Leap Graphic Novel

 

My Thoughts:

Leap by author/illustrator/artoonist Simina Popescu (they/she) of Romania joins other difficult LGBTQIA+ coming of age graphic novels like Juliet Takes a Breath by Gabby Rivera, Sunhead by Alex Assan, and Messy Roots: A Graphic Memoir of a Wuhanese American by Laura Gao. I would perhaps also include a connection to Skim by Mariko Tamaki here.  Some of these connections are complicated, or rather, my feelings about the graphic novels are complicated. However, I connect these because my feelings toward this graphic novel are also complicated.

Perhaps complicated is the wrong word. I felt so bad/sad/sorry for Ana as she just kept giving and giving to Carina without any real commitment back. As a high school teacher, I have seen this where one partner is not willing to give the other partner the same amount of devotion. It does not matter if the couples are same sex or cis. What matters is that the some partners want to be on the down low for lots of reasons that harm the other partner. As a teacher, it is difficult to watch, but also difficult to stop. It is part of the coming of age process. We can advise, but ultimately, it is the teen or young adult that needs to learn from this and come out stronger in the end (hopefully). That may be inaccurate or even bad advice on my part. Granted, I am not a trained counselor/psychologist. But really, that transactional conflict where the text digs into my own teaching experiences is what makes this a complicated read for me. I could not distance this text from my own students. 

Ultimately, perhaps the best advice I should use is to give the right book at the right time when I am not sure what else I can do. 

From the Publisher:

A coming-of-age graphic novel following two dancers at a conservative performing arts school―exploring friendship, first love, and what it means to fall out of step with your own dreams.

Ana has been studying contemporary dance since she was little, but her heart isn’t in it anymore. Instead her focus is on Carina―a beautiful, ambitious ballerina whose fear of being outed keeps Ana in the closet and their fragile relationship from seeing the light of day. Risking her own career, Ana gives up more and more in order to fit into the shadows of Carina’s life.

Sara, on the other hand, is fielding whispers she may be the best dancer their school has produced in years. Much of that is thanks to her mentor and instructor, Marlena, who plucked Sara from the classical track and encouraged her to blossom as a contemporary dancer. Sara has always been in awe of Marlena, but recently, that admiration has sparked into something more, and Sara’s not sure what to do about it.

As junior year at their performing arts school begins, Ana and Sara are assigned as roommates. What starts off as a tentative friendship soon becomes a much-needed anchor.

Publication Information:

Author/Illustrator: Simina Popescu

Publisher: Roaring Brook Press (November 12, 2024)

Paperback: 304 pages

ISBN-13: 978-1250838308

The Midnight Girls

 

My Thoughts:

This sapphic romance book is more about passion, one-sided rivalry, jealousy, fear and competition than it is about romance, but it does have a satisfyingly non-sappy epilogue. 

What makes the relationship between Marynka (Midday), Zosia (Midnight) and Beatta (Morning) interesting is that not only are they all servants of three sister Witches, but that this rivalry and attraction between Midday and Midnight has been going on long before the two girls were chosen. Their intense connection, then, is fate. 

What does Marynka really want? What price is she willing to pay? What does Zosia really want? And what price is she willing to pay? Do both girls like the power that makes them into monsters? What will either of them do with their freedom? And what does Beatta want? 

The book slowly reveals their individual desires and ambitions while also sending them on a thrilling chase for Prince Josefʻs heart (literally - they need his heart pulled out of his body). Can they work together or do they end up killing each other? This was a pretty wild ride: witches, monsters, magic and holy swords, oh my. 

From the Publisher:

In a snow-cloaked kingdom, two wicked rivals secretly compete for the pure heart of a prince, only to discover they might be falling for each other.

Karnawał season is a time for mischief and revelry. For the next few weeks, all will be wintry balls, glittery disguises, and nightly torch-lit sleigh-parties.

Unbeknownst to the merrymakers, two uninvited girls join the fun. Zosia and Marynka are drawn to each other the moment they meet, until they discover they're rivals, who both have their sights set on the prince's heart. If one consumes a pure heart, she'll gain immeasurable power. Marynka plans to bring the prince's back to her patron in order to prove herself. While Zosia is determined to take his heart and its power for her own.

Their ambition turns into a magical contest with both girls vying to keep the prince out of the other's grasp, even as their attraction to one another grows. But their attempts on his life draws the attention of the city that would die for him, and suddenly their escalating rivalry might cost them not just their love for each other, but both their lives.

Author: Alicia Jasinka

Publisher: Sourcebooks Fire

Publication date: December 28, 2021

The Danes

The premise of this graphic novel may seem fantastical, but the appeal is in the realism of both the pictures and the plot. After all, mosquitoes carrying the Zika virus can infect pregnant women causing their babies to be born with the birth defect microcephaly. The drug Thalidomade, touted to ease morning sickness in pregnant women resulted in more than 10,000 babies worldwide to be born with malformations, bone hypo plasticity and congenital defects before it was pulled off the shelves in the early 1960s.

It is not far fetched, then, to imagine a world where a retrovirus in pregnant women might produce blond, blue eyed babies even when parents are ethnically different. It is also not far fetched to imagine that the outward appearance, rather than the paternity test markers would cause ethnic unrest, disbelief, racism and chaos. Nor is it implausible that the pharmaceutical companies would race to try and create a vaccine for such retrovirus.

This story does a realistic job of imagining such a scenario, clearly playing out the stakeholders and balancing the unrest and corruption with a human story of love and family.

Ironically, I had a job working in South Africa in 2014 and I rented a movie to watch in the B&B called Skin which told the true story of an Afrikaans (Dutch that settled in South Africa) girl born in South Africa in 1955 to two white Afrikaners. Sandra, the daughter looked coloured, or part black but genetically she was the product of these two white parents. How ironic that this true story and this made story are both about the Dutch. To be fair, though, Sandra Laine is a product of a genetic case of atavism, which basically is that a gene from a very distant ancestral traits resurfaces after generations. I feel like Skin predicts the kind of life that Sorraya and Ibraham's baby will go through if this story were also a memoir.