Laddertop Volume 1
Orson Scott Card, Emily Janice Card, Zina Card and Honoel A. Ibardolaza. Tor/Seven Seas, $10.99 trade paper (192p) ISBN 978-0-7653-2460-3
Orson Scott, Emily Janice and Zima Card join the ranks of Anne & Todd McCaffrey and Dick & Felix Francis as parent and children collaborate on this near future adventure. In a world transformed a quarter century earlier by the fantastic technology of the enigmatic alien Givers, ambitious teens like Roberta Holten and Azure Miles contend for what they have been led to believe are prestigious positions up on Laddertop, a giant space station connected to earth by a ladder; one of the Giver's gifts, Laddertop offers access to the entire solar system to humanity. As the pair soon learns, the promises made to them are misleading, training is brutal, the process of selection is seemingly arbitrary and subject to the whims of alien machinery and the true purpose of Laddertop remains a mystery even to the adults who believe they administer it. With competent manga-style illustrations by the award-winning Ibardolaza, this volume is devoted to asking the questions the rest of the series will be answering; approached as the first installment of an extended story, this stands as a worthy young adult adventure novel. (Sept.)
The Lives of Sacco and Vanzetti
Rick Geary. NBM Comics Lit, $15.99 (216p) ISBN 978-1-56163-605-1
Geary continues his campaign to use graphic novels to present complicated historical cases in a manner both clear and suspenseful with this look at the notorious case. Geary lays about what is known, and what is not, about the famous, controversial case, in which the two Italian anarchist immigrants were put to death after being found guilty of robbery and murder. The carefully constructed narrative not only details the events of the crime, manhunt, and trial, but also includes information about the lives of Sacco and Vanzetti and their families. The duo shared anarchist beliefs—creating suspicion in an era upset by the Russian Revolution and the rise of Communism. An unsympathetic judge leads to evidence favorable to the pair, and their execution sparked protests worldwide. Geary’s linear black and white illustrations, full of straight lines and right angles, are especially helpful in lending order to the confusing and often contradictory facts. His use of maps also helps explain the events, both of the killing and the worldwide response. Geary, a cartoonist with the soul of a historian reaches no easy conclusions, but gives readers the tools to drawn their own. (Aug.)
Americus
MK Reed and Jonathan Hill. Roaring Brook/First Second, $14.99 (216p) ISBN 978-1-59643-768-5
In this charming tale, Reed and Hill offer a lovely valentine to readers and, especially, to librarians. Neil Barton is an outcast about to enter high school in the conservative small town of Americus. His life is made bearable by books—especially the fantasy series The Chronicles of Apathea Ravenchilde, The Huntress Witch—and the young-adult librarian Charlotte, who gives him a job and someone to talk to. Even those pleasures are threatened when some vocal members of the community begin a campaign to ban the Ravenchilde series, arguing they promote witchcraft and other illicit behavior. Soon all of Americus is involved in the battle, lining up on one side or the other, with Charlotte leading the charge for intellectual freedom. As Neil develops confidence through the fight, he also finds a circle of friends. Woven throughout are excerpts from the Ravenchilde story, echoing the theme of the struggle in Americus. Hill’s black and while illustrations, full clean, bold lines, fill the tale with a sense of drama and action, even when the characters are reading silently. Americus is ultimately a reminder of the small miracles a good book can conjure up, in individual lives and across communities. (Aug.)
Nursery Rhyme Comics: 50 Timeless Rhymes By 50 Celebrated Cartoonists
Chris Duffy, ed., introduction by Leonard S. Marcus. Roaring Brook/First Second, $18.99 (128p) ISBN 978-1-59643-600-8
In this easy-to-read and fun to read aloud collection, classic nursery rhymes get a contemporary spin from artists as varied as The New Yorker’s Roz Chast and Hellboy creator Mike Mignola. Each miniature story is beautifully colored, making each two-page spread a visual treat, and the traditional panel form of comics and graphic novels merge easily with the syncopated beats of the familiar rhymes. The interpretations of the nursery songs range from literal—such as Lilli Carré’s “Sing a Song of Sixpence” to the slightly wacky. In Dave Roman’s “One, Two, Buckle My Shoe,” the numbers in the title refer to tiny clones created by a wizard inventor, with the help of gadgets like the Clone Master 3000 and the Mega Incubator. And any preconceived notions you have about old women living in footwear should be abandoned before reading Lucy Kinsley’s delightfully original “The Was an Old Woman Who Lived in a Shoe.” Instead of a crotchety crone, the titular woman lives in a funky boot and runs Ruth’s Rock & Rock Babysitting. Every panel explodes with enough rich detail to keep attention glued to the page. Ages 3-up (Aug.)
Hocus Pocus
Sylvie Desrosiers and Rémy Simard. Kids Can, $16.99 (32p) ISBN 978-1-55453-577-4
The cartoony style of this wordless comic about a magician’s hungry rabbit and loyal dog has a familiar Saturday-morning feeling to it. The rabbit wants to snack on the tempting fresh carrots that the magician has just brought home from the grocery store—understandable, given that the bunny has just finished up a shift in the magician’s hat. However, the magician’s earnest pooch wants to keep the errant rabbit in its place. The dog pursues and the rabbit outwits in a series of capers, drawn by Simard in a blocky, color-outside-of-the-lines style that is at once clean and energetic. The reversals of fortune is still satisfying and will delight kids, who so often are sensitively attuned to matters of fairness and identify with the little guy in stories. Without words, the book may be zipped through by readers trained to focus on words, but younger readers with burgeoning observation and comprehension skills encouragement to give art as much consideration as letters will enjoy testing them. Ages 3-7 (July)
Mameshiba: On the Loose!
James Turner, Jorge Monlongo and Gemma Correll. Viz, $6.99 trade paper (80p) ISBN 978-1-4215-3880-8
The Mameshiba, immensely popular characters in Japan with their own TV short cartoons and merchandise, are adorable crosses between different varieties of beans and dogs, each with its own personality. They find as much peril in the kitchen sink drain as they do in outer space, and the adventurers use their strengths and weaknesses to either embroil themselves in more trouble or find their way out of it (whether intentionally or unintentionally). Manga-style paneling and details like speed lines provide for fast-paced action, while chibi (cute) facial expressions and fanciful villains like sewer chickens and pink aliens provide cuteness and playfulness. Nerdy Lentil Bean and gregarious Edamame offer facts, figures, and trivia to anyone around them, which is a holdover from the characters’ original incarnation (dreamt up by a Japanese advertising agency). The characters have enough personality to carry these stories, but the graphic novel lack the bizarre charm of the original Japanese animated shorts. Turner, Monlongo and Viz Media have re-imagined the Mameshiba for a young audience, and while the results are fun, fast reading, they may have lost the genuine quirkiness at the heart of the Mameshibas’ broad appeal. Ages 8-12 (July)
Around the World
Matt Phelan. Candlewick Press, $24.99 (240p) ISBN 978-0-7636-3619-7
In the wake of Jules Verne’s Around the World in Eighty Days, the desire to circumnavigate the globe ran rampant as Phelan (The Storm in the Barn) illustrates in this oddly unexciting tale of three such adventure seekers. In 1884, Thomas Stevens, a former miner, vows to cross the US by bicycle, then a newfangled mode of transportation. After successfully traveling from coast to coast, Stevens decides to continue on to Europe via ship, and on through India and China before ending his 13,500-mile journey in Japan. Nellie Bly, by far the most interesting globetrotter seen here, departs New York in 1889 as a reporter with the goal of traveling around the world in 74 days, beating Verne’s fictional Phileas Fogg. Sending dispatches back during her long steamer and train journey—during which she briefly meets Verne in France—Bly’s ticking clock adds an element of suspense. Finally, in 1892, Massachusetts sea captain Joshua Slocum sets sail alone on the Spray, intending to sail around the world. Despite visitations from his dead wife and rough weather to liven up the voyage, his journey is comparatively dull. Little differentiates the three stories visually and the elements begin to blur, the result as flat as a breezeless sea. Ages 9-12 (Oct.)
Mangaman
Barry Lyga and Colleen Doran. Houghton Mifflin, $18.99 (144p) ISBN 978-0-547-42315-9
A clever idea—tossing a manga-style boy into American graphic novel art, where the "proper" characters see his differences—is more successful artistically than textually. The obvious points are hit, beautifully illustrated by Doran: Marissa's a very popular girl who, bored, ditched her sports star boyfriend and starting dressing in costumes. (The ex is just this side of a date-rapist-in-training.) Ryoko is a refugee from a world where all the manga conventions are true. They fall in love, leading to images of him with literal hearts in his eyes, visible sweat drops (indicating passion), the janitor having to sweep up his speed lines, and so on. This is all expected, given the premise. The pacing, though, runs in fits and starts, and the book can't seem to decide whether it wants to be about in-jokes for genre fans, saving the world from generic monsters, or exploring high school culture clash. Once Lyga starts truly playing with postmodernism (a sequence where Doran excels, evoking Mucha), it feels as though he's run out of space for his goals, as well as descending into unexpectedly sexual and violent scenes. A longer book from a non-children's imprint might have been more successful. YA (Nov.)
