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books

Earthling! by Mark Fearing

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Earthling has just what I like in a graphic novel: colorful, vibrant art and a story to match. Nine year old Bud moves with his dad to a new home, and he’s pretty nervous about it, particularly his first day at his new school. Little does he know that he is in for a first day unlike any other…
While waiting at the bus stop, Bud mistakenly boards a bus on its way to outer space school: Cosmos Academy, to be specific. At Cosmos, alien kids from all manner of planets intermingle – all planets except Earth, that is. Bud quickly learns that the aliens at Cosmos all believe Earthlings are the terror of the galaxy, and the principal in particular has a vendetta against them. Bud quickly befriends an alien named Gort, who keeps his secret and tells him to pretend to be a Tenarian, a race of aliens that are more reclusive.
Bud and his new friend concoct a plan to get him back home, which involves winning the school’s Zero-Ball competition so they can hop a ride back into space on their way to the finals and hopefully catch a ship back to Earth. Amid this main storyline, Bud also has to contend with bullies, the suspicion of the principal, and the fear that he will give himself away as an Earthling.
I loved how much fun Fearing had with both the story and the art. With so many different alien cultures as his disposal, he could be really creative with the way the aliens look and how they interact. (One alien race molts periodically and it causes a minor crisis for a Zero-Ball team.) He also clearly enjoyed creating fun, out there (pun intended) school rules. (When a child is expelled, he or she is placed in suspended animation.)
Fearing treads a lot of old ground (the underdogs try to win a special alien sport; a fish out of water has to find his way home) and some of the plot devices are obviously there just to keep the story moving (a basic piece of technology allows all aliens to understand each other), but it doesn’t really matter. There’s action and humor and pathos and all the other good stuff that is integral to a successful story. And have I mentioned how much I love the art? Fearing creates terrific facial expressions, and his aliens have tentacles and lots of eyes and all manner of oddities that make you want to look and look again.
This is a good pick for your reluctant readers for sure, and it’s a pretty substantial book, so it feels like a real accomplishment to finish it. I read this on the heels of Legends of Zita the Spacegirl and I think they’re good readalikes – they both have just the right amount of space wackiness coupled with an ordinary kid who becomes extraordinary.

Graphic Novel Roundup

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Explorer: The Mystery Boxes edited by Kazu Kibuishi

I love the Flight anthologies for their art, but the stories themselves are very hit and miss. Explorer is the version for younger readers, and this is the first volume I’ve tried. I found it pretty similar to the “grown up” Flight anthologies: great art, inconsistent storytelling. The unifying theme is a box of some kind, and the artists are free to interpret it as they wish. In one story, a boy finds a mysterious box in his closet and is soon visited by wizards willing to pay a high price for it. In another, a box is the mechanism by which a butter spirit is trapped.

My main issue (with this collection and the Flight anthologies on the whole) is that so many of these stories are very slight or clearly just the beginning of a longer tale, which makes them pretty unsatisfying. But as far as art goes, you can’t beat these anthologies. (Kibuishi’s offering, which closed out the collection, was the real stand-out in both art and story.)

Legends of Zita the Spacegirl by Ben Hatke

I reviewed Zita the Spacegirl back in 2011 and was pleased to find that Hatke wrote a sequel. The follow-up is just as fun and lively. After the events of the first book, Zita has become a celebrity. She signs autographs and is the envy of robots everywhere, and one robot in particular. In fact, this particular robot is so envious that it starts impersonating Zita, causing all sorts of trouble. And then there’s that planet that needs saving, and Zita still wants to find a way home…

Hatke’s artwork is colorful and eye-catching, comparable to Raina Telgemeier. This volume is a little less self-contained than the first, but most readers shouldn’t mind – it means there is more to come.

The Amazing Screw-On Head and Other Curious Objects by Mike Mignola

This is a collection of short stories by the renowned Hellboy creator, and two of them won Eisner awards. I may be committing blasphemy here, but I don’t understand why. The stories seemed inane to me, like they were bizarre simply for the sake of being bizarre. I found Mignola’s take on Jack and the Beanstalk to be minorly enjoyable, but the rest were not my cup of tea in the slightest. Similarly, the artwork is not my style. 
In reading reviews of this collection, many fans state that this is not the ideal place to start reading Mignola, but I can’t say I’ll give anything else a shot. (As always, your mileage may vary.)

The Marvelous Land of Oz by L. Frank Baum, adapted by Eric Shanower

I love these books and I love Eric Shanower for doing them so well. I don’t think I’ve read this book since I was a kid, and as I read Shanower’s adaptation, I’m reminded of the wonderful wordplay and dry humor Baum was so good at. I’m also reminded of just how good the sequels are and how much readers miss when they stop at book one.

I love how vibrant the colors are here, and I mostly enjoy Skottie Young’s artwork, although I tend to prefer Shanower’s (included in this compilation are several alternate covers done by him). Some of Young’s characters seem a bit more frightening in appearance than I think they’re meant to be, particularly the Scarecrow and Jack Pumpkinhead. Those are minor quibbles, though, as Young’s art superbly captures the spirit of the books and is infused with energy.

The third compilation is already out and the fourth is in the works. I don’t buy many comics for myself, but I’m considering purchasing these – they are that good.

Binky Under Pressure by Ashley Spires

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I was introduced to Binky the Space Cat last year and was utterly charmed. As a space cat, it is Binky’s job to protect his family from the “aliens” (bugs) that threaten the “space station” (the family’s home). It’s a tough job…but somebody’s gotta do it. In Spires’ third installment, Binky must contend with an interloper in the space station – a foster cat named Gracie who is more than she seems.

I quite enjoyed the story. The first two books were were pretty solitary – Binky interacted with his family (only a little, and they never understood him) and his best friend Ted (who is a stuffed animal), but no one on his own level. With the addition of Gracie, he’s given another animal to socialize with, and they get up to some fun hijinks.

Although the gimmick of Binky being a “space cat” is no longer new, each additional book in the series has maintained the same high quality as the first. The stories are clever and fun (with just the right amount of farting) and the art continues to delight. While Binky himself doesn’t talk, he does make some hilarious noises. His facial expressions are probably my favorite – Spires communicates so much with just a little re-positioning of the mouth or narrowing of the eyes. There are enough details that a second reading is just as enjoyable as the first.
Previously, on Binky the Space Cat…

Since much of the story is told through captions rather than dialogue, thought-bubbles, or pure action, I think these books work well as read-alouds, which can’t be said for most comics. Of course, the art is still wonderful – those expressions on Binky’s face kill me – and adds so much to the story, meaning it’s best shared with one or two little ones so they can each get a good look. (Or you can have your grown-up boyfriend read it and giggle with you, whichever.)

Binky isn’t sure how he feels about the new addition to the space station. Look at his expression in the last panel! Precious and sassy.

Same Difference by Derek Kirk Kim

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I’ve resisted picking up Derek Kirk Kim’s Same Difference
for a while for what might be a silly reason: the illustrations are in
black and white. Ever since I started reading graphic novels, I’ve been
more than a little prejudiced against black and white art, no matter how
good that art may be. But I’ve pretty much read through my entire
library’s small collection of full color graphic novels whose stories
seemed remotely interesting to me, so it was time to buckle down and
move on.
There’s no better place to start than Same Difference,
a much-lauded book featuring characters in their twenties, which First
Second re-released in a “deluxe edition” in 2011. By much-lauded, I mean
that it garnered Kim three major comics awards when it was first
published in 2003: the Eisner, the Harvey, and the Ignatz award for new
talent. Pretty impressive, yes? Plus, I really dug Kim’s illustrations
in The Eternal Smile, so I hoped I would like them equally in black and white.
I needn’t have worried – Same Difference
deserves the accolades. By saying that, I realize this review won’t add
much of anything new, since the world has had almost ten years to
figure this out on its own, but for the two of you who hadn’t heard of
this book until now, this is for you. 
Simon
and Nancy are two friends going through a quarter-life crisis. They’re
in their mid-twenties, a bit directionless, past high school but not
quite settled into adulthood yet. They’re eating lunch together when
Simon gets a blast from his past: he sees Irene, a former high school
friend of his, waiting at a bus stop. Rather than go and talk to her, he
instead recounts to Nancy the story of their friendship, a story that
still makes Simon feel deeply ashamed of his actions.
Later, the two are at Nancy’s
apartment and Nancy admits to Simon that she’s been receiving letters in
the mail addressed to a former tenant from a lovesick man named Ben –
and she’s been writing back, pretending to be Ben’s object of affection.
Ben lives in Pacifica, which just happens to be Simon’s hometown, and
the two decide to go to Pacifica, hoping to get a glimpse of the man
Nancy’s been stringing along. Not only is Ben not what they expected,
Simon also runs into Irene – and he can’t avoid speaking to her this
time.
The best thing about Same Difference
is the way it manages to be both funny and poignant at the same time. I
laughed out loud at so many moments. At one point, after high school
Simon realizes what a giant…jerk…he’s been, he’s depicted as just
that in the panel. There might not be anything funnier than a picture of
a giant sad-faced…jerk. (Three guesses: What do you think my favorite
part of Superbad was?) And Simon and Nancy are great wise-crackers, constantly ribbing each other like good friends do.
Often, the humor is a lead-in for something a bit deeper: reflections on
life, past experiences that haunt us, and mistakes we continue to make
into adulthood. It’s never heavy-handed, though, and it’s done in only
80 pages with black and white artwork that perfectly captures both the
humor and the poignancy.

The
only thing I wish First Second had done differently with the re-release
is to include the “Other Stories” that were published alongside the
original story.

Sidekicks by Dan Santat

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I normally stay away from stories about animals. Even as a kid, they never really did anything for me. BUT. Dan Santat’s comic about pets as superhero sidekicks had been calling out to me for a while, mostly because of the artwork, and it’s definitely a worthwhile read.
Captain Amazing, superhero extraordinaire, has been getting older, and he’s decided it’s time for him to get a sidekick. His pets – Fluffy the hamster, Roscoe the dog, and Shifty the chameleon – are all eager for the job, but Captain Amazing (Harry to his pets) is completely oblivious to this. He’s also oblivious to the fact that his pets have already begun to develop superpowers – powers that will come in handy when Harry gets into a spot of trouble himself with his old nemesis Dr. Havoc.
In many ways, this is a fairly standard superhero story. The pets are the underdogs who must move past their bickering and learn to work together to save Captain Amazing. Will they emerge victorious? If you’re at all in doubt, you haven’t read a single graphic novel in your life. 
But Santat makes the book unique enough in other ways to keep it enjoyable. For starters, it’s funny, and most of its funny moments come from the art (in glorious, bold full colors). Santat gets a lot of mileage out of Fluffy’s buck teeth and bulging eyes (often mismatched in size for greatest impact) and Shifty’s changing skin. Facial expressions are frequently hysterical, particularly when a gust of wind (or a sneeze) blows past the animals. Plus, the pets are just plain adorable, and I am a sucker for adorable. The book also benefits from Santat’s ability to create distinctions between the pets in personality as well as appearance. Naturally, this makes the story more engaging, even if the reader is never in doubt of its ending. And he includes a couple nice side stories and a clever bit at the end that make the book just that much better.
Fluffy is my favorite. Isn’t he adorable?
Sidekicks is solid middle grade entertainment, and it seems like it would have wide appeal to that age group. It feels a little bit like the Incredibles with pets instead of kids, and the outcome is the same. It’s got a heartwarming, but not heavy-handed, message about making sure to spend time with the ones you love – not a bad takeaway at all.