THE LEAGUE OF LASERS

Intrepid Star Scout Avani Patel is back!

In the first installment of this humorous graphic-novel series, protagonist Avani Patel, a sassy Indian-American preteen, joined a ragtag group of intergalactic scouts. In this second installment, as snappy and funny as its predecessor, Avani is recruited into an elite secret society of scouts—the titular League of Lasers—and promptly dispatched to a faraway planet as part of her initiation. She is told that she needs “to survive on a wild world for a week with nothing but your official League of Lasers multi-tool,” a smartphone-shaped device that deploys a double-headed battle axe among other handy tricks. When her single-parent father learns that his daughter has sailed to the “other side of the galaxy,” he follows in search of her with Avani’s scout friends. By the end of her quest, Avani has slain monsters, including a fantastic, huge, long-snouted beast, and been reunited with her father after a harrowing near-death experience in deep space. Lawrence’s spreads are bright and dynamic, and most of the book’s panels are drawn at eye level, allowing readers to strongly identify with the gumptious dark-skinned protagonist. His nonhuman characters are wildly inventive and deeply appealing.

An entertaining romp for graphic-novel, science-fiction, and adventure-story readers alike.