Full disclosure: I pre-ordered all the scheduled next volumes for this series, too. Anything that has "Urasawa" on the cover, I'll be greedily reading ...
I have volumes 3 and 4 of Ikigami already pre-ordered (although not coming soon enough, I might add) so that ought to tell you I'm clearly hooked on this series. I also wish they were longer, too, but that's a groupie talking ...
Just like addictive junk food (not that I would know, ahem!), you can't read just one volume of Monster. You start one, you have to immediately finish all the ones you can get your hands on. Too bad I ordered only five at a time...
Picking up a Peter H. Reynolds book is always transporting. "What wondrous things books can be," he writes in a lovely letter-as-introduction in his new edition to his 1977 classic, The North Star. "My favorites are the ones that move me – to laughter, to...
The chapter titles of this splendiferous collection of images of people around the globe read like a poem: Touch / Feel / Love / Hope / Laugh / Hurt / Fear / Believe / Try / Play / Rest / Need ...
Growing up is hard to do, especially in this detached, disconnected 21st century-world. Presented as nine "tracks," the vaguely linked stories are reminiscent of the loud, incoherent music intermittently spilling out a young person's ear buds ...
In a barren wasteland of "perpetual night" called Amberground where only the capital city has access to light from an artificial sun, 18-year-old Gauche Suede works as a dedicated tegami bachi (literally 'letter bee'), a mail carrier whom people entrust "with their hearts." Living in a...
Apparently the big book controversy this week (besides the Wal-Mart $10 vs. Amazon $9 pre-order pricing war) is David Small's 2009 National Book Award nomination in the Young People's Literature category for his graphic memoir, Stitches. YA or not YA, that is the question ...
"Hadiya's name is not really Hadiya," the editor's note introduces this harrowing, heartbreaking blog-turned-book. "We have used pseudonyms for every Iraqi in this story because each of their lives could be in danger if they were identified. But Hadiya is a real teenager in Mosul,...
Here's a joyful little gift to share with your children over the long weekend ...
Once upon a time, Kenji wanted to be a rock star guitarist. But somehow, in 1997, he's ended up managing a convenience store with his cranky mother and his missing sister's baby usually strapped on his back. Then he gets word that Donkey, one of...
I should have ordered all 18 volumes in one batch, because I really can't stand the thought of waiting to see what happens! I gladly admit I couldn't put down the four volumes that arrived last night (I originally got the first Monster from the...
Volume One: A Cartoon Story of Hiroshima Volume Two: The Day After Volume Three: Life After the Bomb Volume Four: Out of the Ashes Volume Five: The Never-Ending War Volume Six: Writing the Truth Volume Seven: Bones into Dust Volume Eight: Merchants of Death Atom bomb. Unimaginable horrors. Survival against all odds. Bearing...
As this volume is currently the last one available in English, I DID try and save and savor it ...
Atom's protector, Professor Ochanomizu, is under police protection, but that doesn't stop the dangerously unpredictable Goji, who created the Persian Kingdom's robot army for the Central Asian War, from making his way into the good professor's home and threatening the safety of his daughter and...
Studio Ghibli and Satoshi Kon are together an empowering exercise in girl power: strong, independent female protagonists of all ages abound in their anime. With countless awards, including a Best Animated Feature Oscar for Spirited Away, Hayao Miyazaki is one of anime's greatest. His Ponyo...
Certain kiddie authors whose books that my children have outgrown I can't bear to part with – in fact, I keep buying their latest titles anyway, even as my children have moved on to Steinbeck (our now-teenage daughter) and Cisneros (our tween son) to keep...
So I'm jumping on the Monster bandwagon a little late (which debuted in 1995 in Japan to multiple awards but took another 11 years to arrive Stateside in translation) ...
Based on the Ching Yeung Russell's own path toward becoming a writer, Tofu Quilt is one delicious free-verse memoir. In the summer before she starts kindergarten, Yeung Ying is a rambunctious young child who cannot sit still, but can effortlessly recite the difficult classical poems...
The already well-established X-Men franchise of books (and films) gets a somewhat peculiar makeover in the first of a new series designed for the middle grade/13+ crowd. "Don't fix what ain't broke," comes to mind. But that might be an old-age reaction ...
