Delicious fun that’s out of this world.
An Earth pâtissière is beamed up to an intergalactic cooking competition reminiscent of Iron Chef.
With oversized glasses, light skin, and a hairstyle reminiscent of Lucy’s from “Peanuts,” Peony spends her days whipping up culinary delights at the bakery where she works. However, one fateful day, she is visited by a bespectacled frog who invites her to participate in a competition to find "the greatest chef in the galaxy." Suddenly, Peony finds herself on Space Battle Lunchtime, a televised show staged in an out-of-this-world kitchen with alien ingredients (literally) and odd appliances unlike anything she’s ever seen. Undaunted by her exotic surroundings, Peony finds that her relentless optimism and cooking know-how help her persevere and woo the extraterrestrial judges. Threatened by her success, her ET opponents are not above sabotage, and Peony soon discovers the lengths some of them would go to ensure she does not win. Will Peony survive, or is this just the way her cookie crumbles? Riess' series opener is highly imaginative and enjoyable, with strong worldbuilding working joyfully alongside bright and humorous illustrations. An odd yet well-spun mixture of food fiction and space tales, with a dash of pop culture, this unusual charmer defies genre conventions and seems to revel in its own sheer individuality and campy wonder.
Delicious fun that’s out of this world. (Graphic science fiction. 7-14)Pub Date: Oct. 12, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-62010-313-5
Page Count: 120
Publisher: Oni Press
Review Posted Online: Aug. 1, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
A vivid double character portrait, enhanced by equally sharp glimpses of climbing techniques, strategies and hazards....
The exploits of two young men mad for climbing mountains are retold in graphic panels.
Trading off narrator duties, Norgay and Hillary trace their childhoods and early lives. The Sherpa was a driven youth who earned a reputation for solid reliability working for European expeditions tackling various Himalayan mountains, while the Kiwi was the restless son of a beekeeper, who satisfied his yen for heights and adventure by making connections with renowned climbers. A third-person voice takes over for their ultimate meeting on Everest’s slopes and the heroic trek to the summit. Tayal captures their likenesses in flurries of small but visually varied cartoon scenes, often placing figures in front of reworked photos of forbidding ice fields and peaks. Helfand fills the dialogue-heavy narrative with specific biographical details and exciting accounts of some of the great triumphs and tragedies of Himalayan mountaineering. He rounds out the lives of his two subjects with highlights of their later careers and closes with quick looks at modern teenagers who have climbed Everest.
A vivid double character portrait, enhanced by equally sharp glimpses of climbing techniques, strategies and hazards. (Graphic nonfiction. 11-13)Pub Date: Aug. 16, 2011
ISBN: 978-93-80741-24-6
Page Count: 96
Publisher: Campfire
Review Posted Online: May 20, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2011
Despite occasional stumbles, a worthwhile reminder for readers who will recognize his name but may be a little hazy on what...
An inspirational biography in graphic format—highlighting both King’s passion for his cause and his devotion to Gandhi’s nonviolent methods.
The authors craft original dialogue that reads like policy statements and have Dr. King even as a child spouting lines like “We are being treated as inferior people solely because of the color of our skin. How unfair.” Nevertheless, they deliver a clear, cogent account of their subject’s upbringing, the vicious racial (and, later, social and economic) issues that sparked his involvement in the civil rights movement and the ensuing course of his short but enduringly influential career. Not all of the dialogue balloons and narrative boxes are properly placed, but Kumar draws facial features accurately. With a mix of overlaid and separated panels, he creates a strong sense of drama whether he’s depicting Dr. King firing up a crowd or Rosa Parks’ quiet composure. Numerous passages (not always accurately quoted: “the arm [sic] of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice”) from Dr. King’s speeches and writings add oratorical authority to the account, and a folding timeline at the end provides a broad historical overview of African-American history up to Barack Obama’s first presidential election.
Despite occasional stumbles, a worthwhile reminder for readers who will recognize his name but may be a little hazy on what he stood for. (Graphic biography. 11-13)Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2013
ISBN: 978-93-80028-69-9
Page Count: 88
Publisher: Campfire
Review Posted Online: Nov. 30, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2012
BOOK REVIEW
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