monster graphic novel book review

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Monster: a graphic novel, common sense media reviewers.

Thought-provoking adaptation of classic coming-of-age novel.

A Lot or a Little?

What you will—and won't—find in this book.

Monster: A Graphic Novel does a great job of showi

Scenes of redemption and self-reflection throughou

Because of the main character's ambiguity, it's to

Inmates are concerned about being raped in jail, a

Name-calling, including "f--got" and "stupid."

Adults are shown drinking alcohol, smoking what co

Parents need to know that Monster: A Graphic Novel is an illustrated representation of timely but strong themes in Walter Dean Myers' original novel. Street life, a murder, and life inside jail are realistically depicted. Parents should be ready to discuss the criminal justice system, racism, perception of…

Educational Value

Monster: A Graphic Novel does a great job of showing elements of self-examination as well as introducing film terms and an insider's look at the criminal court process.

Positive Messages

Scenes of redemption and self-reflection throughout that serve as bright spots of positivity within the darkness and despair of a violent murder trial.

Positive Role Models

Because of the main character's ambiguity, it's tough to view him in a solely "positive" light. However, he does exhibit positive traits. HIs parents are positive role models -- two of only a few adults who are portrayed positively.

Violence & Scariness

Inmates are concerned about being raped in jail, and readers "hear" a possible rape in progress in jail. There are several fight scenes and one situation in which an innocent victim is shown having a letter cut into his face as part of a gang initiation. People are intimidated with violence, and the main story involves the murder of a shop owner. The shop owner's body is shown in a flashback as well as in police investigator photos.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Violence & Scariness in your kid's entertainment guide.

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Drinking, Drugs & Smoking

Adults are shown drinking alcohol, smoking what could be marijuana, and selling drugs. A teen is offered a marijuana cigarette but refuses the offer.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Drinking, Drugs & Smoking in your kid's entertainment guide.

Parents Need to Know

Parents need to know that Monster: A Graphic Novel is an illustrated representation of timely but strong themes in Walter Dean Myers' original novel . Street life, a murder, and life inside jail are realistically depicted. Parents should be ready to discuss the criminal justice system, racism, perception of guilt or innocence, and peer pressure.

Where to Read

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What's the Story?

Steve Harmon is a 16-year-old budding filmmaker awaiting trial for the murder and robbery of a beloved bodega owner. He sees his experiences in jail and on trial through the lens of a movie script. Steve grapples with fear, depression, and questions of whether he really is the MONSTER the prosecution says he is.

Is It Any Good?

Readers may be wary of messing with a masterpiece when a new version of a classic novel is created, but the striking, eerie art of this graphic novel adaptation quickly puts those fears to rest. The fear, doubt, uncertainty and confusion of Walter Dean Myers' novel is all there. As with the original, you want to root for Steve -- to believe in his innocence and hold your breath for his safety as he navigates the horrors of prison life. Yet, as with the novel, readers of the graphic novel will find themselves doubting the innocence of a teen with so much to live for who's working so hard to convince himself he still has some piece of humanity left.

In the hands of indie comic favorites Guy A. Sims and Dawud Anyabwile, the book comes to life for a new generation of readers at a time when society's narrative about the humanity of boys and men of color is often subjective. Stark and open-ended, MONSTER: A GRAPHIC NOVEL is an excellent resource when discussing current events, criminal justice, and peer pressure.

Talk to Your Kids About ...

Families can talk about media portrayals of violent crimes. What is the difference between the way a criminal trial is presented in the novel versus the way it's presented on television?

Families also can talk about peer pressure and ways to say no, even under threat of harm.

What happens when people view the same event(s) from different perspectives? Can you point to examples of this in current news events?

Book Details

• Authors : Walter Dean Myers , Guy A Sims
• Illustrator : Dawud Anyabwile
• Genre : Contemporary Fiction
• Topics : High School
• Book type : Fiction
• Publisher : Amistad
• Publication date : October 20, 2015
• Publisher's recommended age(s) : 14 - 18
• Number of pages : 160
• Available on : Paperback, Nook, Hardback, Kindle
• Award : Coretta Scott King Medal and Honors
• Last updated : August 15, 2021

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A GRAPHIC NOVEL

by Walter Dean Myers ; adapted by Guy A. Sims ; illustrated by Dawud Anyabwile ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 13, 2015

It’s not easy for an adaptation to please both old and new readers, but this respectful one pulls off that trick

A faithfully adapted graphic-novel retelling of the first Printz Award winner.

If ever a novel lent itself to a graphic adaptation, it is Monster (1999). Written in a screenplay format interspersed with first-person journal entries, it practically adapts itself into a visual presentation. Fortunately Sims and Anyabwile are smart enough not to mess with a good thing, and they stick closely to the original to tell the story of New York teenager Steve Harmon’s trial for felony murder. Myers’ admirers will be pleased to see much of the original dialogue and narration preserved, though neatly edited in places to keep the pace brisk. Meanwhile, Anyabwile’s black-and-white illustrations do more than simply interpret the original’s camera directions and descriptions. They also add subtle layers to the courtroom accounts and journal entries, all while maintaining the narrative suspense and ambiguity that’s made this story linger with a generation of readers. It’s not any clearer in this version what role Steve truly might have played in the crime. Black gutters between panels and heavy shading create an appropriately oppressive atmosphere. Though the overall effect can be muddy, it generally suits the darkness of the story and the bold lines of Anyabwile’s figures.

Pub Date: Oct. 13, 2015

ISBN: 978-0-06-227500-4

Page Count: 160

Publisher: Amistad/HarperCollins

Review Posted Online: July 21, 2015

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2015

TEENS & YOUNG ADULT MYSTERY & THRILLER | GENERAL GRAPHIC NOVELS & COMICS | TEENS & YOUNG ADULT FICTION

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by Walter Dean Myers ; illustrated by Floyd Cooper

by Walter Dean Myers

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New York Times Bestseller

A GOOD GIRL'S GUIDE TO MURDER

From the good girl's guide to murder series , vol. 1.

by Holly Jackson ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 4, 2020

A treat for mystery readers who enjoy being kept in suspense.

Everyone believes that Salil Singh killed his girlfriend, Andrea Bell, five years ago—except Pippa Fitz-Amobi.

Pip has known and liked Sal since childhood; he’d supported her when she was being bullied in middle school. For her senior capstone project, Pip researches the disappearance of former Fairview High student Andie, last seen on April 18, 2014, by her younger sister, Becca. The original investigation concluded with most of the evidence pointing to Sal, who was found dead in the woods, apparently by suicide. Andie’s body was never recovered, and Sal was assumed by most to be guilty of abduction and murder. Unable to ignore the gaps in the case, Pip sets out to prove Sal’s innocence, beginning with interviewing his younger brother, Ravi. With his help, Pip digs deeper, unveiling unsavory facts about Andie and the real reason Sal’s friends couldn’t provide him with an alibi. But someone is watching, and Pip may be in more danger than she realizes. Pip’s sleuthing is both impressive and accessible. Online articles about the case and interview transcripts are provided throughout, and Pip’s capstone logs offer insights into her thought processes as new evidence and suspects arise. Jackson’s debut is well-executed and surprises readers with a connective web of interesting characters and motives. Pip and Andie are white, and Sal is of Indian descent.

Pub Date: Feb. 4, 2020

ISBN: 978-1-9848-9636-0

Page Count: 400

Publisher: Delacorte

Review Posted Online: Oct. 27, 2019

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2019

TEENS & YOUNG ADULT MYSTERY & THRILLER | TEENS & YOUNG ADULT SOCIAL THEMES

More In The Series

by Holly Jackson

More by Holly Jackson

LIAR'S BEACH

From the liar's beach series , vol. 1.

by Katie Cotugno ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 2, 2023

This scorching glimpse of life (and death) among the moneyed classes hits its marks, if a bit mechanically.

A summertime stay on Martha’s Vineyard confirms everything Linden thinks about rich people.

Best known for emotional YA romances, Cotugno tries her hand at an emotional whodunit—and readers who can roll with the weird attraction her protagonist seems to exert on the two main young women here may find themselves caught up in an engrossing whirl of, as the title promises, lies, secrets, and louche living. Hardly has he arrived for a two-week stay at palatial August House than Michael Linden and his host and boarding school roommate Jasper’s twin sister, Eliza, are bedroom-bound; his ghosted former platonic friend Holiday turns up; and Greg, despised boyfriend of another houseguest, winds up in a coma after an apparent accident. Dragged along by Holiday, who, along with inexplicably letting bygones be bygones, turns out to be an enthusiastic amateur sleuth, scholarship student Linden finds plenty of fuel for his (supposedly) secret resentment of the privileged classes and the way they can get away with anything. Though not, as it turns out after a comfortably conventional denouement complete with surprise confession, murder. Also, as a tease at the end suggests, for all that he comes clean about several secrets of his own, Linden leads the pack in the “things to hide” department. Aside from one prominent supporting character—a brown-skinned lacrosse champion—the central cast reads White.

Pub Date: May 2, 2023

ISBN: 9780593433287

Page Count: 288

Review Posted Online: March 13, 2023

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2023

by Katie Cotugno

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by Candace Bushnell & Katie Cotugno

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Monster: A Graphic Novel by Walter Dean Myers | Book Review

I received this book for free from Publisher in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

A stunning black-and-white graphic novel adaptation of Walter Dean Myers's Michael L. Printz Award winner and New York Times bestseller Monster, adapted by Guy Sims and illustrated by Dawud Anyabwile Monster is a multi-award-winning, provocative coming-of-age story about Steve Harmon, a teenager awaiting trial for a murder and robbery. As Steve acclimates to juvenile detention and goes to trial, he envisions the ordeal as a movie. Monster was the first-ever Michael L. Printz Award recipient, an ALA Best Book, a Coretta Scott King Honor selection, and a National Book Award finalist. Now Monster has been adapted into a graphic novel by Guy Sims, with stunning black-and-white art from Dawud Anyabwile, Guy's brother. Fans of Monster and of the work of Walter Dean Myers—and even kids who think they don't like to read—will devour this graphic adaptation.

Why Did I Read Monster: A Graphic Novel?

Monster: A Graphic Novel by Walter Dean Myers, adapted by Guy A. Sims and illustrated by Dawud Anyabwile is a book that I decided to read in the beginning of 2016 because it is an adaptation of Myers’s book by the same title , and because I am someone who cannot get enough of graphic novels. Further, with listening to Serial, watching Making Murderer and reading  All American Boys , I cannot get enough of media that explores the American justice system, flaws and all. Also – my 2016 reading goal is 250 books and anything that can be read super quickly, shallow as that sounds, is prioritized. This is the sort of book you can definitely read in an hour.

What’s The Story Here?

Monster: A Graphic Novel is what it sounds like – a graphic novel adaptation of the book with the same title by Walter Dean Myers. More specifically it is about this Black teenager named Steven Harmon. Steven is on trial for murder. He is alleged to be an accomplice, because he acted as a look out. So, the novel goes over the trial, but also how the Steven is a filmmaker and he seems almost like a passive viewer in the biggest event of his life so far. If you like stories about the justice system and are engaged when it comes to very important issues the system faces, well this is a good one to read. It certainly challenged a few of my perceptions.

How Did I Like This Adaptation of Monster?

I thought that  Monster: A Graphic Novel was an okay adaptation of the book. I liked seeing the story in a whole new form. I do not think that this book added anything new to the story — it wasn’t quite like a movie where you walking away maybe taking in the story in a new light. However, I do think that this adaptation makes the story accessible to a new group of people. I think that maybe this format will make the story more appealing to people who might struggle with literacy – given all the pictures, and that it is a graphic novel. For that alone, I think that this adaptation was worth making. I also liked how this graphic novel refreshed me with the story. There was quite a bit that I did not really remember. I also felt more sympathetic to Harmon on this go around.

How’s The Art:

The art in  Monster: A Graphic Novel was all done by Dawud Anyabwile. His art is completely new to me. To me, it looked like pencil drawings or charcoal, I am not an artist at all so I can’t be sure. I thought that Anyabwile made great use of shading and of light and dark. The art is very textured. I thought that the graphics matched the story very well. There were even some symbolic depictions as well. Anyabwile does a superb job in the way that his art interact with Walter Dean Myers’s story and Guy A. Sims’s adaptation.

Sum It Up With A GIF:

This gif is perfect because prison actually does scare Steven Harmon.

Other Reviews of Monster: A Graphic Novel by Walter Dean Myers:

Jill’s Bookmark -  “ the court scenes became more impactful for me ”

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What would you do when the law comes for you?

Monster: The Graphic Novel by Walter Dean Myers and Guy A. Sims

September 28, 2022 by BlackRaven Leave a Comment

The themes of truth, trust and lies are tossed on their heads in Guy A. Sims adaptation. Monster: The Graphic Novel includes a realistic take on the justice system. However, due to the type of people and the fact the characters are not likable, I believe you will have empathy but maybe not a real sympathy. Even for our narrator. With that said the outcomes of the trail seem realistic and each character may not be completely “fleshed out” but as characters each one is interesting and is important overall.

The ideas of truth, lies and trust shape the story. Steve Harmon, a young man accused of partaking in a robbery of a store that ends in the murder of the clerk/owner, explores who do you trust. Your lawyer? Your buddies? Your family? Your gang? And it explores the idea of truth and lies. Who is telling the truth? Are lies just other forms of truth? And who is to say what is a lie? It could be the truth for that person, but not for you. And of course, that truth might have conditions. After all, Steve was “only” the lookout for the robbery. That does not mean he should be given 25 to life for felony murder, should it? And due to what the lawyer wants him to say, was he even there doing anything or just happens to be an “innocent” bystander? Also, race does play a part, but maybe not as large as you might assume.

Harmon is a character who may not be a reliable narrator. You need to see all the factors, even small ones. As a film maker (or wants to be) he sets the trial and his life up as a movie as he tells you the events. This way he can pick and choose who you see, hear, and what pieces he allows or edits out. The ending reinstates the fourth wall breaking (sometimes he speaks directly to the reader and sometimes it feels as if you are reading his diary) but I will not say how as it is a piece of the story I feel you need to experience fresh and with your own feelings, thoughts and even biases.

The cover gives you a false assumption to the illustrations. Dawud Anyabwile created black and white imagery that is both fleshed out and simple. Not simplistic, but not as busy or colorful as you might think. The setup is in the traditional paneling of graphic novel, but also it can feel like a movie as well. The art is not graphic but does not hide what is happening or how people look.

Best for ages 14 and up (there is language and violence, plus concepts might not be appropriate for younger readers).

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Monster: a graphic novel.

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A stunning graphic novel adaptation of Walter Dean Myers's New York Times bestseller Monster .

Monster is a multi-award-winning, provocative coming-of-age story about Steve Harmon, a teenager awaiting trial for a murder and robbery. As Steve acclimates to juvenile detention and goes to trial, he envisions how his ordeal would play out on the big screen.

Guy A. Sims, the acclaimed author of the Brotherman series of comic books, collaborated with his brother, the illustrator Dawud Anyabwile, in this thrilling black-and-white graphic novel adaption of Monster.

Monster was the first-ever Michael L. Printz Award recipient, an ALA Best Book, a Coretta Scott King Honor selection, and a National Book Award finalist. Monster is also now a major motion picture called All Rise starring Jennifer Hudson, Kelvin Harrison, Jr., Nas, and A$AP Rocky.

Fans of Monster and of the work of Walter Dean Myers—and even kids who think they don't like to read—will devour this graphic adaptation.

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Monster: A Graphic Novel

About this ebook.

Monster is a multi-award-winning, provocative coming-of-age story about Steve Harmon, a teenager awaiting trial for a murder and robbery. As Steve acclimates to juvenile detention and goes to trial, he envisions how his ordeal would play out on the big screen.

Guy A. Sims, the acclaimed author of the Brotherman series of comic books, collaborated with his brother, the illustrator Dawud Anyabwile, in this thrilling black-and-white graphic novel adaption of Monster.

Monster was the first-ever Michael L. Printz Award recipient, an ALA Best Book, a Coretta Scott King Honor selection, and a National Book Award finalist. Monster is also now a major motion picture called All Rise starring Jennifer Hudson, Kelvin Harrison, Jr., Nas, and A$AP Rocky.

Fans of Monster and of the work of Walter Dean Myers—and even kids who think they don't like to read—will devour this graphic adaptation.

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About the author

Walter Dean Myers was the New York Times bestselling author of Monster, the winner of the first Michael L. Printz Award; a former National Ambassador for Young People's Literature; and an inaugural NYC Literary Honoree. Myers received every single major award in the field of children's literature. He was the author of two Newbery Honor Books and six Coretta Scott King Awardees. He was the recipient of the Margaret A. Edwards Award for lifetime achievement in writing for young adults, a three-time National Book Award Finalist, as well as the first-ever recipient of the Coretta Scott King-Virginia Hamilton Award for Lifetime Achievement.

Dawud anyabwile is an Emmy Award-winning artist and the cocreator and illustrator of the groundbreaking comics series Brotherman: Dictator of Discipline, which is cocreated and written by his brother, Guy A. Sims. Dawud has also worked as a character designer on television productions such as The Wild Thornberrys and Rugrats as well as served as a production artist on a variety of music videos, commercials, and game animations.

Guy A. Sims is a poet and fiction writer as well as the cocreator of Brotherman Comics. He is the author of Living Just a Little: A Novel; The Cold Hard Cases of Duke Denim; The Kwanzaa Handbook; and The Kwanzaa Kids Learn the Seven Principles.

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Monster: A Graphic Novel

Book Information

• Ages 11-13 (Older Readers)
• Ages 14+ (Mature Readers)
• The Champion
• The Investigator
• The Jokester
• The Team Player
• African American
• African American author
• Black Lives Matter
• boys and men
• boys/girls books for girls books for boys
• diverse books
• graphic novel
• main character: male
• 11-13 Older Readers
• 14+ Mature Readers

A stunning graphic novel adaptation of Walter Dean Myers's  New York Times  bestseller  Monster .

Monster  is a multi-award-winning, provocative coming-of-age story about Steve Harmon, a teenager awaiting trial for a murder and robbery. As Steve acclimates to juvenile detention and goes to trial, he envisions how his ordeal would play out on the big screen.

Guy A. Sims, the acclaimed author of the Brotherman series of comic books, collaborated with his brother, the illustrator Dawud Anyabwile, in this thrilling black-and-white graphic novel adaption of Monster.

Monster  was the first-ever Michael L. Printz Award recipient, an ALA Best Book, a Coretta Scott King Honor selection, and a National Book Award finalist.  Monster  is also now a major motion picture called  All Rise  starring Jennifer Hudson, Kelvin Harrison, Jr., Nas, and A$AP Rocky.

Fans of  Monster and of the work of Walter Dean Myers—and even kids who think they don't like to read—will devour this graphic adaptation.---from the publisher

160 pages                      978-0062274991                     Ages 13-17

Keywords:  graphic novel, African American, African American author, Black Lives Matter, diversity, diverse books, coming of age, trial, juvenile detention, crime, 13 year old, 14 year old, 15 year old

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Sam Thielman is a reporter and critic based in Brooklyn. In addition to his monthly column for The Times, he has written about comics and graphic novels for The New Yorker, The Atlantic, Slate and The Guardian.

The seven-year wait since Emil Ferris published her debut graphic novel has felt far longer than that, but MY FAVORITE THING IS MONSTERS, BOOK 2 (Fantagraphics, 412 pp., $44.99) is finally here, and now the first book is no longer in a class by itself. There is apparently nothing Ferris can’t render: A cartoony girl-werewolf — her protagonist, Karen Reyes, drawn as she sees herself — seems to flow from her multicolored ballpoint pens as easily as Jan Sanders van Hemessen’s musclebound Judith , standing contrapposto next to the head of Holophernes on one memorable page, wields her sword.

And that’s part of the point. Ferris is drawing a murder mystery and a story about Chicago in the 1960s and a coming-of-age tale, but she’s also interested in all the ways that high art is in conversation with low art. Her gangsters, drag queens and hippie philosophers might be aliens or vampires from a sleazy magazine on one page, but they could just as easily populate a Picasso or a Goya drawing on the next. There’s a page of Medusa as the Mona Lisa that feels like the book’s cri de coeur: Why shouldn’t beauty and monstrosity peacefully coexist within the same subject?

This is not merely an artistic problem. Karen’s beloved brother, Deeze, is devoted and protective, but he’s also brutally violent. And as Karen tentatively gets more comfortable being gay, she learns that one of her neighbors, Anka, a Holocaust survivor, has been murdered — a fact made all the more tragic because of the terrible things she did to survive.

Ferris doesn’t tie up all these plot threads; she revels in the contradictions rather than resolving them. A prequel, “Records of the Damned,” is reportedly already in the works, and somehow my anticipation for the next volume is already exactly the right kind of pleasant agony.

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Alex Delaware graphic novels

Ande parks  ( adapter ) , michael gaydos  ( illustrator ) , jonathan kellerman.

176 pages, Kindle Edition

First published June 6, 2017

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Three years ago, I attended a lecture at St. John Cantius Catholic Church in Chicago with a dear friend of mine. A YouTuber named Jonathan Pageau, with whom I had been casual familiar, was giving some sort of lecture, and I decided to drive in and see it. That lecture turned out to be about Kanye West and the restoration of beauty and sacred art . Pageau is an Orthodox Icon carver, and he puts a lot of thought into the importance of symbolism and the ultimate meaning behind art. He spoke extensively about the nature of order and chaos, the role of foolish characters in turning the world upside down, and the state of the chaotic modern world.

Towards the end of his lecture, he showed several concept art pieces from a comic book he had been working on called God’s Dog, and I immediately knew I would need to get a copy when it was released. Last winter, he finally put up an IndieGogo Campaign to print and distribute the completed novel, and copies of the hardcover shipped in August after some notably serious delays.

Check out Geeks Under Grace’s interview with Jonathan Pageau from last November!

Content Guide

Spiritual Content:  Themes of lightness and darkness. The story is set in early Christendom and directly explores the implication of the fall of Eden. Violence:  Some brief moments of blood and violence. Language/Crude Humor:  None Sexual Content:  A few depictions of bear female breasts, in a non-sexual context. Characters make lewd references to desiring women. Drug/Alcohol Use:  Characters casually drink wine and enjoy drunken merriment. Other Negative Themes:  None Positive Content:  Themes of redemption and seeking truth.

God’s Dog is a graphic novel I have been eager to read for nearly three years, and finally getting to read it has been one of the highlights of 2022!

As Pageau writes:

In this series, we will join together the wildest strains from the Christian tradition, from the Bible, and from later hagiography. Anachronism and legend will be mixed together with history and modern fantasy. With God’s Dog, we hope to have created an epic story which lovingly explores the consequences of the Fall and the effect of the garments of skin in the world.

The book that shipped is only the first volume of a multi-volume series, and I think the first volume is off to a strong start with reservations.

God’s Dog tells the stories of two very prominent saints within the Orthodox and Catholic traditions: Saint George and St. Christopher. Most people are likely familiar with the former from the famous story of St. George and the Dragon, to which this graphic novel explicitly is intended as a pseudo-sequel. St. Christopher is slightly less well-known, especially in Protestant or Evangelical circles.

As Pageau writes, “Reprobus, later known as Christopher, is based of course on the legends of St. Christopher. He is also an amalgamation of Christian legends involving dog-headed men… Christopher is traditionally a martyr, having died under the Emperor Decius in the 3rd century.”

The nominal protagonist is Daniel, a doubting monk who has broken his vows and is following St. George on a pilgrimage to the holy land. Just as the group has settled in for a celebration of Fat Tuesday or “Meatfare,” a villager runs into town screaming of a beast attacking his animals. The pilgrimage departs and finds themselves stalked by an enormous dogman to whom George decides to offer mercy. George comes to realize the meaning of a saying given to him by St. Symeon — that there are beasts to be killed, tamed, and left alone — and Reprobus shouldn’t be killed.

God’s Dog is a story of redemption — of a beast who is called forth to awaken his humanity and follow the path of light against the forces of darkness. As the book’s introduction makes clear, there are dark forces at work in this world: giants, strange thieves, servants of Nimrod, and darkness.

It is only the first part of that story, though, and it is inconclusive where that journey will take our protagonists. Pageau has already said the culmination of the story will conclude with an epic siege of Jerusalem by the forces of evil and that he has material for at least three more volumes.

We learn quite a lot about George, Daniel, and Reprobus, the world they live in, and just what they’re capable of. The pilgrimage is nowhere near complete by the book’s end, though. The foes are not vanquished and the stirring threats and curses churning beneath the surface of the graphic novel are unresolved. The central villain and conflict of the series are left cryptic, and many of its characters need more time to develop. The book’s nominal resolution is the hope that Reprobus will find what it is he is looking for; whatever elusive thing that is — as he says, he has no name, no home, and he is only looking for “more.”

If there is one idea that Pageau continually returns to in his work, it’s the idea of subversion of chaos by chaos. He’s very fascinated by jesters and clowns who are capable of flipping the world upside down and returning the world to normalcy in the midst of chaos (ergo his fascination with Kanye West).

St. Christopher makes a wonderful muse for Pageau, in that sense; planting his story in the realm of 3rd century Christendom gives him the chance to play with the ideas and legends surrounding the Orthodox Church Fathers and to thread their stories and lives into that of St. Christopher. This world he presents is one that is clearly upside down, clearly under threat of darkness, and in need of an unlikely hero. I guess it should be taken as a compliment that my greatest complaint is that there wasn’t more of the story and that I didn’t want the story to end so prematurely — that we didn’t get to see just what St. Christopher was fully capable of yet.

+ Excellent Moments and Great Artwork + Wonderful Character Beats + Fascinating Themes and Worldbuilding

- Inconclusive Story

The Bottom Line

God's Dog's first volume is very good, but it is short of the masterpiece it has the potential of being until we see how its story concludes.

Tyler Hummel

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Emil Ferris Tackles Big Issues Through a Small Child With a Monster Obsession

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There are two types of monsters: Ones that simply appear scary and ones that are scary by their cruelty. Karen Reyes is the former, but what does that make her troubled older brother, Deeze?

Emil Ferris has finally followed up on her visually stunning, 2017 debut graphic novel with its concluding half, My Favorite Thing Is Monsters Book 2 . It picks up right where Book 1 left off (spoilers for Book 1 … now), with 10-year-old Karen in a fever dream as she processes her mother’s death from cancer and the revelation that she had another brother named Victor before his twin Deeze killed him.

For the uninitiated, the story is essentially Karen’s diary as she dons a detective hat and oversized coat to solve mysteries — like who killed the upstairs neighbor and where her emaciated classmate disappeared to — in 1968 Chicago, featuring historical events like the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.’s assassination and Vietnam War protests. Karen, a monster-loving Catholic school student who identifies more with werewolves than with girls, sketches her experiences in lined notebooks. She has an astounding ability to capture people — a technically skilled artist who also sees through her subjects and depicts their nature alongside their features. And she’s gay, something her beloved Mama definitely did not approve of and which she must now reconcile with the society she lives in.

Monsters may be narrated by a kid, but it is definitely an adult book with adult language and themes. Ferris raises complicated issues ranging from the patriarchy’s role in homophobia and America’s role in eugenics to the merits of capitalism, socialism and communism. Along with why school sucks.

And I cannot give Ferris enough accolades for acknowledging the depth of children, who often see and understand more than most adults want to admit.

Ferris revels in gray areas and often calls taboos and moral lines into question, using Karen’s elementary-age perspective as an opportunity to see people not as their profession, race or sexuality, but as people — or, in any case, monsters, but equalizing regardless.

Although Book 2 has an introduction and brief callbacks to remind readers who’s who and what happened, it’s really best to read or reread Book 1 first. There are tons of characters at play and it’s a multi-faceted story that requires deep reading. The recaps are decent reminders, but they can’t possibly capture the nuance from Book 1 in just a page or two.

If Book 2 seems almost too familiar, that’s because it follows the same basic plot arc as Book 1 , even down to starting and ending with wild dreams. But unlike its prequel, the plot jumps around with considerably more frequency and suddenness. Ferris leans on her readers to read between the lines and apply the same techniques for viewing her art that her characters use when they visit the Art Institute of Chicago.

Monsters is an incredible feat of both storytelling and artistic achievement that makes for a brag-worthy coffee table art book, as well as a compelling story with a seriously intense moral and philosophical workout. Ferris is a must-have for any comic-lover’s collection.

‘My Favorite Thing Is Monsters Book 2’ by Emil Ferris is released via Fantagraphics on May 28, 2024.

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Stamped from the beginning–a graphic novel of the book.

Review by C.J. Bunce

Stamped from the Beginning is a 2016 non-fiction work by Professor Ibram X. Kendi, a scholar whose works on racism have received popular acclaim internationally.  The title was a phrase used by Confederate Jefferson Davis, who referred to the inequality of whites and blacks as “stamped from the beginning”–according to him racial inequality was the “will of God.”  A new graphic novel by cartoonist Joel Christian Gill takes Kendi’s book and explains the history of racism in America in vivid detail, using five biographies of Americans as mile markers in the nation’s four centuries of black inequality.  The graphic novel is available this month here at Amazon.

The book looks at Cotton Mather, a noted Boston preacher and intellectual from the late 17th century, antislavery, anti-abolitionist President Thomas Jefferson, early 19th century abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison, the first great professionally trained black scholar W. E. B. Du Bois, and anti-racism advocate Angela Davis.

But the bulk of the history is found in-between these figures, as Kendi and Gill address all the steps that have taken place between slavery in America and inequality today, from the role of the church and early philosophers during the founding of America to the Declaration of Independence, forward and backward steps leading up to the Civil War, the Emancipation Proclamation, Reconstruction, the role of popular writers in fiction and the press in shaping good ideas and bad, and policies of politicians from across the political spectrum in shaping the laws that created the Civil Rights movement, the role of the philosophies of segregation and assimilation, and how racial bias has threaded across culture.

Gill approaches Kendi’s work with first person narration using modern, colloquial phrases and viewpoints to address the historical figures Kendi highlighted in his book, often taking extensive information and compressing it into a single page.  In doing so he makes historical concepts more accessible to today’s readers, especially anyone who may not approach the original book directly.  It’s not dumb-downed in any way, and it’s also not targeted at kids per se–it’s probably not going to make it into grade schools because it must depict events like lynching and incorporate profanity to maintain its historicity.  But using the graphic novel as a medium, the creators should be able to get the content into the hands of a new audience, especially with the reach of electronic editions.

Because Kendi’s book was published in 2016 and stops with Barack Obama’s presidency, the book will feel like it needs some more chapters, but an epilogue begins the conversation referencing the murders of George Floyd, Breanna Taylor, Ahmaud Barbery, the shooting of Jacob Blake, and the Black Lives Matter protests.

Knowledge is power, and this book aims to share a historically ignored cross-section of history with a new generation, and in a non-traditional format.  It’s a thick, book-length, 284-page account available in hardcover, paperback, or digital.  Stamped from the Beginning is now available here at Amazon, from Ten Speed Graphic press.  Or pick it up at Elite Comics or your local comic shop.

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Five of this year’s best graphic novels make perfect summer reads

These books by Maurice Vellekoop, Eddie Ahn, Nate Powell and others offer fresh stories and beautiful images.

This has already been a banner year for thrilling new comics. Here are five of the year’s most exciting titles that you can read now.

‘I’m So Glad We Had This Time Together,’ by Maurice Vellekoop

Three-fourths of the way into Maurice Vellekoop’s textured memoir, the Canadian cartoonist delivers a pure heartfelt payoff. The last reel makes everything worth the wait.

“I’m So Glad We Had This Time Together” — the title nods to the experience of growing up with “Carol Burnett Show”-era television while being enchanted with Barbie dolls and Disney fairy tales — unfolds mostly chronologically, from innocent, often joyous boyhood to the rocky journey of adult self-discovery.

Over the course of the book, Vellekoop comes out to his strict Calvinist immigrant parents, leading to a long estrangement from his intolerant mother, with whom he had once taken buoyant shopping trips. Their fraught relationship provides one arc of ongoing painful poignancy.

As in Alison Bechdel’s “Fun Home,” the role of art-making is also deftly threaded through the narrative, sometimes providing personal enrichment, sometimes serving as a means of escape. Once Vellekoop heads off to art school, film and live performance especially serve not only as social glue but also as mirrors for meaning. Meanwhile, his romantic life unfolds in fits and starts — partly during the rise of AIDS — as he works out his complicated relationship with his desires.

Eventually, Maurice, by now a successful artist, begins seeing a therapist, and the pieces of the emotional mosaic begin to click together powerfully. The back-and-forth between his mental health sessions and his day-to-day relationships gives the memoir its most revelatory uplift.

Vellekoop — a veteran commercial illustrator, fashion artist and author whose books include gay erotica (this memoir includes graphic sexual content) — renders his memories beautifully, with expressive faces, liquid lines and effective palette shifts.

‘Advocate: A Graphic Memoir of Family, Community, and the Fight for Environmental Justice,’ by Eddie Ahn

How do you resolve sharp divergence when you and your parents have different definitions of the American Dream?

As he demonstrates in his brisk memoir, “Advocate,” Eddie Ahn, a California environmental justice lawyer, often feels he’s making a difference through his work in the nonprofit sector. His aims, though, can run counter to the notions of “progress” prized by his Korean immigrant parents.

Ahn’s story moves efficiently from the author’s roots in Texas, where his family has a liquor and convenience store, and his early youth work with AmeriCorps to his law school years and his career with environmental nonprofits in the Bay Area. Along the way, we see Ahn endure a medical crisis and a detour into the allure of poker and “easy money,” as well as a job recession and racial prejudice while he occasionally mines his family’s past when grasping for illumination.

Ahn’s life story has so many intriguing pieces that, if anything, the reader might hunger for more asides and excursions. What if we could follow young Eddie more deeply into community conflicts, say, or his challenge in caring for a worsening parent? Any number of these tight chapters could be worth exploring more fully — perhaps they will inspire a sequel.

‘Aya: Claws Come Out,’ by Marguerite Abouet and Clément Oubrerie, translated from French by Edwige Renée Dro

Nearly two decades ago, Marguerite Abouet launched her superstar character, Aya — whom we met as a lively teenager in the ’70s, and who is now an ambitious college-age intern. Her deliciously soapy world has roots in both the Ivory Coast, where Abouet was born, and in France, where the author lives today.

Abouet created the series’ cast with her artist husband, Clément Oubrerie, who was born in greater Paris. More than a decade since the last book, they return with “Aya: Claws Come Out,” in which the series’ core friendships evolve with playful humor and sly banter intact, now set during the ’80s in the Ivory Coast capital, with an occasional cutaway to France.

Office politics, student protests, corrupt officials and double-edged celebrity all come in for cutting wit and high drama. Rendered in thin, inviting lines and bright pops of color, “Aya” proves that Abouet and Oubrerie are still at the top of their game.

‘Fall Through,’ by Nate Powell

This sci-fi story follows a time-traveling punk band called Diamond Mine that is magically tethered to both the ’70s and the ’90s. A break in the space-time continuum occurs whenever the touring group performs its spell-laden tune “Fall Through.” What hath the band’s vocalist wrought? And what can our hero — Jody, the upstart bassist — do to break this increasingly disenchanting loop?

Powell, the National Book Award-winning artist behind John Lewis’s “March” trilogy, embeds this bewitching work with Easter eggs that inspired his story, including nods to such bands as the Sex Pistols, William Martyr 17 and Five-O (the act behind the ’90s recording “ Fall Through ”), as well as the Eisner Hall of Fame cartoonist Lynd Ward, most famous for his wood-engraved wordless novels.

What is the seductive addiction to losing yourself with the “found family” of a touring band — a sonic and psychic escape from the quotidian nature of humdrum life back home? The cartoonist uncannily depicts the social rhythms of life on the road, built on ever-dynamic points of contact and conflict, tension and release.

As artist and storyteller, Powell is a master of colorful chord progressions that accompany the thump of a punk-rock heart.

‘Lies My Teacher Told Me: A Graphic Adaptation,’ by James W. Loewen and Nate Powell

Also worth reading is Powell’s recent graphic adaptation of the sociologist James W. Loewen’s “Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbooks Got Wrong.” It conveys, often in stirring chiaroscuro, Loewen’s thesis that U.S. textbooks fail when they become beholden to sanitized hero narratives and sweeping arcs of perpetual American progress. Powell’s visual depth beautifully adds visceral layers to Loewen’s efforts to undercut scholastic elisions: What did at least a dozen oft-used textbooks long leave out about Columbus’s direct effects on the Western Indigenous populations that came under his boot, or about Helen Keller’s radical socialism, or about one American colony of color that predated the Pilgrims? In cleverly dissecting and debunking what was taught for decades, Loewen’s stories collectively serve as an illuminating textbook in their own right.

Michael Cavna is an arts journalist, artist and 2023 recipient of the Ink Bottle Award from the Association of American Editorial Cartoonists. He has also worked at The Washington Post as television/media editor, theater editor, book reviewer and creator of the Comic Riffs column.

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Deja Ross Speaks to Freaks

Lisa Naffziger Top Shelf Productions ( Jul 2, 2024 ) Softcover $19.99 ( 208pp ) 978-1-60309-540-2

A seventh grader meets monsters while traveling with her family in Lisa Naffziger’s graphic novel Deja Ross Speaks to Freaks .

While on vacation with her family in Texas, Deja is excited to enter the territory of an infamous monster, the chupacabra. She sneaks off at night and finds the chupacabra, whose name, it turns out, is Greg. He agrees to an interview and offers to introduce Deja to other monsters so they can tell their stories, too.

L.W., the Lake Worth Monster, turns out to be a less imposing goat-man than his reputation indicates, while the Rougarou, a werewolf in New Orleans who has difficulty with math, tries to make Deja a monster. Deja escapes the Rougarou and meets with a club of cryptid investigators that made a secret deal with the disreputable curator of a roadside museum, capturing monsters for display. When the club grabs a lizard man along with Greg, L.W., and the Rougarou, Deja and her brother hatch a plan to free the monsters from captivity.

The illustrations are clean, colorful, and fresh in this fast-moving, entertaining story featuring loads of fun and excitement. Deja is a curious, intelligent heroine, and her relationship with her skeptical brother is marked by his gentle, concerned form of antagonism, which makes his eventual support for her plan more meaningful. And the family’s road trip brings them into proximity with local legends from multiple geographic areas, leading to illuminating information, as with a brief discussion of voodoo when they’re in New Orleans.

Tracking monster myths across the United States, Deja Ross Speaks to Freaks is an edifying graphic novel adventure.

Reviewed by Peter Dabbene July / August 2024

Disclosure: This article is not an endorsement, but a review. The publisher of this book provided free copies of the book to have their book reviewed by a professional reviewer. No fee was paid by the publisher for this review. Foreword Reviews only recommends books that we love. Foreword Magazine, Inc. is disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255.

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Medea Giordano

Review: Kobo Libra Colour

If you buy something using links in our stories, we may earn a commission. This helps support our journalism. Learn more . Please also consider subscribing to WIRED

I love e-readers. They’re convenient and one of the few pieces of tech that’s not trying to overload your senses with unnecessary distractions. That’s why I was worried when I heard Kobo was releasing color e-readers . I pictured an iPad-like display littered with apps—yet another screen for my eyes to burn themselves on.

Thankfully, that's not the case. It’s still the E Ink you know and love from your favorite e-readers , just no longer restricted to black and white. Do you need a color screen to read ebooks? No. Is it fun? Yes.

Color Me Impressed

A color screen means you can see your favorite ebook covers in all their glory, but it also means illustrated children's books and graphic novels really come to life on the display. Curious George and Dune look beautiful on the Libra Colour's 7-inch E Ink panel.

I also tested the new Kobo Clara Colour , which has a 6-inch screen. Dune was fine, but Curious George wasn’t as aesthetically pleasing—the text in this ebook is blue on a yellow background, and the smaller screen made it all more compact in a way that was annoying to my eyes.

Having a color screen means you can write and highlight in color. You can mark up your favorite ebooks directly on the page, not just in separate note files like on a Kindle . However, all of this requires the Kobo Stylus 2 , which costs an extra $70. It has a highlight button on the side and an eraser on the end. (You can't write on the Clara Colour, but you can highlight in color.) It's worth noting that the Stylus 2 was out of stock everywhere as of publishing. I've asked Kobo when it’s expected to be available again.

The Libra has a notebook section so you can jot down notes and to-do lists, manage a calendar, or doodle in eight colors plus black and gray. The colors look even more vibrant once you export notebooks to your computer, but exporting also removes the lines from page layouts like calendars and daily planners, which is unfortunate. Color ink was technically available in Kobo's supersize Elipsa 2E , meant for heavy note-taking, but since that screen supports only black and white, these colors only came across once exported to a computer.

If you save a lot of articles using Pocket , you can read them on Kobos . The Pocket integration was supposed to go away in 2023 , but Kobo updated its system to enable them to work, and this is no longer an issue. You can’t write on Pocket articles no matter where you're reading them, but you can import documents you want to mark up to the Libra as PDFs. As a writer, it's fun to break out my old proofreading marks again.

I also tested Kobo's SleepCover ($40) , which can be folded into a stand. I usually go coverless when using e-readers because they're pretty durable, but I liked this one too much. It keeps the device steady even when I write notes.

Right to Repair

How colors appear on the Libra screen versus how they appear when exported to a computer.

Reading on the Libra Colour was a largely problem-free experience, but I had some “ghosting” (where you can see faint traces of menus or erased text) in the notebooks. This usually remedied itself after a few seconds, but it was more noticeable than other e-readers I've tested of late. Occasionally I'd have to turn the page and go back to fix it.

The Libra is waterproof and made from recycled plastics , and the battery should last a month or so, depending on how much you read and write. I am of the mind that the page-turn buttons included here should be standard across all e-readers. That said, the Libra Colour is expensive at $220. Add in the $70 stylus and it's even more of a steep price for a color screen.

If it's any consolation, the Kobo Libra Colour is repairable , so your money can go a long way. Kobo has partnered with iFixit to make kits for repairing the display, battery, and motherboard, plus the front and back covers. This extends to the Clara Colour and the original black-and-white Clara. More details on this are coming soon.

Kobo e-readers may lack the Amazon Kindle's large library, but if you've been trying to move away from all things Amazon , it's a perfectly great e-reader. And with this new Libra, reading and writing in color is just plain fun.

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