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Kids posts by Molly W
Books that involve gangs of problem solving kids, hijinks and hilarity are perennially popular at my house. I checked this new book out because it looked like it fit that bill, and boy did it ever. Wherever this series goes I will follow. Madison, Dylan, Emma, Aidan and Ava are twelve years old, classmates, and members of the Not-So-Secret Society.
A famous chef and restaurateur in failing health decides to pit his children against one another in order for one of them to achieve the rights to his successful empire. All of the children (12 boys!) and one daughter, Brianna Jakobsson, must start a new restaurant. The child with the most successful restaurant wins the inheritance. Each restaurant must be in a different town and all of the children must open their restaurant without any assistance from their father. Brianna is at a major disadvantage because she is the youngest in the family and has only recently graduated from culinar
Going back over time, I calculate that I've read and written about at least six different cat comics or children's graphic novel series on MADreads. This does not include a childhood spent reading Garfield. This does not include my recent (personal) purchasing and reading of the new "Grumpy Cat/Garfield" comic series. Who knew that Grumpy Cat and Garfield knew each other?!?!? It's an amazing world!! I guess what I'm trying to say is that there's a wealth of this kind of material out there and I celebrate it. All of it.
All I can say is, wow. Somehow we make it through elementary and middle school friendships. It's not easy. It's not nice. It's not quickly forgotten. And it doesn't seem to get any easier for subsequent generations. Why is that?
Newsprints by Ru Xu features girls as newsboys, strained race relations and a serious look at robot civil rights in what I would describe as a steampunk variation on Annie! The story is beautifully drawn with complicated gender roles and a somewhat mysterious locale and setting.
