three graphic novels I did not much like
Jun. 25th, 2019 05:01 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rushthatspeaksI read the first two entries on this list because apparently First Second is putting out BASICALLY AN ENTIRE LINE of YA LGBT comics (cf. On a Sunbeam and Laura Dean Keeps Breaking Up With Me), and while we've moved on a bit from the point in history when I would buy such things simply because they exist, I will still read them simply because they exist. Because did you notice? This stuff exists. Also, I was able to pick these up and read them because of a circumstance which legitimately causes me to tear up. This year, both of my local independent non-used bookstores have a Pride display, front and center, full of interesting things, and then you go to the children's sections and they each have an entire separate Pride display there, from picture books right up to New Adult. And they have the whole age spread, and, like, we're talking an entire full bookcase in each instance, not just a couple of shelves. This is the first year I have seen anything like this and I am delighted, because this is possible, because they are doing it, because the books are out there. I grew up with the first queer characters I encountered in fiction being written by Mercedes Lackey, when I was twelve years old, and with a general community consensus among queer folks whose work I found that maybe if we never, ever mentioned the existence of children, or that queer people had any, or that children eventually figure out sexual orientations and gender identities, maybe then people would stop with the endless pedophile slurs. Seriously, when I first got on the internet looking for community there was a general consensus of 'don't talk with anyone who seems to be under eighteen'. I do not miss that.
Kiss Number 8, by Colleen A. F. Venable and Ellen Crenshaw
Amanda, who goes to a Catholic high school, has a massive crush on her best (female) friend but isn't saying anything about it, a status quo eventually interrupted when a family secret, also involving queerness, comes to light. This isn't terrible-- the art is expressive, the dialogue feels natural. It also isn't great. It just feels very... dramatic, in that way where you can tell someone behind the scenes is carefully timing the revelations and reactions for greatest effect. Which means, in this instance, that it comes off more like a Very Special Episode than one might want. I do appreciate that Amanda coming out has a realistic spread of reactions among the people she knows-- some she loses forever, some temporarily, some have some awkwardness but get over it, some have some determined cheerfulness but get over it, some of her relationships don't change at all, some drastically improve... I also appreciate the way religion is woven into the book, where Catholic school, Catholic values, and Catholic neighbors who are a strong presence produce an atmosphere that simultaneously makes it very clear what everyone is expected to do and also very rarely says any of the expectations out loud. I remember that from my own Catholic school growing up, though it was a little different since my family is explicitly not Catholic. But I also think the family secret element of the plot is not handled very well, and the overall effect of the book is to make me wish it had been a couple notches better than it was.
Bloom by Kevin Panetta and Savanna Ganucheau
I really love the art of this book. It's quiet and dreamy and manga-influenced but not overly so, expressive and fluid and charming. That said, for a long, pleasant while this amble through the life of Ari, who doesn't want to inherit his parents' Greek bakery, has no particular plot. Which is nice. Ari vaguely plans to move to the big city with his friends, and vaguely flirts with Hector, the new guy at the bakery, and it's realistic and low-key, and then suddenly there's a plot and everything tips so heavily into melodrama that it completely removes my ability to care. Seriously, this goes within a couple of pages from being a sweet, believable romance to me going 'yeah, I wouldn't buy that in a Hallmark movie'. The dynamic between Hector and Ari also gets wrecked sufficiently by Oncoming Plot that, by the end, not only do I not believe they'd wind up together, I actually believe they shouldn't. Writers among you: it's okay for a book not to have a plot. It's just fine! If a mood piece is executed well enough, no one will miss it! Especially not with this art, which executes the mood plenty well enough. Oh, how I wish they had left well enough alone. Take out the plot, add like three more recipes from the bakery (there are already several, and they look great), and wait for the accolades to roll in. Sigh.
The third graphic novel I did not like very much is not from my current Read Queer YA Graphica phase; a while ago,yhlee recced Terri Libenson's debut middle-grade, Invisible Emmie, and I have to say, it's spectacular. It's plotted like clockwork and funny and painful. I was a little less enthused by Libenson's second, Positively Izzy-- still fun-- but momentum carried me through into her third, Just Jaime. Where I probably stop unless/until I get another specific recommendation. All three of these are about interpersonal relationships between girls in that twelve to fourteen nexus where it's so easy for everything to go wrong, and are well-observed portraits of being in middle school and the drama of everyday life. Just Jaime is focused on an interesting question, what to do when your friend group suddenly drops you for inscrutable reasons, and the social fallout from that; the art, characterization, and moment-to-moment writing remain great. It's just that, well, there's a Thing the first book's plotting does, which is really, really cool, and then Libenson tried to do a Similar Thing in book two, where it is rather more shoehorned in, and now in book three she needs to put down the Plot Thing and walk away slowly. I mean, by this time everyone can see the Thing coming from a mile away, and also, it would be nice to see her do something else, instead of the same Thing producing diminishing returns. For those returns, they have diminished. Also, and this may or may not be a problem (your mileage may vary), but the first two stand alone quite nicely, though also well with one another, and the third does not. And it's almost certainly not Libenson's marketing decision for the book not to have a large number 3 on the spine, but I suspect we would all be much happier overall if it did. Get Libenson's first for your resident tweens, and hopefully she'll eventually get the Thing out of her system.
That leaves me, if I'm bookblogging June, hm... three large books about which I would want to say substantial things behind. Sigh.
Kiss Number 8, by Colleen A. F. Venable and Ellen Crenshaw
Amanda, who goes to a Catholic high school, has a massive crush on her best (female) friend but isn't saying anything about it, a status quo eventually interrupted when a family secret, also involving queerness, comes to light. This isn't terrible-- the art is expressive, the dialogue feels natural. It also isn't great. It just feels very... dramatic, in that way where you can tell someone behind the scenes is carefully timing the revelations and reactions for greatest effect. Which means, in this instance, that it comes off more like a Very Special Episode than one might want. I do appreciate that Amanda coming out has a realistic spread of reactions among the people she knows-- some she loses forever, some temporarily, some have some awkwardness but get over it, some have some determined cheerfulness but get over it, some of her relationships don't change at all, some drastically improve... I also appreciate the way religion is woven into the book, where Catholic school, Catholic values, and Catholic neighbors who are a strong presence produce an atmosphere that simultaneously makes it very clear what everyone is expected to do and also very rarely says any of the expectations out loud. I remember that from my own Catholic school growing up, though it was a little different since my family is explicitly not Catholic. But I also think the family secret element of the plot is not handled very well, and the overall effect of the book is to make me wish it had been a couple notches better than it was.
Bloom by Kevin Panetta and Savanna Ganucheau
I really love the art of this book. It's quiet and dreamy and manga-influenced but not overly so, expressive and fluid and charming. That said, for a long, pleasant while this amble through the life of Ari, who doesn't want to inherit his parents' Greek bakery, has no particular plot. Which is nice. Ari vaguely plans to move to the big city with his friends, and vaguely flirts with Hector, the new guy at the bakery, and it's realistic and low-key, and then suddenly there's a plot and everything tips so heavily into melodrama that it completely removes my ability to care. Seriously, this goes within a couple of pages from being a sweet, believable romance to me going 'yeah, I wouldn't buy that in a Hallmark movie'. The dynamic between Hector and Ari also gets wrecked sufficiently by Oncoming Plot that, by the end, not only do I not believe they'd wind up together, I actually believe they shouldn't. Writers among you: it's okay for a book not to have a plot. It's just fine! If a mood piece is executed well enough, no one will miss it! Especially not with this art, which executes the mood plenty well enough. Oh, how I wish they had left well enough alone. Take out the plot, add like three more recipes from the bakery (there are already several, and they look great), and wait for the accolades to roll in. Sigh.
The third graphic novel I did not like very much is not from my current Read Queer YA Graphica phase; a while ago,
yhlee recced Terri Libenson's debut middle-grade, Invisible Emmie, and I have to say, it's spectacular. It's plotted like clockwork and funny and painful. I was a little less enthused by Libenson's second, Positively Izzy-- still fun-- but momentum carried me through into her third, Just Jaime. Where I probably stop unless/until I get another specific recommendation. All three of these are about interpersonal relationships between girls in that twelve to fourteen nexus where it's so easy for everything to go wrong, and are well-observed portraits of being in middle school and the drama of everyday life. Just Jaime is focused on an interesting question, what to do when your friend group suddenly drops you for inscrutable reasons, and the social fallout from that; the art, characterization, and moment-to-moment writing remain great. It's just that, well, there's a Thing the first book's plotting does, which is really, really cool, and then Libenson tried to do a Similar Thing in book two, where it is rather more shoehorned in, and now in book three she needs to put down the Plot Thing and walk away slowly. I mean, by this time everyone can see the Thing coming from a mile away, and also, it would be nice to see her do something else, instead of the same Thing producing diminishing returns. For those returns, they have diminished. Also, and this may or may not be a problem (your mileage may vary), but the first two stand alone quite nicely, though also well with one another, and the third does not. And it's almost certainly not Libenson's marketing decision for the book not to have a large number 3 on the spine, but I suspect we would all be much happier overall if it did. Get Libenson's first for your resident tweens, and hopefully she'll eventually get the Thing out of her system.That leaves me, if I'm bookblogging June, hm... three large books about which I would want to say substantial things behind. Sigh.
no subject
Date: 2019-06-26 05:29 am (UTC)Since I may or may not read any of these books, what's the Thing?
no subject
Date: 2019-06-26 09:49 am (UTC)Nyy guerr eryl ba gur xvaq bs gjvfg Zrtna Junyra Gheare qbrf, jurer lbh svaq bhg vasb gung pbzcyrgryl ersenzrf rirelguvat lbh'ir orra gbyq. Va gur svefg obbx, vg'f n cresrpg gjvfg, angheny, hathrffnoyr, sberfunqbjrq. Gur frpbaq vf sbeprq. Gur guveq vf orlbaq sbeprq.
no subject
Date: 2019-06-26 04:36 pm (UTC)That sounds really frustrating.
no subject
Date: 2019-07-03 08:03 pm (UTC)Snerk. I love you.