#graphic format

Reluctant Reader Wednesday: Ten Days in a Mad-House (Adapted From the Work of Nellie Bly) by Brad Ricca & Courtney Sieh 

In 1887, a woman who used the pen name of Nellie Bly broke into the competitive world of New York journalism by getting an exclusive story. Her assignment was to go undercover in the Women’s Lunatic Asylum on Blackwell Island (known today as Roosevelt Island). But in order to complete this assignment, she would have to pretend to be insane, and fool enough people in authority until she was committed to the asylum. And then she had to watch, and wait, and hope that her new employer would be able to rescue her before it was too late. 

After her experience was over, Nellie Bly wrote articles about the entire experience, including descriptions of the horrible conditions she saw in the asylum. Her reporting was compiled under the title Ten Days in a Mad-House, and this book is a graphic-format adaptation of her work.

Reluctant Reader Wednesday: Welcome to St. Hell: My Trans Teen Misadventure by Lewis Hancox 

This is the story of a trans man named Lewis, reflecting back on his years growing up as girl named Lois, who couldn’t understand why she didn’t fit in with other girls. While it’s an autobiographical story, telling it in graphic format means that Lewis gets to add imaginative elements like having him as an adult talk to Lois and talk to his parents, and having them talk back to him, which adds a lot of humor to this roller coaster of a story. 

The subject matter, the title, and the cover will all definitely grab readers’ attention (it certainly did mine!) But I should give you one heads-up about something that is not immediately apparent, which is that this book is set in the UK. So be forewarned that you might need to use context clues or the internet to understand some of the British expressions and slang terms that the characters use.

Middle School Monday: Jane Austen: Her Heart Did Whisper by Manuela Santoni

How did Jane Austen’s early life shape her into the kind of woman who would grow up to write First Impressions (aka Pride and Prejudice) and many other classic stories that are still being read today? This graphic-format biography takes us on a journey back to Jane’s early days, when she first learned from her mother that she needed to become a good lady in order to find a husband. We follow her along her journey as she bristles under society’s expectations of women, as she develops a love of reading, as becoming a writer helps her find her voice, and as falling in love helps her create fictional characters with timeless appeal.

Reluctant Reader Wednesday: Super Late Bloomer: My Early Days in Transition by Julia Kaye 

In this graphic-format nonfiction book, Julia Kaye shares how she used her webcomic Up and Out to document the changes that took place in herself and the people around her when she started to transition from male to female. She shares her emotional turmoil as well as her joy during this period in her life. Sometimes the biggest challenges were with the way that people around her reacted, and sometimes it was adjusting to the hormonal changes in her own body.

Reluctant Reader Wednesday: The Bride Was a Boy by Chii

In this transgender manga based on the author’s own life, there is a lot of confusion, a lot of drama, and one big love story. Chii was assigned male at birth, and spend many years feeling like he didn’t belong in his own body. Then Chii learned about different kinds of people across the LGBT spectrum, and realized that transitioning into a woman might be the answer.

Middle School Monday: Primates: The Fearless Science of Jane Goodall, Dian Fossey, and Birute Galdikas by Jim Ottaviani and Maris Wicks

This graphic-format nonfiction book shares the true story of three unique women whose different personalities and lives intersected with their love of primates.  Jane, Dian, and Birute were all recruited and inspired by an anthropologist named Louis Leakey.  He believed that women were more patient and perceptive than men, so they would be better at studying animals over long periods of time in their natural environments.  These women helped us learn much more about chimpanzees, mountain gorillas, and orangutans than we ever knew before.   

Reluctant Reader Wednesday: Ay, Mija! My Bilingual Summer in Mexico by Christine Suggs 

This book is about Christine, a 16-year-old Mexican-American who is going through several kinds of identity crisis at once. Readers will get to be inside Christine's head as they wrestle with their body image, their evolving sexual interests, and their inability to keep up with the Spanish conversations of their Mexican family members. 

Middle School Monday: Just Pretend by Tori Sharp

When Tori was in middle school, she was dealing with different kinds of stress at home and at school. There was tension with her siblings, tension between her divorced parents, and tension with her friends. But through it all, she had her imagination and the stories that she created by herself and with her friends.

In this graphic-format autobiography, readers will be pulled along in different directions as they follow Tori’s real life, the fantasy stories that she created, and the way that her life influenced those stories.