An authentic and funny look at masculinity and growing pains that resonates across the decades.
A graphic memoir presenting a humorously disarming look at machismo and personal responsibility.
It’s 1975, and 10-year-old Paul is enjoying a summer vacation with his Fantastic Four comics, military toys, and best friend, David Chu. The harmony is disrupted when Swain, an older boy, wins over both David and Bernie Dias, the youngest kid in the group. “Playing with” friends becomes the more mature “hanging out.” The guys are also fixated on the new blockbuster horror movie, Jaws. But the film traumatizes Paul to the point that he has conversations with an imaginary shark who pressures him into expressing the most toxic version of masculinity. Irish American Paul’s parents mostly talk over him, leaving him to his internal monologues, particularly whenever his dad tries to teach him about cars. Between the shark and Swain’s influence, Paul briefly becomes a more callous version of himself, dispensing insults, throwing crabapples, and going along with Swain’s shoplifting dare. Paul is usually so gentle that he prefers to play baseball with a tennis ball; he ultimately tunes into his inner compass and resists being a jerk for the sake of impressing others. Elaine, Bernie’s sister, punctures male egoism on the spot, modeling maturity, and Paul and his friends ultimately demonstrate genuine growth. The simple but dramatically expressive artwork plays to Gilligan’s strengths with deadpan humor, and the text and illustrations work in harmony to convey complex insights and feelings with clarity.
An authentic and funny look at masculinity and growing pains that resonates across the decades. (1975 Time Capsule) (Graphic memoir. 10-13)Pub Date: Oct. 15, 2024
ISBN: 9781774880463
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Tundra Books
Review Posted Online: July 19, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2024
PERSPECTIVES
A rich and deeply felt slice of life.
Crafting fantasy worlds offers a budding middle school author relief and distraction from the real one in this graphic memoir debut.
Everyone in Tori’s life shows realistic mixes of vulnerability and self-knowledge while, equally realistically, seeming to be making it up as they go. At least, as she shuttles between angrily divorced parents—dad becoming steadily harder to reach, overstressed mom spectacularly incapable of reading her offspring—or drifts through one wearingly dull class after another, she has both vivacious bestie Taylor Lee and, promisingly, new classmate Nick as well as the (all-girl) heroic fantasy, complete with portals, crystal amulets, and evil enchantments, taking shape in her mind and on paper. The flow of school projects, sleepovers, heart-to-heart conversations with Taylor, and like incidents (including a scene involving Tori’s older brother, who is having a rough adolescence, that could be seen as domestic violence) turns to a tide of change as eighth grade winds down and brings unwelcome revelations about friends. At least the story remains as solace and, at the close, a sense that there are still chapters to come in both worlds. Working in a simple, expressive cartoon style reminiscent of Raina Telgemeier’s, Sharp captures facial and body language with easy naturalism. Most people in the spacious, tidily arranged panels are White; Taylor appears East Asian, and there is diversity in background characters.
A rich and deeply felt slice of life. (afterword, design notes) (Graphic memoir. 10-13)Pub Date: May 18, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-316-53889-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: March 30, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
PERSPECTIVES
This will appeal to fans of Alexander’s previous middle-grade novels as well as young sports fans.
Building on the great success of his Newbery-winning The Crossover (2014), Alexander provides advice and life lessons to young readers, drawn mostly from the world of sports and organized by a schema of “rules.”
Instead of chapters, the work begins with a preface called “Warm-up: The Rules” and is then divided into the four quarters of a game, each having a theme: “grit,” “motivation,” “focus,” and “teamwork and resilience.” “Passion” is included as a half-time consideration, and there is an “overtime” look at Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. There are brief profiles of athletes Wilma Rudolph, LeBron James, Pelé, and Venus and Serena Williams, along with maxims and personal anecdotes from both male and female sports figures who’ve excelled in different arenas as well as a few nonathletes, including Maya Angelou, Nikki Giovanni, Sonya Sotomayor, and Nelson Mandela. Throughout there is poetry, verses that remind us why Alexander connects with readers. “Rule #45 / A loss is inevitable / like rain in spring. / True champions / learn / to dance / through / the storm.” The advice never feels heavy-handed, and the author's voice shines through. The design is as much a part of the book as its lively text, set in varying font sizes and colors (black, white, or orange), differing layouts, and judicious use of photographs and illustrations.
This will appeal to fans of Alexander’s previous middle-grade novels as well as young sports fans. (Nonfiction. 10-12)Pub Date: Feb. 14, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-544-57097-9
Page Count: 176
Publisher: HMH Books
Review Posted Online: Dec. 13, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2017
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