as to how you think the story will evolve. The plot changes every five pages, with new characters, powers, locations, or secrets being disclosed that alter how others react to the Big Doom, and that is before the book’s format is taken in account.

Deeply Dave is a graphic novel that’s one of the most creative, unique and fun that we’ve read in years. It’s creative, smart and perfect for curious kids eight and up.

This graphic novel is so much fun to read

A Review of Almost Sunset: A Unique Take on Ramadan in a graphic novel

Hassan is a typical teenager in many ways. Almost Sunset is a graphic novel that follows him during that one month of the year when he’s not typical, and that’s the period of Ramadan. He’s a teen whose family respects the traditions of Ramadan and all of the sacrifices and inconveniences that accompany it. This is a graphic novel that’s not about religion, but is about the people and families that follow it. It touches on the practices of Islam, but doesn’t espouse or preach its beliefs.

Almost Sunset: A Graphic Novel takes a light hearted look at a teen during Ramadan and how it’s dealt with life’s other issues.

A teen graphic novel by any other name

It’s About Time!: A Fun Dive into Concepts of Time

Time is a tricky concept because it’s abstract, can be a noun or a verb, and is countable or uncountable. It’s About Time!: Big Ideas That Changed the World is the sixth in this graphic novel series and is almost as audacious as that Egyptian who suggested dividing a day into 12 parts. The ancient Egyptians counted on their three mid-fingers, as well as, their pinky, plus two of the knuckles on their pinky. But time and people needing to record it for one reason or another didn’t start with them. It’s About Time takes the 500-pound confusing gorilla and tackles it head-on. The graphic novel makes an esoteric topic like ‘time’ interesting, makes young readers think and doesn’t pretend to know all of the answers.

It’s About Time!: Big Ideas That Changed the World is the sixth in this fabulous non-fiction graphic novel series that threads the needle between fun and education.

IT’s a graphic novel that’s smarter than you and it’s OK.

Why Kids Will Love The Mighty Bite: Hog-Rocket Ruckus

I love Phineas & Ferb. I’m convinced that a generation of scientists will reference it as a main inspiration for their endeavors and inventions. I also enjoy Ren & Stimpy. What if the former had a tiny sprinkle of the rudeness and over-the-top insanity of the latter? The Mighty Bite: Hog-Rocket Ruckus is the graphic novel representation of this idea. It’s incredibly smart. It’s also incredibly silly. At times, it’s just a little bit rude and noisy, but never enough to make parents or librarians lower their brows. Hog-Rocket Ruckus is the second book in The Mighty Bite book series that we’ve read, and the third overall. There’s something about Hog-Rocket Ruckus that will speak to some upper-elementary and older readers.

The Mighty Bite: Hot-Rocket Ruckus is slapstick silly, but also very intelligent, in this graphic novel series that speaks to audiences via flying pigs and viral videos.

Unique, awesome, funny, entertaining for mid-elementary up

‘Hi, Earth’: A Fresh Take on Satirical Graphic Novels

What if Team America: World Police had a graphic novel baby with The Far Side. All you’d have to do is give it a British accent, colorize it, sprinkle in more dark humor with climate change references and you’ve got Hi, Earth. It’s a bitingly funny graphic novel that will reward comic strip fans who thought they’d never see another series with revolving characters in disparate situations that are able to make you belly laugh in four panels. That’s a mouthful and if it’s too much then know that Hi, Earth is from the two that brought the very funny webcomics, War and Peas to your inbox.

Hi, Earth is the graphic novel collection of funny webcomics from War and Peas that resembles the child of Team America: World Police and The Far Side.

Ha ha? Ha ha ha!