ISO graphic novel suggestions for middle school

[Sneezyone]

My DS loves graphic novels. He is currently obsessed with historical ones. March trilogy...done. The Odyssey...in progress. Macbeth...up next. I would like to give him some lighter options too but have no real clue what's out there. If your kids (or you) love graphic novels as much as mine does, please share your faves below!!

[Sneezyone]

6 minutes ago, Æthelthryth the Texan said:

I don't have a suggestion- but wanted to give you something to file away. WTMA has a graphic novel course at the high school level. Dd is taking it now. Just something to keep in mind for him in a few years! 

 

Oh, thank you! I will keep that in mind. I know NOTHING about this genre.

[fairfarmhand]

There’s one by John Hendrix about Dietrich Bonhoeffer that all of my kids loved.

[Sneezyone]

17 minutes ago, fairfarmhand said:

There’s one by John Hendrix about Dietrich Bonhoeffer that all of my kids loved.

Thanks!

[Farrar]

If he liked March, George Takei's new graphic memoir, They Called Us Enemy, was excellent. Also, The Silence of Our Friends.

Sticking with difficult topics... Maus is an excellent classic. 

Persepolis is a classic and amazing.

Anything by Gene Yang - but especially American Born Chinese and Boxers and Saints.

Hey Kiddo is really good. Like, really really good.

I've heard that I Am Alfonso Jones is good, but haven't read it yet.

Nimona is amazing and super fun. Very meta about villains.

There are GN versions of tons of things now... Speak, Wrinkle in Time, The Giver, To Kill a Mockingbird. Anything done by Gareth Hinds will be good because he uses the actual text of The Odyssey, Edgar Allen Poe, Beowulf, etc. for his GN's.

The GN of Kindred is really good.

In terms of traditional comics publishers... Ms Marvel is good. Runaways is really fun. Saga is great. Sandman is a classic and excellent. My teen loved Scott Pilgrim.

All of this is really just scratching the surface. Since he's reading March, I assume he's beyond the middle grades GN's like Amulet, Bone, etc? But that's another whole arena of exploration and many of those can be loved by middle schoolers too.

 

[Sneezyone]

33 minutes ago, Æthelthryth the Texan said:

Neither do I! We just happened to run across it in the course listings over the summer and she was like "sign me up!" If you want, and you remind me, I'll give you a review come winter. It's just a single semester course. So far, so good! 

Here's the course description with reading list in case it gives you any ideas for now. I honestly have no idea of the content level on the books, so not sure if they are middle school friendly. I just pay for them, LOL. I can ask dd after the fact. 

https://www.wtmacademy.com/courses/classes/electives/fall/graphic-novel-panels/

 

Yep. I’ve considered several of the books on that reading list for him but decided to wait a little and stick with ancients for this year. There is a George Takei one that I found that has good reviews too. The themes in some of these may be a bit much just yet. I’d love to hear how the class goes tho!!

[Sneezyone]

7 minutes ago, Farrar said:

If he liked March, George Takei's new graphic memoir, They Called Us Enemy, was excellent. Also, The Silence of Our Friends.

Sticking with difficult topics... Maus is an excellent classic. 

Persepolis is a classic and amazing.

Anything by Gene Yang - but especially American Born Chinese and Boxers and Saints.

Hey Kiddo is really good. Like, really really good.

I've heard that I Am Alfonso Jones is good, but haven't read it yet.

Nimona is amazing and super fun. Very meta about villains.

There are GN versions of tons of things now... Speak, Wrinkle in Time, The Giver, To Kill a Mockingbird. Anything done by Gareth Hinds will be good because he uses the actual text of The Odyssey, Edgar Allen Poe, Beowulf, etc. for his GN's.

The GN of Kindred is really good.

In terms of traditional comics publishers... Ms Marvel is good. Runaways is really fun. Saga is great. Sandman is a classic and excellent. My teen loved Scott Pilgrim.

All of this is really just scratching the surface. Since he's reading March, I assume he's beyond the middle grades GN's like Amulet, Bone, etc? But that's another whole arena of exploration and many of those can be loved by middle schoolers too.

 

 

Oh thank you! I will check these out. He started out with stuff like Bone, Smile, etc. and I tried to interest him in Amulet but no dice. He loves history tho. I think the Garett Hinds Odyssey is the one he’s reading now.  Is the Beowolf one very graphic? I was hesitant to buy more, especially Poe, without knowing that. DS is sensitive to horror type stuff. Our local library is surprisingly limited where GNs are concerned so I can’t check in person.

Edited September 8, 2019 by Sneezyone

[Sneezyone]

10 minutes ago, Æthelthryth the Texan said:

Just out of curiosity- how the heck do you FIND out all of this stuff? I feel like you are so much more connected on this level than I ever could be, although I try! What is your secret mojo to being on the level with this middle/teen age group interest? I'd love to know! 🙂

 

Ditto! My son thinks I’m some kind of mind reading genius and it’s all thanks to the hive. He’s liked everything I filched...so far! I am particularly intrigued by the description of Nimona. He might really go for that.  I was looking at Persepolis earlier today too. I think he might like that one too since it connects with our time overseas.

Edited September 8, 2019 by Sneezyone

[Junie]

41 minutes ago, Farrar said:

If he liked March, George Takei's new graphic memoir, They Called Us Enemy, was excellent. Also, The Silence of Our Friends.

Sticking with difficult topics... Maus is an excellent classic. 

Persepolis is a classic and amazing.

Anything by Gene Yang - but especially American Born Chinese and Boxers and Saints.

Hey Kiddo is really good. Like, really really good.

I've heard that I Am Alfonso Jones is good, but haven't read it yet.

Nimona is amazing and super fun. Very meta about villains.

There are GN versions of tons of things now... Speak, Wrinkle in Time, The Giver, To Kill a Mockingbird. Anything done by Gareth Hinds will be good because he uses the actual text of The Odyssey, Edgar Allen Poe, Beowulf, etc. for his GN's.

The GN of Kindred is really good.

In terms of traditional comics publishers... Ms Marvel is good. Runaways is really fun. Saga is great. Sandman is a classic and excellent. My teen loved Scott Pilgrim.

All of this is really just scratching the surface. Since he's reading March, I assume he's beyond the middle grades GN's like Amulet, Bone, etc? But that's another whole arena of exploration and many of those can be loved by middle schoolers too.

 

I was going to suggest Boxers and Saints.  These were the first graphic novels that I read and I enjoyed them.

I also enjoyed El Deafo and Speak.  El Deafo is really light.  Speak deals with a more mature topic (r@pe); I enjoyed the graphic novel of Speak more than the actual book -- which really, really surprised me.  I have a degree in English education and it took me a while to accept graphic novels as Literature.

[Farrar]

49 minutes ago, Sneezyone said:

 

Oh thank you! I will check these out. He started out with stuff like Bone, Smile, etc. and I tried to interest him in Amulet but no dice. He loves history tho. I think the Garett Hinds Odyssey is the one he’s reading now.  Is the Beowolf one very graphic? I was hesitant to buy more, especially Poe, without knowing that. DS is sensitive to horror type stuff. Our local library is surprisingly limited where GNs are concerned so I can’t check in person.

I don't think the Hinds' GN's are all that "graphic" in the too much violence sense, so I wouldn't worry about that. If he is finding The Odyssey fine, then I'd think the others would be too, assuming he was interested.

If he's a sensitive reader, some of my suggestions were a bit more on the grown up 8th grader end, but not all. But, say, Boxers and Saints is definitely a bit violent, though it's historical. Maus is about the Holocaust, so that's obviously upsetting.

On the more middle grades end of things for history...

Trinity about the atomic bomb is really good.

All the Nathan Hale's Hazardous Tales are great and mostly fun.

The Great American Dust Bowl is really well done.

T-Minus is short but excellent.

Annie Sullivan and the Trials of Helen Keller is also short but great.

There's a great graphic novel about Nat Love.

Lewis and Clark by Nick Bertozzi is really good.

There's a GN about Laika, the Soviet space dog, that's great.

There's an author - Wayne Vansant - who does American military history - sort of YA/adult level. Military history is not my cuppa so I haven't read through them, but they seem good for that.

 

[Farrar]

Oh! And Max Brooks's The Harlem Hellfighters is supposed to be very good.

There's a high school history teacher who gives really good talks about GN's for history in the classroom. He has a website that's not totally comprehensive, but is as close as you'll see for history...
http://www.historycomics.net/

Graphic novels about history are a thing I know about. 🤷‍♀️

[Farrar]

1 hour ago, Æthelthryth the Texan said:

Just out of curiosity- how the heck do you FIND out all of this stuff? I feel like you are so much more connected on this level than I ever could be, although I try! What is your secret mojo to being on the level with this middle/teen age group interest? I'd love to know! 🙂

At one point, I probably knew *every* middle grades and easy reader level marketed graphic novel out there. They've exploded so much that I can't keep up - especially now that my kids are out of middle school and aren't into them themselves as much.

But I know an especial amount about history GN's because... I developed two syllabuses for an online middle school history through graphic novels course... that for some reason I could not seem to get enough families hooked to take. Go figure. 

I know enough about it that I can tell you... there are a LOT of GN's about social justice geared toward YA readers right now. But zilch about women's rights or the women's rights movement. I wish I was the person to write that because I think there's a spot in the market for, say, a really great YA GN about Victoria Woodhull or Lucy Stone or Ida B. Wells or someone.

[NataliaMusk]

Ir your DS is interested in Star Wars like mine is, these adaptations are pretty good: Star Wars: Prequel Trilogy Graphic Novel and Star Wars: Original Trilogy Graphic Novel. 

[Tanaqui]

15 hours ago, Farrar said:

I know enough about it that I can tell you... there are a LOT of GN's about social justice geared toward YA readers right now. But zilch about women's rights or the women's rights movement. I wish I was the person to write that because I think there's a spot in the market for, say, a really great YA GN about Victoria Woodhull or Lucy Stone or Ida B. Wells or someone.

 

I know Rejected Princesses has two print books out.