Staff Picks: Mental Health Awareness Month

In this powerful memoir, Emilia McKenzie lovingly pays tribute to her friendship with her close friend Charlotte and reflects upon her grief over Charlotte’s struggle with depression and eventual suicide.

With its effective drawings and McKenzie’s excellent use of anecdotes to build her story, But You Have Friends was one of my favorite reads of 2023 for good reason. Readers bereaved by suicide will likely find a supportive voice in McKenzie’s work.

Discussion of mental illness; discussion of suicide; brief nudity (makes sense in context)

Megan Rupe

Deb (Jung Jin at home) was born in Korea, but has lived in the US for a while. They have been learning the violin, even playing in the school orchestra, but they want to do art. In so many ways, Deb feels like they belong nowhere and no one understands them. Life at home is volatile at best, with their mom oscillating between sweet and awful. Things spiral out of control and get so much worse, but slowly, Deb begins to climb out and find their voice. Note: the graphic novel uses she as the pronoun for the character of Deb, but this is a graphic memoir, and the creator now goes by they, so to reflect that, they is used here for the character as well.

This is one of those graphic novels that effectively uses art to convey meaning, overlaying deep and difficult topics by changing art styles to convey emotion, including even photography in some panels and surreal moments in others. This is a fantastic and complex coming-of-age story that can be empowering for teen readers who may also feel trapped between and left behind.

Parental abuse of child - verbal and physical, discussion of suicide/depiction of suicide attempts, depiction of experiencing depression

Shannan Prukop

Using dice to decide the fate of your character when you're playing a tabletop game can be exciting, but what if you used a twenty-sided dice to decide the choices you made in real life? That's what Maggie decides to do for her first year of middle school to help her deal with the fact that she doesn't always know what the right thing to do is when it comes to making friends and navigating a new school. But when Maggie becomes reliant on using her dice to make decisions, even when it goes against what she wants to do, her parents suggest that she go to therapy to help them figure out why she feels so compelled to do these things.

Fans of "Guts" and "Real Friends" will love this story of making friends and becoming more confident.

Tayla Cardillo

In this manga collection of nine stories, the author's diagnosis with ADHD as an adult prompted her to write this collection so that other people with developmental disorders can see real-life stories of people like them. The collection addresses ADHD, Autism Spectrum Disorder, and learning disabilities. This manga provides a great insight into non-Western perspectives about these disorders.

Manga fans looking to learn more about this topic from a real person's perspective will enjoy this collection.

Depictions of Suicide Attempts and Suicidal Ideation, Ableism

Tayla Cardillo

Cartoonist Ellen Forney returns in this self-help comic chock full of advice that she has gleaned from learning to master her bipolar disorder. This is the perfect follow-up to Marbles, her graphic memoir about learning to live and still create with her bipolar disorder.

With helpful, often amusing artwork, practical tips, and an empathetic tone, Rocky Steady is perfect for teen and adult readers seeking advice on managing their mood disorders and general mental health.

Megan Rupe

In 2010, Rachel Lindsay worked in advertising for a pharmaceutical company to pay for her bipolar treatment. However, working on advertisements for psychiatric medications weighed on her, and she soon found herself slipping into a manic episode that ended in her involuntary commitment. With energetic art and storytelling, Rx explores the experience of one creative individual trying to stay stable in a world where we are all exploited in some way.

Readers looking for mental health stories that explore how work and the medical health system impact patients will want to pick up Rx.

Swearing, drug use, and a scene of stripping in a ward

Megan Rupe

Best Friends Clay, who has ADHD, and Kyle, who is on the Autism Spectrum, have always known they were funny. From cracking jokes while working the stage crew in the school play to open mic nights at a local cafe, they always seem to know how to get a laugh. When Clay decides to try out for an acting part in the school play, a serious production of "Guys and Dolls," her ADHD makes it hard for her to memorize her lines or stay focused during rehearsals. She quickly realizes she needs an outlet to joke around. She and Kyle decided to start a podcast where they give comical advice to their fellow middle school students.

Current and future theater kids will relate to this story of finding your niche and being ok with being a little bit different.

Tayla Cardillo

After witnessing something awful, Manuel has isolated himself from everyone at school, using photography to deal with it all. Then he gets assigned a group project, forcing him to interact with classmates again. Through them, he learns about life out on a farm, processes what happened, and opens up enough not just to make some friends but to develop a crush. The art is evocative, effectively showing Manuel's PTSD, but also lovely shots of scenery and framing.

Despite the heavy topic, The Golden Hour handles it all very gently, giving the characters and moments room to breathe. This is a fantastic comic for someone who wants to understand what PTSD can look like and how it affects the life of someone with it, although that's not necessary to read this fantastic graphic novel.

Depiction of a school shooting, depictions of someone experiencing PTSD - panic attacks, dissociation, flashbacks, nightmares

Shannan Prukop

Gendron takes her popular webcomic, The Mini ADHD Coach, and turns it into an informative and easy-to-digest guide for ADHDers or anyone who wants to get a basic understanding of what it's like to live with ADHD. In this graphic informational guide, Gendron defines terms, breaks down misconceptions about ADHD, discusses the feelings that may arise after a diagnosis, offers insight into a day in the life of someone with ADHD, and provides helpful tips for individuals with ADHD to thrive. This guide is a great first stop for anyone looking to learn more about ADHD.

Its highly visual format will appeal to ADHDers or anyone looking to learn more, but is short on time.

Brief discussion of ableism

Tayla Cardillo

Clara is struggling. She can’t work on her next book, work is overwhelming, and she feels like existing is impossible. As Clara spirals, she longs for connection and a way out of the dark pit inside herself.

With a distinctive early adult voice and a youthful, relatable protagonist, readers who like heavy-hitting slice-of-life comics or are looking for relatable protagonists struggling with mental health will want to pick this up.

Suicide ideation; discussion of sexual assault

Megan Rupe

Tony love all things comics, anime, and video games, and likes to think of himself as stepping into the shoes of those characters. Unfortunately, his peers generally don't share his opinions, and even his parents don't entirely understand why he is this way. Tony's world shrinks until everything becomes grey, until a very terrible day. After this, his parents have Tony switch schools to give him a fresh start and it seems like maybe, things aren't so terrible as they seemed before.

The primary message of Weirdo is that it's okay to be different and to own your identity, which ties into so many other tween and middle-grade graphic novels. But the angle of interest in things like anime and comics means it could be good for readers of Dungeon Club or Buzzing, as they both discuss social issues, but with a tabletop gaming framework.

Depictions of social and physical bullying (one character is choked briefly), discussion of a suicide attempt without details or visuals.

Shannan Prukop