LOST & FOUND

YouTube artist and content creator Yu makes her graphic novel debut with a story inspired by her family’s move from their native China to Canada.

Drawn with an exuberant smile and bouncing ponytail, young Mei is initially thrilled to leave home. She imagines that in Canada she’ll have plenty of new friends and a spacious bedroom—and that she’ll encounter cuddly polar bears. Reality proves to be much more difficult. Mei neither speaks nor reads English, and, upon disembarking from the plane, she realizes that the language barrier is much scarier than she could have anticipated. Things only get worse when she arrives for her first day of school. She’s unable to communicate with the other students or even to ask to go to the bathroom; her day is full of fear and humiliation. While Mei’s struggles with language form the central and most fully developed conflict, she must also navigate other challenges, from her first bologna sandwich to the realization that her parents, too, are struggling to adapt to their new home. Yu’s manga-style art is full of silly and dramatic flourishes that perfectly capture the overwhelming experience of culture shock. Mei uses creative thinking and her love of art to find her way, and readers will rejoice at the winsome hero’s triumphs.

Charming, funny, and full of heart.