Sara’s parents are traveling for work this summer, so she’ll be staying with her aunts while all her friends go to drama camp together. She’s disappointed, but trying to make the best of things. After all, Sara’s family is moving soon, and maybe being in a new place will help her get some practice at making new friends.
But as it turns out, Sara’s aunts live on an island, a boat ride away from the closest neighbors. And it’s not just any island: once you pass through the fog that surrounds it, things start to get magical. Here, trees and rocks and even the wind seem to have personalities. And animals can talk—including her aunts’ two friendly, chatty dogs, who can’t wait to spend the summer with Sara. So maybe she can still practice making new friends. They just won’t be humans.
That isn’t easy, at least at first. Sara is supposed to help with chores (like cleaning the chicken coop) and learn new skills (like paddling a rowboat to nearby islands), and she feels like she’s failing at everything. She doesn’t want to admit she’s struggling, which means she can’t ask for help. Finally, Sara realizes that you don’t make friends by pretending things are fine when they aren’t—you have to be honest, be yourself, and accept help. That’s when the magic really starts happening.
Small Magics is a charming story about a girl who goes from feeling lonely and adrift to connected and capable. The island setting is both whimsical and immersive, with lots of little magical twists for Sara to learn, and lots of settings visited and revisited enough for them to feel like real places. The dogs—who are the characters Sara spends the most time with – are kind and fun-loving, with a bouncy energy that feels very dog-like, but also each with their own hobbies, interests, and fears. They are especially excited to have another human around because, despite accommodations that Sara’s aunts have made, lots of things in their world are still easier to navigate with opposable thumbs. (For instance, dogs can’t row boats. Though one of them can, if absolutely necessary, use the outboard motor.) But of course, there is also plenty they can do that humans can’t, and we get glimpses of their particularly doggy senses and sensibilities.
The artwork is colorful and feels casual even while sometimes being quite detailed. The poses are active and expressive, making good use of postures and the dogs’ ears as well as regular human facial expressions. The outlines are often loose, sometimes barely there, but the colors keep everything clearly defined, and their brightness adds to the art’s playful energy. Much of the creator’s art experience is in background painting, so it’s not surprising that the book has some lush, beautiful settings and backdrops.
Small Magics is a sweet read with humor, heart, and an inventive fantasy setting. Hand it to fans of cozy fantasy or anyone who likes gentle Studio Ghibli vibes.
Small Magics By Emily Tetri Macmillan First Second, 2026 ISBN: 9781250855640
Company Age Rating: 8-12
NFNT Age Recommendation: Middle Grade (7-11), Tween (10-13)
Memoirs often capture memories frozen in time, yet over the years, these memories can become reshaped, remixed, and even distorted. After all, facts become scattered but the truth behind the experiences endures. In her introspective memoir Until We Meet Again, Lily Kim Qian wrestles with deeply ingrained truths as she recounts her earliest memories leading to the estranged relationship between her parents, setting her on a path to discovery and inner healing.
The story begins in a jumbled dream-like state as Lily, a daughter of Chinese Canadian immigrant parents, sorts through a mixture of forgotten and remembered childhood memories—baby pictures, birthday parties, walks on a frozen lake, sizzling fried eggs made by her PoPo—which abruptly shifts to a darkened room where she watches her mother in a deep slumber. The scene later segues into a two-page spread where a tidal wave sweeps into a bedroom, signifying violent verbal battles between her parents that rage like a relentless tsunami. Narrated in vignettes, each story illustrates a moment in time, highlighting intimate details as she grapples with the gradual decline of her mother spiraling into the throes of mental illness. Segmented into chapters labeled after family members and locales spanning from Toronto to Shanghai, the plot runs the gamut of turbulent family dynamics converging through time and place as Lily constructs shattered fragments of her childhood to forge a new identity. From affectionate moments of her mother giving her a bath and dining over a meal of fried rice to outbursts of anger erupting between her warring parents, she navigates the ebbs and flows of fractured relationships in search of meaning and stability.
Bold and vivid line streaks infused with flecks of color paint the emotional landscape of each story. A variety of layouts—dynamic double-page spreads, a collage of photos, full-page scenes of places and characters—showcases a compelling assortment of visual compositions and storytelling prowess. Most striking is how the artwork translates metaphors into concrete images, which ranges from Lily somersaulting through recursive panels to illustrate her constant displacement from one home to another to a tangled ball of yarn symbolizing the mass confusion in the triangular relationship with her parents.
A memoir that reveals episodes of inherited trauma encompassed by the stigma of mental illness in Asian cultures, this story unearths poignant experiences dredged up from private memories. Much like how the brain functions when bombarded by a barrage of memories, Lily’s stories, or rather her recollection of them, unravels through a kaleidoscopic series of fractured moments that form a complex mosaic. Until We Meet Again adds a deeply intimate voice to young adult collections, exploring the complex emotional landscape of dysfunctional family dynamics in a beautifully rendered visual memoir from an Asian Canadian perspective.
Until We Meet Again By Lily Kim Qian Macmillan First Second, 2026 ISBN: 9781250884237
Company Age Rating: 14-18
NFNT Age Recommendation: Teen (13-16) Creator Representation: Canadian-American, Chinese, Depression Character Representation: Canadian-American, Chinese, Depression
Growing up is hard. Changes are hard. Especially in the middle grades, right before high school. I can’t imagine how much harder it must be now, with the internet, smart phones and social media. Even without any of that, I remember how awkward and unsure I was.
Charisse must be about my age and have grown up in the 70s. The clothing, references, and houses look very 70s. (The boom box and “Shake your booty” on page 236 gave it away.) Maybe that’s why she reminds me of me back then. My junior high school was packed with kids, I only had about three friends, and I was also obsessed with everything. It was hard for me to make friends too. I also broke the rule about going off campus and skipped a period to go to the 7-11. I was also obsessed about getting actual Candie’s shoes. (Google it) (Too expensive, but my mom bought me knock-offs at Zayre’s) I also changed best friends about then—I didn’t have so dramatic a falling out with the one I had grown up with, but we hung out less and less as she got more and more involved in things I didn’t do. Just like Charisse, I felt grouchy and hurt.
I remember how up-and-down the early teens are—how I was so sure NO ONE ELSE EVER FELT LIKE THIS. It’s a tough time for any young woman. You’re not sure you’re good enough, you don’t like your skin or your teeth or your whatever. Then the next day, things are good. Things are changing fast. Charisse can talk to her mom, though, and her brother and her mémé – if only in halting French in her mémé’s case. Charisse has a lot to be thankful about. Negotiating changing friendships is a difficult thing sometimes, and sometimes you don’t want to talk to anyone about it. This book can help middle-schoolers and early teens to not feel like they’re so alone. It’s helpful to know that feeling awkward and trying different things to see if they fit is normal. It’s also normal to think that something is going to last forever. It’s telling that Charisse fears running into her ex-bestie through the whole book, but when she does, it’s not really a thing. She’s moved on.
The artwork is brightly colored and sharp, and the panels are varied in size to break the story into different sections. This helps give the reader a break during some emotional parts. It also slows the pacing, which is perfectly executed. I reviewed the digital copy, so can’t speak to the printing or binding. The book is 262 pages, plus whatever is added to the print edition. Harper has also written “So Embarrassing—Awkward Moments and how to get through them”, which would be a natural partner to this book. Recommended for any middle school library.
Wrong Friend By Charisse Mericle Harper Art by Rory Lucey Macmillan First Second, 2026 ISBN: 9781250851970
Tripping Over You, Volume 2, from Suzana Harcum and Owena White, picks up not long after the first graphic left off, showing unlikely couple Liam and Milo navigating their maturing relationship. This slice of life romantic comic was adapted from real life couple Harcum and White’s webtoon in February and promises more volumes to come. Fresh out of high school, the pair are growing into young adults and trying to allow their relationship to grow with them. Liam and Milo are in a very interesting phase, kind of semi-out to their families (who bring their own baggage into their relationship) and striving to make room for each other as their lives grow fuller. Liam doesn’t know what he wants out of his future and Milo seems plagued with self doubt, but they keep circling back to find comfort in each other. This volume catches our couple at a very real, very vulnerable time where a high school relationship can evolve into an adult one or where it can flounder under the weight of growing up.
This is a sweet story that young readers can easily connect with. The art is incredibly cute with Harcum and White using a style that hits me as a kind of Disneyified Manga: characters with big eyes and bold lines in a world of saturated color. It is very easy to read and honestly just pretty. Liam and Milo give classic black cat/golden retriever energy and seem hyper aware of the struggles that can come with relationships where people have different needs and communication styles. While this comic does show a growing young adult relationship and the intimacy that comes with it, there’s nothing explicit on page or even suggested and I would probably recommend it as young as 6th or 7th grade, depending on the reader. There are a couple of shirtless scenes and implied sex and Liam still hasn’t kicked his smoking habit from book one. But with that, their relationship maintains an innocence that will keep it accessible to a wide range of readers.
The plot beats were a bit of a hang up to me. The small domestic moments of our couple meeting new people, fighting to find time together, struggling with demanding families, and eventually moving in together feel almost like filler, like all of these moments are leading towards conflict in a future volume. The most striking of these involve Milo’s new friend Hebert, an American theater student. There isn’t immediate conflict but there is definitely unresolved tension and Hebert’s motives are questionable at best. Many of the plot points feel unresolved. Liam still does not have a clear career path and Milo still seems uncertain in aspects of their relationship. All of these things made this feel less like a step in their story and more like laying groundwork for the next book.
But honestly, I don’t know if I care. It was still a lovely read. The characters are ones you want to spend time with and their relationship is easy to invest in. It’s sweet and loving and a ready made next read for my Heartstopper fans. Parts of it do come off as wish fulfillment, particularly the moment where Liam comes out to his father. But queer kids deserve as much wish fulfillment as they can get. I can’t help but worry that these boys will have a tough time ahead of them, but my fingers are crossed for a happy ending.
Tripping Over You, Volume 2 By Suzana Harcum Macmillan First Second, 2026 ISBN: 9781250330734
Company Age Rating: 14-18
NFNT Age Recommendation: Middle Grade (7-11), Older Teen (16-18), Teen (13-16) Creator Representation: Lesbian, , Character Representation: Queer, Jewish ,
Aisling is a princess about to turn eighteen, but a week before her big debut, she is kidnapped by Forget-Me-Not, who plans to get revenge for being replaced at birth by a changeling. Aisling is that changeling, although she had no idea of her fae heritage and neither did her parents because they don’t recognize her without the glamour she’s been wearing. As they travel through the fae lands, both Aisling and Forget-Me-Not discover they have more in common than they originally thought and start developing a relationship. We learn more about the fae lands through Aisling’s interactions (and almost disasters) and Forget-Me-Not’s backstory about growing up in an alien world that isn’t hospitable to humans. The story wraps up at the end of this volume and provides an epilogue to tie up all the loose ends of the relationship between our two main characters.
The saturated colors worked well with the fantastical setting, and I personally liked how the lighting was used to convey emotions and ambiance throughout the story. This is a standalone as opposed to the start of a series, which makes it a great choice for teen or adult readers looking for a one-and-done LGBTQ+ (specifically sapphic) fantasy romance. There is on-page kissing between two female characters (one that has a masculine look) but no sexual content. I would highly recommend this book for any public library and high school library looking to follow the romantasy trend with LGBTQ+ content. Your patrons will thank you for it.
Forgive-Me-Not By Mari Costa Macmillan First Second, 2026 ISBN: 9781250784179
Company Age Rating: 14-18
NFNT Age Recommendation: Adult (18+), Older Teen (16-18), Teen (13-16) Creator Representation: Brazilian, Portuguese, Character Representation: Lesbian,
This is a relatively new series, focusing on creepy or mysterious stories. However, although written by the same author, the first two books in the series are very different.
In the first title, Area 51, Steve Foxe teams up with Fran Bueno to present a slightly creepy but generally informational explanation of the theories, legends, and facts around “Area 51.” The framing story is a young boy attending his unknown uncle’s funeral. TJ, uncomfortable in a black suit with slicked-back red hair, sneaks off on his own and discovers a secret room in his uncle’s house with CIA classified documents. Bueno illustrates this portion like a, as TJ says, “history textbook.” There are images of Eisenhower, a history of the CIA, an explanation of the popular understanding of the events after nuclear testing, and up through the formation of, and public knowledge, of what came to be known as Area 51.
Throughout this section, the colors vary between dull, sandy browns with a few bright reds showing imagined images of mutants and aliens. The story leads up to the development of aircraft meant for intelligence missions and these planes are shown in sleek blacks with secret night-time scenes in dark blue. As TJ continues reading the files, he is interrupted by men in black suits and his mother and he hastily finishes the tales up through the current day, from humorous denials from public figures like Bill Clinton to a thoughtful look at how conspiracies form and current speculations about Area 51. The story ends with an anticlimactic confrontation with the suited men and TJ returns home with his parents, a single bright disc shooting across the night sky.
The second title, Unwanted Guests, features a different illustrator, Naomi Franquiz, and blends several “true” ghost stories into the framing story. Franquiz’ art in the opening story is colorful and includes lots of folds and lines in clothing as well as the background. Foxe sets the framing story by introducing a biracial family moving to a new neighborhood. Minnie, the younger sister, has thick black eyebrows, an exuberant bush of brown curls, a missing tooth, and freckles. She’s dressed in blue overalls and a pink striped shirt. She’s followed by her older brother Jackson. His curls are shaved on the sides with a pompadour style on top and he wears khaki pants and a bright checked orange and yellow sweater. The two siblings bicker over mysterious stains and noises until their dad, with darker skin and a chinstrap beard, sends them off to the park to play. At the park they meet “Theo” a spookily pale kid who presents Asian. Franquiz continues the bright colors with a reddish playscape surface and bright autumn colors in the leaves.
Theo drops hints about their house and then tells them two scary stories. In the first story, a ghost tale from the 1920s, Franquiz switches to a more subdued palette with sepia tones that contrast with the brightly colored contemporary neighborhood. Minnie and Jackson interrupt for explanations of terms like spiritualism and poltergeists and Theo ends the story on an ambiguous, creepy note. After a very nervous night, the siblings approach Theo again and he tells them a second story about yet another Minnie – Minnie Clyde Winston and her bleeding house. This story, which is from the late 1980s, has brighter, more contemporary colors. Minnie is shown as a Black woman with light skin and curly hair and the pools of inexplicable blood are a viscous red. There are a few gruesome images of blood-drenched monsters but the story fades away as Minnie gradually denies the events to reporters to get some peace. As the story ends, readers return to the bright autumn park and Theo hints at a third story, about a young boy named Theodore who disappears in an attic… echoes of the earlier stories he told are revisited in the siblings’ experiences that night and the book ends with a final, ghostly shiver.
Both titles include sources for the unsolved mysteries, but the first book has a more straightforward, historical approach which is mirrored in the simpler, more basic tones of Bueno’s art. The second book, with the lengthier and creepier framing story, has a more gruesome tinge which pairs well with Franquiz’ colorful art and heavily emphasized lines. While both books will appeal to young readers, the first is more likely to interest those who already have an interest in aliens, unsolved mysteries, and history while the second will appeal more to fans of ghost stories and scary tales.
Archives of the Unexplained By Steve Foxe Art by Fran Bueno, and Naomi Franquiz Macmillan First Second, 2025
Volume
ISBN
1 Area 51
9781250850287
2 Unwanted guests
9781250850263
NFNT Age Recommendation: Middle Grade (7-11), Tween (10-13)
Science Comics is a long-running series, which invites a wide variety of skilled creators to explore different scientific subjects. All of the titles in the series have a certain amount of narrative story holding the information together, but some definitely lean more towards the expository, which is the case in this title
A prose introduction from Emily Lindsay, a paleontologist who works at La Brea Tar Pits, gives some context for the book, explaining the rise and extinction of megafauna and prehistoric mammals and the importance of large mammals today. Flood begins the narration with an iconic sequence of panels showing a line of mammoths tramping across a glacier in Siberia, where they are then attacked by a pack of cave lions and one young mammoth plunges into the icy water below.
He uses this sequence to kick off the basic concepts being introduced in the book, showing the modern relatives of mammoths and cave lions – elephants and African lions – and then jumping back to the origin of mammals and their gradual development over millions of years. These pages are filled with neatly drawn charts of evolution and cartoon creatures in bright colors who comment on each other’s adaptions with jokes.
Flood helps readers follow the evolutionary development of mammals with a yellow diapsid, “Dia” and a red synapsid, “Sid.” Eventually, Dia evolves into the dinosaurs, eyeing Sid hungrily, while Sid evolves into the early mammals, brownish-yellow, blue, and purple creatures. In the next big extinction, Dia’s survivors shrink down to a feathery yellow bird while Sid returns to his red, basic mammalian form. Flood’s color-coded animal adaptations make it easy for young readers to follow the complex concepts of evolution and adaptation over the huge periods of time represented.
The story next moves on to the Cenozoic, the age of mammals. Flood illustrates the early mammals in soft browns and grays with faint black patterns, setting them amidst lush green jungles and forests. This morphs into the more colorful variety of mammals we’re more familiar with today, as well as gradually diversifying plant life, with colorful flowers, birds, insects, and more. Dia and Sid continue to show up—Dia staying in her yellow bird form while Sid changes frequently, although generally keeping to a four-footed, small red mammal shape.
Flood continues the story, showing how the changes in climate and habitat prompted evolutionary changes in mammals and drawing more and more parallels between prehistoric and modern creatures as evolution progresses. The original red of Sid the synapsid shows up again here, in the arrows and charts, while extinct animals are generally shown in plain greys and browns, allowing the animals who have contemporary survivors to show up more clearly in the artwork.
Sid shows up again, illustrating the evolution of herbivores from small to large, to survive the large carnivores. Dia flies along above a fleeing Sid, making comments on the predator and prey racing about. The two follow along as the story nears the modern day, showing the niche animals that evolved on the now-distinct continents and the convergent evolution of different species. When the narration reaches the ice ages of the Pleistocene, Flood steps away from animals in a spread to illustrate the climate changes with blue and green diagrams and a fiery sun shooting rays of orange and red toward earth.
The narrative begins to return to the introduction, showing the migration of mammoths and describing the La Brea Tar Pits, as well as introducing the evolution of a new mammal – humans. Sid and Dia show up again, watching the arrival of humans. Flood illustrates the changing evolution of different human species, showing a variety of darker skin colors, postures, and hair textures. He has a distinctive style when drawing human faces and this begins to show up in this last section of the book, with larger eyes, square, blocky hands, and thick lips. The story ends with a discussion of the current extinction event we are living through and the effect it has on mammals, including humans.
Flood has written or illustrated several other Science Comics titles and his blocky, simply style with lightly humorous touches and clear, simple diagrams is well-suited to the series. He does an excellent job in this title of connecting the complicated and wide-ranging topic together, moving between epochs and eras and tying the exposition together with narrative touches from beginning to end. The text is very readable, although the number of Latin species names may daunt some young readers. However, those who are interested in prehistoric life will be generally familiar with the nomenclature and the text is very understandable even if readers stumble over some of the names. This is another excellent entry in a strong series that should be represented in all public and school libraries.
Prehistoric Mammals From the Jurassic to the Ice Age By Joe Flood Macmillan First Second, 2026 ISBN: 9781250868428
NFNT Age Recommendation: Middle Grade (7-11), Tween (10-13)
A near apocalypse at the hands of an Aztec Earth goddess has led to the impossible: Pablo Ortiz is popular again. Since the publication of the first Monster Locker in October 2024, Pablo and his friends Takashi and Maggie have been working to banish the demons and mythical creatures that use Pablo’s basement locker as a FastPass into the human world back into their own dimension. Most of our trio is burnt out with all of their monster fighting, but Pablo is feeling the rush of finally being seen in a good way again and is pushing his friends to keep the monster banishing and their social capital up. The problem with being seen, though, is sometimes the wrong things are looking.
Monster Locker: Nine-Tail Trouble, scheduled for release April 21, 2026, sees creators Jorge Aguirre and Andrés Vera Martínez diving back into the world of the first book with a new focus and an equally lovely story. While monster banisher Pablo still acts as the protagonist, this story is really about his friend, the charmingly unhinged Takashi Rosenberg. Takashi is not overly thrilled with their heavily monster focused schedule and has a lot on his mind. He wants to get back to RPGs and becoming a J-Pop sensation and worrying about his upcoming Bar Mitzvah and missing his mom in Japan. Like many children from different, distinct backgrounds, Takashi doesn’t know how to reconcile his Judaism with his Japanese heritage and vice versa. He feels out of place in both, a situation escalated by his parents divorce and his mother’s physical distance. And this also leaves him vulnerable when a new, dangerous monster threatens not just the trio’s school and popularity, but the roots of their friendship.
I loved the first Monster Locker when it came out but felt like the side characters, like Takashi, didn’t get a lot of fleshing out and it’s like Aguirre and Martínez were reading my dream journal. This second volume not only gives Takashi amazing depth and a massive struggle with identity, but pulls folkloric characters from both of his heritages into the story. While the first book was like an ode to Pablo’s Meso American ancestry and Aztec gods, Nine-Tail Trouble sees Kitsune (the Japanese nine-tailed fox trickster) and a Golem (an animated, humanoid chunk of clay from Jew folklore) doing battle, turning Takashi’s internal struggle into a visibly destructive one.
With the shift in focus comes a shift in artistic style. While the first Monster Locker took a lot of visual inspiration from Meso American art, this one pulls in references to Medieval Jewish art to draw in the Golem’s background and soft Japanese watercolor for the Kitsune. It’s lovely to look at and the emotional heft is clear without being overpowering. Takashi’s struggle is universal and makes a powerful framework for this story.As much as I love the focus on Takashi, much like the first Monster Locker, the other characters are not given much time to grow. The story sees many of the characters from the first book return but all, even Pablo, our protagonist, take a backseat. I would love to see more balance between the characters and their growth in future volumes.
Aguirre and Martínez have created a world that has some of my favorite things about graphic novels: the stories are fun and surprising, the characters are unique but grounded in real emotional stakes, and the art is gorgeous. This series continues to please and I can’t wait for more.
Monster Locker: Nine-Tail Trouble By Jorge Aguirre Art by Andrés Vera Martínez Macmillan First Second, 2026 ISBN: 9781250749765
Company Age Rating: 10-14
NFNT Age Recommendation: Middle Grade (7-11), Teen (13-16), Tween (10-13) Creator Representation: Colombian-American, , Character Representation: Japanese, Mexican-American, Jewish ,
Twin sisters Sloane and Ash love to draw. For years, they have dreamed of becoming animators, working on movies like the Disney films they love. Now, at thirteen, they are taking the first step toward making that dream a reality: both girls have been accepted to a prestigious local animation summer program. Sloane is nervous, but she’s always nervous about starting new things and meeting new people. Ash can’t wait to learn from the pros—including the maker of her favorite animated movie, Monstrous.
Despite Sloane’s first-day jitters, both girls make friends at the program right away. But Ash soon finds herself struggling with the challenging animation assignments, and the creator of Monstrous isn’t the encouraging mentor figure she hoped for. Meanwhile, Sloane does well with the assignments, but is starting to question whether a career in animation is really what she wants. While Ash pushes herself hard to try and improve her craft, Sloane worries about how Ash will handle the idea of losing their shared goal.
The summer is teaching the twins a lot: about art skills, about different paths in animation (not all roads lead to Disney!), and about themselves. These discoveries are sometimes stressful, putting pressure on Sloane and Ash’s relationship. But if they listen to each other, their new friends, and an unexpected mentor from the animation program, then this could be a summer of exciting new possibilities.
These characters have a lot going on emotionally. Ash’s enthusiasm helps her connect to people, but can spiral into a stressful kind of overexcitement. Sloane struggles with discovering that art, her passion, feels more like a chore at animation camp. New friend Nisha used to bond with her grandmother over drawing, but is now losing that connection to her grandmother’s dementia. Two of the animation instructors provide an interesting contrast: Douglas Frye is has had exactly the kind of career Ash wants, working at Disney before starting his own studio. Ash is starstruck by him, but eventually comes to realize he’s an unhelpful teacher, a bit self-obsessed, and seems to unfairly favor male students over female ones. Film studies teacher Lisa Sato doesn’t have Frye’s celebrity sparkle, but she offers supportive advice and introduces her students to different styles of animation and career path possibilities.
Like author/illustrator Faith Erin Hicks, Sloane and Ash are aspiring young artists in Canada in what seems to be the 90s. (The exact year is never stated, but the characters watch VHS tapes, the newest film explicitly referenced came out in 1989, and anime is not yet mainstream in North America.) Hicks worked in the animation industry before switching to graphic novels, so she also has that experience to draw on (pun not intended but also not deleted) in creating the animation summer camp and its instructors.
The art style will be familiar to fans of Hicks’ work: a slightly cartoonified realism, expressive and dynamic, rich with detail. Given that animation is art plus movement, it is interesting to read a story centered on it in a medium that does not move. We see lots of drawing exercises from the summer program, like animating a bouncing ball or a person walking. We also see Sloane being introduced to anime, which she finds thrilling and inspiring in a time when she is struggling to reignite her passion for drawing. The book illustrates Ash and Sloane’s experience of spending a summer immersed in art.
Inbetweens shows us a fun, challenging, important summer in the lives of its young protagonists. It doesn’t tie up every little thing, like Ash’s trouble with overexcitement or Sloane’s questions about her future, but it ends in a happy and hopeful place. And after all, these characters are thirteen, so it makes sense that they don’t have everything figured out. Hand Inbetweens to fans of middle grade realistic fiction, especially those who like school stories or film and animation.
Inbetweens By Faith Erin Hicks Macmillan First Second, 2026 ISBN: 9781250838742
The bond between a boy and his dog is a special one that can last a lifetime. Building that tender relationship, however, takes considerable time and effort as demonstrated in Andy Hirsch’s (Science Comics series from First Second) Good Boy, a story of how one high-strung boy and his unpredictable dog learn to connect with each other and nurture a remarkable friendship.
Charlie is a middle grader who, when pressured into stressful situations, switches into panic mode and ends up barfing. This occurs right before a camping trip when he prepares to board the school bus. He stresses over packing only one toothbrush, which then explodes into a flurry of thoughts that sends him back home where he finds refuge under a blanket on the couch. To his surprise, his mom brings home a rescue dog named Ralph. Eager to befriend his new playmate, Charlie approaches Ralph only to be greeted with a ferocious growl. Slowly but surely, Ralph grows to trust Charlie and thus begins a budding relationship between the two. When Ralph unwittingly follows Charlie to school one day, the principal’s assistant suggests that Charlie teach him agility training lessons.
The two launch into a series of rigorous athletic trainings: From leaping through hoops and over hurdles, darting through tunnels, balancing on see-saws, and scaling up and down inclined ramps, Charlie and Ralph develop a bond built from mutual trust, patience, and calculated timing while fostering a social emotional connection that undergirds their relationship. Shaded panels and thought bubbles bombard Charlie during sudden episodes of social anxiety, balanced out by an expressive range of emotions and reactions from Ralph. At the heart of this endearing relationship lies a story of pushing through playful antics and obstacles that test the dynamics and gamut of their friendship.
Most poignant are the interpersonal subtleties that arise and evolve between the two as they navigate on a road paved with numerous obstacles—a partnership cultivated from the virtues of trust, patience, respect, and ultimately deep understanding of each other. A delightfully amusing addition to middle grade graphic novel collections, one that explores the psychology of pet ownership, Good Boy excels in capturing the struggles and mishaps of coping with social anxiety, mastering the art of pet training, building trust, and persevering through all the obstacles along for the ride.
Good Boy By Andy Hirsch Macmillan First Second, 2025 ISBN: 9781250291950
her friends go to drama camp together. She’s disappointed, but trying to make the best of things. After all, Sara’s family is moving soon, and maybe being in a new place will help her get some practice at making new friends.
Memoirs often capture memories frozen in time, yet over the years, these memories can become reshaped, remixed, and even distorted. After all, facts become scattered but the truth behind the experiences endures. In her introspective memoir Until We Meet Again, Lily Kim Qian wrestles with deeply ingrained truths as she recounts her earliest memories leading to the estranged relationship between her parents, setting her on a path to discovery and inner healing.
must be now, with the internet, smart phones and social media. Even without any of that, I remember how awkward and unsure I was.
couple Liam and Milo navigating their maturing relationship. This slice of life romantic comic was adapted from real life couple Harcum and White’s webtoon in February and promises more volumes to come. Fresh out of high school, the pair are growing into young adults and trying to allow their relationship to grow with them. Liam and Milo are in a very interesting phase, kind of semi-out to their families (who bring their own baggage into their relationship) and striving to make room for each other as their lives grow fuller. Liam doesn’t know what he wants out of his future and Milo seems plagued with self doubt, but they keep circling back to find comfort in each other. This volume catches our couple at a very real, very vulnerable time where a high school relationship can evolve into an adult one or where it can flounder under the weight of growing up.
revenge for being replaced at birth by a changeling. Aisling is that changeling, although she had no idea of her fae heritage and neither did her parents because they don’t recognize her without the glamour she’s been wearing. As they travel through the fae lands, both Aisling and Forget-Me-Not discover they have more in common than they originally thought and start developing a relationship. We learn more about the fae lands through Aisling’s interactions (and almost disasters) and Forget-Me-Not’s backstory about growing up in an alien world that isn’t hospitable to humans. The story wraps up at the end of this volume and provides an epilogue to tie up all the loose ends of the relationship between our two main characters.
titles in the series have a certain amount of narrative story holding the information together, but some definitely lean more towards the expository, which is the case in this title
of the first Monster Locker in October 2024, Pablo and his friends Takashi and Maggie have been working to banish the demons and mythical creatures that use Pablo’s basement locker as a FastPass into the human world back into their own dimension. Most of our trio is burnt out with all of their monster fighting, but Pablo is feeling the rush of finally being seen in a good way again and is pushing his friends to keep the monster banishing and their social capital up. The problem with being seen, though, is sometimes the wrong things are looking.
films they love. Now, at thirteen, they are taking the first step toward making that dream a reality: both girls have been accepted to a prestigious local animation summer program. Sloane is nervous, but she’s always nervous about starting new things and meeting new people. Ash can’t wait to learn from the pros—including the maker of her favorite animated movie, Monstrous.
considerable time and effort as demonstrated in Andy Hirsch’s (Science Comics series from First Second) Good Boy, a story of how one high-strung boy and his unpredictable dog learn to connect with each other and nurture a remarkable friendship.
