Educate me about graphic novels

December 12, 2020 7:00 AM

My precocious, 9 year old daughter loves graphic novels. So does her 12 year old sister. I know nothing about graphic novels. What are some barn-burner, best-of-all time books that they might have missed while scraping our local libraries for content? (PS if it’s fantasy it counts for double).

Caveats : my kids read a lot. Ever since e-readers and overdrive entered my household, I’ve given up trying to guess what they have and haven’t read when giving gifts. My new strategy is to only buy books I think they’ll want to own in physical form into adulthood, even if they’ve found and read it already.

posted by q*ben to Media & Arts (29 answers total)

Hm. Normally I'd immediately recommend Digger, but it's pricey to get hold of in print form. It's free to read online.

Bone is good, and should be findable.
posted by humbug at 7:09 AM on December 12, 2020 [7 favorites]

Mouse Guard is beautiful and amazing. There's tons of it too. It does have some mouse-fantasy violence, but most of the worst is implied. So maybe preview if you're concerned about that.
posted by SaltySalticid at 7:14 AM on December 12, 2020 [2 favorites]

The Nausicaa manga is also very good and worth owning as an adult. Kickass young lady protagonist who fights to help restore nature, flying around in a mystical strange fantasy world. Common sense media puts the movie at age 10+. In general you can use them to gauge appropriateness of content for many of the recs you'll get here.
posted by SaltySalticid at 7:18 AM on December 12, 2020 [3 favorites]

The Amulet series is amazing, but they've probably read it. I bought the whole thing (and some prints of art to hang on my walls) though.
posted by gideonfrog at 7:21 AM on December 12, 2020 [7 favorites]

Amulet series and the Mystery Boxes series by Kazu Kibuishi
Akissi series by Marguerite About
My Beijing by Nie Jin
El Deafo by Cece Bell

Amulet is fantasy and My Beijing is sort of magical realist. The other two are comic realist.
posted by mai at 7:24 AM on December 12, 2020 [2 favorites]

Azumanga Daioh is about a group of junior high girls and it is hilarious, the Anime is great too. It is mostly realism but there's some parts that turn surreal in silly ways.
posted by SaltySalticid at 7:33 AM on December 12, 2020 [3 favorites]

Azumanga Daioh has remained very popular in my household of similar readers. Only iffy part is a creep teacher. It comes in a handy omnibus.

Yotsuba&! is by the same author and also gets read over and over. A little harder to cobble together as it's in 14 volumes.
posted by eelgrassman at 7:36 AM on December 12, 2020 [1 favorite]

Nimona by Noelle Stevenson
posted by crocomancer at 8:13 AM on December 12, 2020 [15 favorites]

Two series, both available in deluxe/omnibus editions, that might be a shade mature in content for 9: Paper Girls and Rat Queens. Paper Girls has mild to moderate violence and some sexual content; Rat Queens takes both up a notch. I would strongly suggest previewing both, because parents and kids are all different w/r/t what is appropriate reading.
posted by xedrik at 8:13 AM on December 12, 2020 [3 favorites]

If they are OK with sci-fi adjacent with a touch of the supernatural from time to time, I recommend the ARIA manga series, as well as the anime. Rightstuf is releasing the Masterpiece editions now, with the last volume out soon. You can find them on Amazon also.

I've really been enjoying Nicola Traveling Around the Demon's World and Witch Hat Atelier.

I'll let you judge, because I don't know any girls that age, but I wonder if they would like A Bride's Story? It's a historical series, and one of the most beautiful manga I've ever read. It is also (from my understanding) fairly accurate about what the day to day life of girls and women was like at that time, in that culture, and at that place.

Azumanga Daioh and Yotsuba&! are also good choices, and from the same mangaka. I always say that ARIA is my favorite manga and anime series of all time, but Yotsuba&! is the greatest manga of all time.
posted by ralan at 8:14 AM on December 12, 2020 [2 favorites]

There's a wonderful series of three books by Rob Davis - The Motherless Oven, The Can Opener's Daughter and The Book of Forks. So weirdly, crazily inventive, like nothing else you've read. Your kids are probably still a bit young to fully appreciate them, but there's nothing really inappropriate for kids that age (unless a lot of talk about death would be too disturbing for them.) If you don't get the books this year, you should definitely make sure your kids get hold of them at some point. (And have a look at them yourself. My husband and I loved this series.)
posted by Redstart at 8:17 AM on December 12, 2020 [3 favorites]

Since you can't know if they have read something, I suggest looking at some lists and then checking if your library system carries them. These lists seem like a good place to start. Pay attention to how many votes as you go down the list since anyone can add to these lists and there is no official check that the book meets the guidelines. I'm sure there will be overlap and there may be stuff that is not appropriate for their age.

Graphic Novels For Children
Graphic Novels for Middle School
Middle Grade & YA Graphic Novels
Young Adult and Middle Grade Graphic Novels and Manga
posted by soelo at 8:40 AM on December 12, 2020 [3 favorites]

Not sure if they'd be too young but our daughter loved Mighty Jack and the Zita series by the same author.
posted by yerfatma at 8:54 AM on December 12, 2020 [7 favorites]

Girl Genius will blow their little minds.
posted by seanmpuckett at 9:46 AM on December 12, 2020 [4 favorites]

Seconding Zita and Mighty Jack.
posted by Winnie the Proust at 9:54 AM on December 12, 2020 [2 favorites]

Highly recommend the Claudette books - Giants Beware, Dragons Beware and Monsters Beware. Both my 3 year old and his 6 year old friend love having them read to them - I'm guessing around 9 would be the sweet spot for reading to themselves.

Probably a bit older, maybe ok for a 12 year old?, is a graphic novel called "The New Kid" - I think the protagonist is starting 7th grade in the first book, but it may be 9th grade..., anyway deals with a lot of more mature themes but is brilliant. As an adult, I loved reading it and the sequel.
posted by slide at 10:46 AM on December 12, 2020 [3 favorites]

Gunnerkrigg Court, though 9 might be young. (Fantasy, boarding school, ongoing; available both online and in hardcover)
posted by trig at 11:16 AM on December 12, 2020 [2 favorites]

Not often on lists, but Rutabaga the Adventure Chef has two books that have become regular in-rotation books for my 9 year old.
posted by furnace.heart at 12:28 PM on December 12, 2020 [1 favorite]

Squirrel Girl!
posted by Pronoiac at 2:30 PM on December 12, 2020 [7 favorites]

Space Battle Lunchtime is super cute and fun to read! I think there's three books.
posted by emjaybee at 3:56 PM on December 12, 2020

The Witch Boy series
Snapdragon
Witchlight
This Was Our Pact
Estranged
posted by Narrative Priorities at 4:23 PM on December 12, 2020 [1 favorite]

Raina Telgemeier! More than any fantasy books (we also love Hilda, Nimona, & Zita), her books have gotten my 10-yr-old kid interested in reading other comics, reading novels, and generally smart about storytelling & narrative pacing & genre. Her autobiographical books (Smile, Sisters, Guts) are the best, and the Babysitters Club reboots & other stand-alones (Drama, Ghosts) are also terrific.
posted by miles per flower at 4:58 PM on December 12, 2020 [4 favorites]

I know it's not fantasy, but you can't go wrong with Superman Smashes the Klan.
posted by Quonab at 6:17 PM on December 12, 2020 [1 favorite]

Elfquest? (though there are aluded to sexy times in there... definitely worth previewing before committing)
posted by kokaku at 6:44 PM on December 12, 2020 [1 favorite]

I also came to say Elfquest. As kokaku says, there is some implied sex, and also violence and character death later in the series, so this might be a title to save for when they are a little older. It completely captivated me when I discovered it in my mid-teens, though, and I still love it three decades later.

The original eight graphic novels can be read in full color for free on the Elfquest website: http://www.elfquest.com. The full color books are hard to find now in physical form, but the black and white graphic novels are still being published by Dark Horse comics.
posted by rakaidan at 7:59 PM on December 12, 2020 [1 favorite]

Seconding Nausicaa.

The graphic novel adaptations of Neil Gaiman's Coraline and The Graveyard Book might be possibilities. P. Craig Russell did the art and it's gorgeous.

Also gorgeous: Eric Shanower's Oz GN's.

Leave It To Chance by James Robinson and Paul Smith. Not sure how easy this one will be to find. The last time I saw this one in print was the early 2000's.

Linda Medley's Castle Waiting. I don’t think the series was ever finished properly, though.
posted by Eikonaut at 8:53 PM on December 12, 2020 [1 favorite]

My kids really liked March.
posted by zerobyproxy at 8:50 AM on December 15, 2020 [1 favorite]

Response by poster: These are ALL the best answer! Thank you all! I ended up buying several of these - Bone, Amulet, Nausicaa - thanks!
posted by q*ben at 2:21 PM on December 17, 2020

I'm a bit late, but please also consider Evan Dorkin and Jill Thompson's Beasts of Burden series about a pack of magical animals battling weird creatures in a small town. Terrific painted art and the animals have distinct personalities with minimal human involvement.
posted by JDC8 at 10:32 AM on December 18, 2020