Who knew that the sleepy little town of Tackleford, England would be home to so many weird and wacky mysteries? A group of local teenage girls, Shauna, Charlotte and Mildred, are working together to keep old Mrs. Biscuits in her house in the face of evil industrialism. Meanwhile, their schoolmates, Jack, Linton and Sonny, are trying to figure out why the owner of their local football team seems to have been cursed. Little do they know, but their cases might be related, if they’d just quit being embarrassed long enough to talk to each other! This hilarious collection of John Allison’s daily online comic strips will satisfy even the most discerning sleuth, all the while keeping them in stitches.
Traci Glass
No Flying, No Tights
http://noflyingnotights.com
Award-winning graphic novelist Gene Luen Yang takes on the historical turf of the Boxer Rebellion in turn-of-the-twentieth century China. Yang gracefully interweaves stories of two young people — one on each side of the conflict — to lay each group’s motives bare. In doing so, he provides the reader with profound insights on how the foreign culture of Britain brought the hope of a better life to some, and destruction of everything familiar and holy to others. The ending, in which we see that the characters’ lives are intertwined despite their differences, is particularly satisfying.
Liz Jones
Lizjonesbooks
http://lizjonesbooks.livejournal.com
Carol Danvers is a lot of things – extraordinary pilot, former Ms. Marvel, part alien, part human. But, there are two things that truly define her: she’s an Avenger and she’s Captain Marvel. And, whether the trouble is on Earth or far out among the stars, she’ll be there with her fellow Avengers to save the day and make some pretty awesome jokes. Both seasoned and new readers will enjoy the first volume in the new ongoing series written by Kelly Sue DeConnick and illustrated by Dexter Soy and Emma Rios. When Captain Marvel accidentally travels back in time to a 1943 battlefield, she finds the all-female Banshee Squadron, and boy, do they need her help. But, if she does…will she change history as she knows it? And, just how is she supposed to get back to her time, or is living in the past her future destiny?
Traci Glass
No Flying, No Tights
http://noflyingnotights.com
Lizjonesbooks
http://lizjonesbooks.livejournal.com
Mechner, Pham and Puvilland created a captivating story based on the Templar Trial in 1307 France, with a fictional cast of the few “ordinary enlisted men” who escaped arrests, but the details were never recorded. Through perfectly penned dialogues and fluid, organic illustrations, readers intimately witness the bravery of noble Martin, the resourcefulness of witty Bernard and loyal Dominic, the tender romance between Martin and Isabelle, and the inevitability of heroic sacrifices for a worthy cause. These historical “figures of no importance” can now live vividly in the imagination of readers of this 472-page tome.
Roxanne Feldman
Fairrosa Cyberlibrary
http://fairrosa.wordpress.com
Do you find spirals frightening? They seem so benign…beautiful, even… ight? In Uzumaki, Junji Ito creates a town spiraling inexorably inward with horrific results. Reminiscent of American stories like Dawn of the Dead and the Twilight Zone, Uzumaki is structured as a series of tales following the same characters through the unfolding disaster, each with a satisfying conclusion. Each tale adds another layer of disruption and fear, and the ending is truly twisted in a very familiar shape. One final tale follows the conclusion, presumably to lighten the mood. The deluxe edition pulls all of the stories together into one volume that teen horror readers won’t want to miss.
Liz Jones
Lizjonesbooks
http://lizjonesbooks.livejournal.com
Soldiers from the Lord’s Resistance Army kidnap Jacob and his friends Tony, Paul, and Norman from their exclusive boarding school in Uganda. At first held for ransom, the four are given a choice—become child soldiers themselves or toil as slaves in the military camp—when their parents fail to buy their freedom. The choices that Jacob and his friends make will test the bonds among them and haunt them long after their desperate journey through a wildlife preserve in an attempt to flee this terrorist group led by war criminal Joseph Kony. Vivid language, storytelling, and artwork connect readers to the characters and evoke the question, “What would I have done in those circumstances?”
Lyn Miller-Lachmann
The Pirate Tree
http://www.thepiratetree.com