Geo Librarian

CALL ME IGGY written by Jorge Aguirre, art by Rafael Rosado, color by John Novak First Second, 2024 ISBN: 978-1-250-20415-8 Source: purchased Ages 14 and up All opinions expressed are solely my own. Book cover & summary provided by the publisher through Goodreads.com. ABOUT THE BOOK Ignacio "Iggy" Garcia is an Ohio-born Colombian American teen living his best life. After bumping into Marisol (and her coffee) at school, Iggy's world is spun around. But Marisol as too much going on to be bothered with the likes of Iggy. She has school, work, family, and the uphill battle of getting her legal papers. As Iggy stresses over how to get Marisol to like him, his grandfather comes to the rescue. The thing is, not only is his abuelito dead, but he also gives terrible love advice. The worst. And so, with his ghost abuelito's meddling, Iggy's life begins to unravel as he sets off on a journey of self-discovery. Call me Iggy tells the story of Iggy searching for his place ...

  JUPITER NETTLE AND THE SEVEN SCHOOLS OF MAGIC written by Sangu Bandanna, illustrated by Pablo Ballesteros Viking, 2024 ISBN: 978-0-593-46449-6 Source: purchased Ages 9-12 All opinions expressed are solely my own. Book cover & summary provided by the publisher through Goodreads.com. ABOUT THE BOOK When you've dreamed of getting into the Seven Schools of Magic your whole life, what do you do when it turns out to be the worst thing ever? This heartwarming graphic novel adventure is perfect for fans of Harry Potter, The Okay Witch, and City of Dragons! For all of her twelve years, Jupiter Nettle has wanted to attend one of the Seven Schools of Magic. When she finally gets the call to take the entrance exam, she shocks everyone with her magic skills . . . but not in the way she'd hoped. Failing spectacularly in one test after another, Jupiter goes home dejected and confused. What will she do now? That night, Jupiter gets an unexpected visitor and, amazingly, another chance at ...

LOST AT WINDY RIVER: A TRUE STORY OF SURVIVAL written by Trina Rathgeber, illustrated by Alina Pete, colored by Jillian Dolan Orca Book Publishers, 2024 ISBN: 978-1-4598-3226-8 Source: publisher for Cybils consideration Ages 9-12 All opinions expressed are solely my own. Book cover & summary provided by the publisher through Goodreads.com. ABOUT THE BOOK It takes courage and bravery to survive in the barrens. In 1944, thirteen-year-old Ilse Schweder got lost in a snowstorm while checking her family's trapline in northern Canada. This is the harrowing story of how a young Indigenous girl defies the odds and endures nine days alone in the unforgiving barrens. Ilse faces many challenges, including freezing temperatures, wild animals, snow blindness and frostbite. With no food or supplies, she relies on Traditional Indigenous Knowledge passed down from her family. Ilse uses her connection to the land and animals, wilderness skills and resilience to find her way home. This powerful ...

THE DEEP DARK written and illustrated by Molly Knox Ostertag Graphix, 2024 ISBN: 978-1-338-84000-1 Source: public library Ages 14 and up All opinions expressed are solely my own. Book cover and summary provided by publisher through Goodreads.com. ABOUT THE BOOK From Molly Knox Ostertag, writer-illustrator, comes a darkly beautiful story of identity, family, love, loss, and magic. Everyone has secrets. Mags’s has teeth. Magdalena Herrera is about to graduate high school, but she already feels like an adult with serious responsibilities: caring for her ailing grandmother; working a part-time job; clandestine make outs with a girl who has a boyfriend. And then there’s her secret, which pulls her into the basement each night, drains her of energy, and leaves her bleeding. A secret that could hurt and even kill if it ever got out -- like it did once before. So Mags keeps her head down, isolated in her small desert community. That is, until her childhood friend Nessa comes back to town, brin...

  HOMEBODY written and illustrated by Theo Parish HarperAlley, 2024 ISBN: 978-0-06-331959-2 Source: public library Ages 14 and up YA Memoir All opinions expressed are solely my own. Book cover & summary provided by the publisher through Goodreads.com. ABOUT THE BOOK In their comics debut, Theo Parish masterfully weaves an intimate and defiantly hopeful memoir about the journey one nonbinary person takes to find a home within themself. Combining traditional comics with organic journal-like interludes, Theo takes us through their experiences with the hundred arbitrary and unspoken gender binary rules of high school, from harrowing haircuts and finally the right haircut to the intersection of gender identity and sexuality—and through tiny everyday moments that all led up to Theo finding the term “nonbinary,” which finally struck a chord. “Have you ever had one of those moments when all of a sudden things become clear…like someone just turned on a light?” A whole spectrum of peopl...

 As a member of the 2025 Cybils Graphic Novel panel I will be reading many great graphic novels in the next couple of months, so I will be posting quite a few reviews for those books. These are my opinions only and do not represent the views of the group. SNOW AND SORCERY Cardboard Kingdom #3 illustrated by Chad Sell, contributing authors: Jay Fuller-Ng, David DeMeo, Katie Schenkel, Vid Alliger, Manuel Betancourt, Barbara Perez Marquez, and Jasmine Walls Knopf Books for Young Readers, 2023 ISBN: 9780593481622  Source: eBook from public library Ages 8-12 All opinions expressed are solely my own. Book cover & summary provided by the publisher through goodreads.com. ABOUT THE BOOK The kids of the Cardboard Kingdom go on a new adventure! This time, they are in search of new friends—but what they discover is a lot more like enemies ... It’s winter break in the Cardboard Kingdom, and kids from the town across the park want to play together! But according to the evil Sorcere...

FINDING FIRE by Logan S. Kline Candlewick Press, 2022 ISBN: 978-1-5362-1302-7 Source: publisher for review Ages 4-8 All opinions expressed are solely my own. Book cover & summary provided by publisher through Goodreads.com. ABOUT THE BOOK Can a young boy find fire for his family—and bring it safely home? An exciting, nearly wordless picture book adventure as visually compelling as a Pixar short. After a hard rain douses the family fire, a brave young boy sets out to search for more fire to bring home before the cold season sets in. Along the way, he’ll face many challenges, from perilous mountains to fearsome predators to raging rivers, and find something wholly unexpected: a friend. In his picture book debut, artist Logan S. Kline crafts a dramatic tale inspired by prehistoric times and told almost entirely through stunningly detailed illustrations. “Finding Fire started with the sketch of a small boy holding a torch and grew from there,” he says. “A lot of research went into crea...