Archives de catégorie : Comics & Graphic Novels

THE HARROWING de Kristen Kiesling, illustré par Rye Hickman

In this YA graphic novel, a psychic teen hunts potential killers until she discovers the boy she loves is her next target.

THE HARROWING
by Kristen Kiesling, illustrated by Rye Hickman
Amulet/Abrams, April 2024

Rowan Sterling should be worrying about normal teenage things like attending college and whether her best friend, Lucas, is maybe more than a friend. . . . Instead, she’s having terrifying visions of blood and violence. As the premonitions increase in number and intensity, Rowan seeks her father’s help, but instead finds herself drugged, kidnapped, and sent to a mysterious facility called Rosewood. It isn’t long before Rowan discovers Rosewood isn’t a boarding school or an asylum: it’s a training center for teens with special abilities who are known as Harrows.

Harrows can view the actions of would–be murderers before they commit crimes, and the scientists at Rosewood believe it is their duty to use the Harrows’ powers to make the world a safer place. Rowan is immediately drawn to Rosewood’s mission; after all, she lost her mother to a random act of violence two years prior. Empowered by the skills she’s acquired and ready to change the world, Rowan returns home, but when a series of visions lead the Harrows to pursue Lucas, Rowan starts questioning everything she learned at Rosewood—and sets out to protect him at all costs.

Kristen Kiesling grew up in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and graduated from the University of Oklahoma. She is an active member of the SCBWI and lives in Houston, Texas, with her husband and two boys.

Rye Hickman is a visual storyteller and a graduate of the Savannah College of Art and Design’s sequential art program. They are co–creator and artist on the upcoming Little Brown for Young Readers graphic novel Buzzing. Past work include TEST, Moth & Whisper, Bezkamp, Jem and the Holograms, the Femme Magnifique anthology, and more.

LION OF JUDAH (Graphic Novel) de M. Menelik Makhar

An immersive graphic novel detailing Bob Marley’s moving personal history and foundation as a musical, cultural, spiritual, and political legend.

LION OF JUDAH: A Graphic Novel
by M. Menelik Makhar
Ten Speed Press, September 2025

LION OF JUDAH is the graphic novel story of Bob Marley’s early life and origins as an artist and musical prophet. The book juxtaposes Marley’s personal history with stories of H.I.M. Haile Selassie I, the former emperor of Ethiopia and Marley’s self-proclaimed « Spiritual Father, » and Kwame Nkrumah, the first president of an independent Ghana, the country of Marley’s family ancestry. LION OF JUDAH—named for the prominent symbol of the Rastafari movement—weaves together the seminal moments of these three timelines through an anthology-style artistic collaboration of an international all-star team of comic artists including Damien Hill, Massimiliano Veltri, Will Rosado, N. Steven Harris, Christopher « ChrisCross » Williams, and Eric Battle among others.
This full-color, immersive visual reading experience is the untold story of Bob Marley, a comprehensive history of Reggae music, and an insightful examination of music, spirituality, and politics. LION OF JUDAH depicts the enduring lessons of struggles, triumph, and tragedy that connect us all.

M. Menelik Makhar is an acclaimed activist, songwriter/ghostwriter, and musician.

LEGENDS & LATTES: THE GRAPHIC NOVEL de Travis Baldree

After a lifetime of bounties and bloodshed, Viv is hanging up her sword for the last time.

LEGENDS & LATTES: THE GRAPHIC NOVEL
by Travis Baldree
Ten Speed Graphic, September 2025

The battle-weary orc aims to start fresh, opening the first-ever coffee shop in the city of Thune. But old and new rivals stand in the way of success―not to mention the fact that no one has the faintest idea what coffee actually is.

If Viv wants to put the blade behind her and make her plans a reality, she won’t be able to go it alone. After all, true rewards of the uncharted path are the travelers you meet along the way. And whether drawn together by ancient magic, flaky pastry, or a freshly brewed cup, they may become partners, family, and something deeper than she ever could have dreamed.

This full color graphic novel adaptation brings the high fantasy and low stakes of this beloved story to vibrant life as its never been seen before.

Travis Baldree is a full-time audiobook narrator who has lent his voice to hundreds of stories. Before that, he spent decades designing and building video games like Torchlight, Rebel Galaxy, and Fate. Apparently, he now also writes books. He lives in the Pacific Northwest with his very patient family and their small, nervous dog.

PETWIZARDS de Kirk Scroggs

Perfect for animal lovers and fans of Lumberjanes, here is a hilarious middle-grade graphic novel about a glam rock-loving boy named Finch with the not-so-secret ability to control animals, and his mission to save the school musical and win the heart of his crush.

PETWIZARDS
by Kirk Scroggs
Union Square Kids, August 2024
(via JABberwocky Literary)

Finch Eaglehawk may seem like an average oddball with a taste for the dramatic and glam-rock musical numbers, but he has a secret. Finch is a PetWizard, with the ability to control the animal kingdom—well, the « et cetera » category of the animal kingdom. Though he loves his naked mole rats, bearded dragons, and boa constrictors, Finch yearns for more. With the help of his best friend, Aberdeen, a mysterious new kid named Erica, and an ancient PetMaster manual, Finch tries to learn how to own his powers and use them to help those in need, protect the vulnerable, and, most important, impress his crush, Ken Chu, the star of the upcoming school musical.

Kirk Scroggs is the author and illustrator of The Secret Spiral of Swamp Kid and We Found a Monster. He has been publishing illustrated middle-grade novels for over fifteen years. Kirk lives in Los Angeles with his husband, Steve, and an ungrateful cat.

DON’T TELL ME WHAT HAPPENS de Raphael Simon et Philip De Léon

Two queer love stories. Two time periods. One mystery.

DON’T TELL ME WHAT HAPPENS
by Raphael Simon and Philip De Léon
TBD
(via The Gernert Company)

Fifteen-year-old Noah lives with his father in New York but is spending the summer with his mother in Venice, CA. An indoor, city sort of person, a RuPaul fanatic, he’s miserable in the sun – until he meets Tomo, a surfer who works in his father’s vintage store. Tomo hands Noah an old composition-style notebook, filled with steamy diary entries by its teenaged owner, Diego, in addition to ephemera from the 1980s. Noah reads about Diego playing footsie in history class with closeted surfer (another surfer!) Casey until one day after school it becomes something more. Noah is enthralled. And there’s one more notebook at the store, but that’s it – Noah and Tomo have no idea what happened to Diego and Casey. And as they set off to find the much older surfer, the two boys find romance of their own…but can Noah keep from sabotaging the first good thing in his life?

Not quite a graphic novel, not quite a traditional prose novel, DON’T TELL ME WHAT HAPPENS is an enchanting story and story-within-a-story in the form of two sequential scrapbook-style diaries that include drawings, photos, concert tickets, flyers, and other memorabilia from the late 80s – a fantastically fulfilling romance, mystery, and coming-of-age novel.

Better known as Pseudonymous Bosch, Raphael Simon is the not-so-secret author of two bestselling middle-grade series, the Secret Series and the Bad Books, as well as the ALA Rainbow-Listed Unbelievable Oliver chapter-book mysteries. Most recently, Raphael published The Anti-Book, the first novel to appear under his own name (“a surprisingly powerful, formula-breaking coming of age story” per the New York Times).

Prior to writing books, Raphael wrote screenplays for film, television, and video games, and was a staff writer on Nickelodeon’s Rocket Power. In recent years, he has contributed essays and reviews to the New York Times Book Review, Los Angeles Review of Books, and Harper’s Bazaar.

As a visiting author, Raphael has shared his work with students at schools all across the country, as well as at bookstores and book festivals, theaters and museums, universities, summer camps, and once, memorably, trapped in a cage. More formally, he has taught creative writing at Occidental College and a queer mystery class (“Closet Cases”) at CalArts.

A graduate of Yale, Raphael holds an MA in Comparative Literature from UC Irvine. An LA native, he lives in Pasadena with his husband, two daughters, and two dogs.

Textile designer and illustrator Phillip De León began drawing as soon as he could hold a pencil.

First working as a creative in the advertising world, Phillip joined forces with his design partner and sister Nicole and their father Marcus to form the De León Design Group, and to direct the Los Angeles-based textile house, Alexander Henry Fabrics, Inc. A queer artist who spent his childhood dancing to disco and foraging the pages of GQ, Phillip has long incorporated a gay sensibility into his artwork.

A native Los Angeleno, Phillip De León grew up in the San Fernando Valley, earning his BA degree in Comparative Literature from UCLA. Designer and illustrator by day and jazz singer by night, Phillip now lives with his husband and their twin daughters in Pasadena.