2023 Gift Guide: Graphic Novels for Kids & Teens
December 1, 2023 Comments Off on 2023 Gift Guide: Graphic Novels for Kids & Teens
The fifth installment of the Gift Guide is packed with graphic novels! I’ve got some terrific selects for you, both fiction and non-fiction, including some for kids and some for teens. Nearly all are new this fall! As was the case with my middle-grade installment, I gave a lot of thought to things with ultra-kid appeal that still felt original or meaty or really, really beautiful.
Please note that I never include sequels in these lists, and this fall has seen some awesome new titles in favorite series, including The First Cat in Space and the Soup of Doom, Above the Trenches (the latest in one of my kids’ favorite series, Hazardous Tales), and Huda F Cares? (sequel to the hilarious YA graphic novel, Huda F Are You?, a Gift Guide pick from a few years ago). Not to mention the new Cat Kid, just out…
These lists are not necessarily Best of the Year lists, either, because if they were I would include some of the graphic novels I covered in this year’s Summer Reading Guide (part one and part two) or Spring Break Round Up, exceptional titles that are beloved in our house, like Parachute Kids and Lo and Behold. It would include A First Time for Everything, which just won the National Book Award, and Sunshine, which just took home the Boston Globe-Horn Book Award, because we love, love, love those.
All this is to say that it has been another banner year for graphic novels, and another year to remind ourselves that with their wide-ranging vocabulary, clever construction, complex characters, and truly incredible art, graphic novels are worth celebrating, not censoring. And with so many of today’s readers ga-ga over them, they’ll make some of the most popular gifts under the tree.
Presented in order of age, with teen titles towards the bottom.
« Read the rest of this entry »Gift Guide 2018: Neighborhood Superheroes
December 2, 2018 § 2 Comments
To say that Chad Sell’s graphic novel, The Cardboard Kingdom (Ages 7-10), has developed a cult following among my children and their friends might be an understatement. In the week we got it, each of my kids read it five times, conservatively. Then they introduced it to friends on a beach trip, where the book was passed back and forth among all five children every morning on our way to the beach and every afternoon on our way home. A few weeks after we left, my friend texted me a picture of her girls wearing handmade costumes. “They told me you would understand?” she wrote. I needed a little help from my daughter, who didn’t hesitate for a second: “Animal Queen and Big Banshee!” « Read the rest of this entry »
Gift Guide 2014 (No. 3): For the Rebel Princess (Ages 5-8)
December 4, 2014 § 1 Comment
Five years ago, when I learned I was having a girl, I self-righteously vowed that I would bar the door from tiaras and princess costumes and those scary high-heeled plastic dress-up shoes with the sequins on the toes. My daughter won’t equate beauty with Disney-fied princesses! My daughter will read books about trains and science and daring adventures! My daughter won’t be held back by stereotypes of femininity!
Of course, ultimatums rarely work out in parenting—nor are they usually for the best. Those of you with girls already know that The Princess Obsession eventually finds its way into the house—slipping through the gap beneath the front door, if need be. Before my kids watched Frozen, my daughter already knew the words to every song, just from listening to her classmates. Before my son pointed to a hot pink skirt with 20 layers of tulle at Target and said (in the sweetest voice, so how could I resist?), “Oh, Mommy, Emily would just love something like that”—before that, Emily was already coming home from play dates in borrowed glitter-encrusted frocks.
What I failed to anticipate as a new parent, is that there are complex dichotomies at work in the princess fantasies of my daughter and her friends. When playing, Emily is just as likely to wear her tulle skirt on her head than around her waist. She likes to pair her purple metallic slippers with a red superhero cape and an astronaut helmet. « Read the rest of this entry »
November’s Birthday Pick Battle
November 8, 2013 § 2 Comments
Six year old boys live in a world of their own. Often, the only people who understand them are other six year old boys. Take this recent conversation I witnessed as I was driving JP and his buddy home from school:
Friend: “I think I just saw a box of dynamite on the side of the street.”
JP: “Cool! Imagine if you took an inflatable bouncy house and blasted dynamite underneath it, and the bouncy house exploded into Outer Space and caught fire to the moon!”
Friend: “Yes! And then the bouncy house would blast the moon to the sun where it would explode into a thousand pieces and turn to gas!”
JP: “And then that gas would get into the Earth’s atmosphere and poison the guts out of all the bad people!”
Friend: “And they’d all become zombies and their eyes would fall out of their heads!”
JP: “Look, my cheese stick is pooping!”
Friend: “Cool!”
We as parents might not be able to compete with this level of engrossing conversation, but I’ll tell you who can: Jon Scieszka and Mac Barnett, whose Battle Bunny (Ages 5-9), is going to rock the world of every boy in the universe, guaranteed. « Read the rest of this entry »
Imagination Turbo Edition
July 3, 2012 Comments Off on Imagination Turbo Edition
When you watch your children practicing yoga moves in their kiddie pool, it’s easy to be struck by how differently today’s children entertain themselves than when we were growing up (yoga?). But then there are the things that never change from one generation to the next—like kids’ uncanny ability to lose themselves in imaginary play, especially if there are action figures involved.
That’s why you can’t go wrong by gifting one of Mini Grey’s picture books about a combat-boots-sporting action figure named Traction Man. In the hands and imagination of one little boy, Traction Man embarks on daring missions with the help of his trusty sidekick Scrubbing Brush. The latest installment in this original series, Traction Man and the Beach Odyssey (Ages 4-7), has just been published and is perfect for your summer birthday gifts (although why not bundle it with the original Traction Man for the Best Gift Ever?).
What to Read to Your Kids 