Stuff for the Teen Age

Hot Off the Presses: Exciting New Graphic Novels For Teens

Revolver by Matt Kindt

Imagine if the film Groundhog Day was put into a blender with a parallel universe and a generous dose of darkness.  If you drank the smoothie that was made from these strange ingredients, then you might have the first inkling of an idea of what Revolver was all about. 

Sam goes to bed after another day of his boring, dead-end life.  But when he wakes up the next morning the world has changed, and it's anything but boring.  The stock market has crashed, a bird flu epidemic is erupting in Asia, and the world is being torn apart by chaos and war.  After struggling to survive for one day he falls asleep ... and wakes up back in his normal world.  The one with no war and no apocalypse.  As Sam alternates between living in these two worlds, his personality and his priorities begin to change.  Soon he realizes that he is going to have to make some difficult and dangerous decisions if he wants to change the future and change himself.

Ghostopolis by Doug TenNapel

Garth Hale has just been told (again) that his disease is incurable.  And yet the most exciting part of his life is just beginning.  When Garth is accidentally sent into the afterlife with a skeleton horse, he begins an amazing adventure in a world that most living people never get to see. This story is creepy, exciting, and funny all at the same time.  When you read this book, the thought will probably occur to you that it would make an excellent movie.  Well, a lot of other people think so, too

 

Saturn Apartments Vol.1 by Hisae Iwaoka

Some time in the future, humans are living in a ring that surrounds the earth in order to save the planet.  In this strange new world, a window-cleaner's job is very important and very dangerous.  It's important because only people with clean windows can see the earth and the sun.  It's dangerous because window cleaners do their jobs while wearing space suits and suspended by ropes, and they can be hurt by wind, meteorites, and radiation.  Mitsu's father vanished five years ago when his rope broke (or was cut) and he fell down to the planet below.  Now Mitsu is going to follow in his father's footsteps, and along the way make some important discoveries about his father's life.  This is a very unusual science fiction story, and it is also a human story.  You'll be rooting for Mitsu to succeed in his new career, to make new friends, and to visit the surface of the earth and find his father's resting place.

 

Sweet Tooth 1: Out of the Deep Woods by Jeff Lemire

The cover of Sweet Tooth will raise a lot of questions.  Like ... What on earth is THAT?  Is it a monster, or a mutant?  Is that blood on its mouth?  Is it a vampire?  Oh, wait ... that's not blood, it's chocolate!  So ... wait, what's going on??? 

Gus is an unusual boy, a human-deer hybrid.  He is one of the children who was born after a great plague swept the world years earlier, killing billions of people and making many of the survivors sick.  Gus is even more special than he realizes: because his father raised him in an isolated cabin in the forest, he has remained safe for years longer than most hybrid children.  Gus is also special because he's valuable: hunters can get a lot of money for a hybrid child.  When Gus' father dies, Gus finds himself in danger until a man named Jepperd saves his life.  Jepperd's motivations are very mysterious, so Gus (and you) will spend a lot of time wondering what Jepperd really wants, and if he can be trusted.  Because Jepperd would be very valuable as a friend ... and incredibly dangerous as an enemy.