illegal

Several years ago, I read Eoin Colfer, Andrew Donkin and Giovanni Rigano's graphic novel Illegal as a Cybils Award judge, and wrote down some rough thoughts. Today, the day after an important US presidential election, I am finally publishing them. Since I’m writing this well in advance, I don’t yet know the results, but I do know that migration – whether it is deemed legal or illegal – is one of the most important moral, ethical, and political issues of our time. Books that tackle immigration and migration in nuanced, empathetic ways are godsend, and this particular volume is in heavy rotation during choice reading time in my classroom. Kids care, and adults should too!

A powerfully moving graphic novel by New York Times bestselling author Eoin Colfer and the team behind the Artemis Fowl graphic novels that explores the current plight of undocumented immigrants.

Ebo is alone. His brother, Kwame, has disappeared, and Ebo knows it can only be to attempt the hazardous journey to Europe, and a better life—the same journey their sister set out on months ago.

But Ebo refuses to be left behind in Ghana. He sets out after Kwame and joins him on the quest to reach Europe. Ebo's epic journey takes him across the Sahara Desert to the dangerous streets of Tripoli, and finally out to the merciless sea. But with every step he holds on to his hope for a new life, and a reunion with his family.

Prefacing the book is Elie Wiesel’s quote, “...No human being is illegal.” Twelve-year-old Ebo is following his brother Kwame from Ghana to Europe. They think their older sister Sisi is already there, but they haven’t heard from her, and their useless uncle drinks. As orphans, they have only each other to rely on. Ebo’s singing voice is his one talent, and both brothers work at each point in the journey to make money for their next crossing, whatever that might be. They face many dangers: the desert, unreliable smugglers, armed police, an unforgiving climate, lack of water, food, and shelter, and an ocean crossing when no one can swim. In the midst of these crises, they experience rare moments of human kindness that transcend language barriers, and help them survive.

It is important to have stories like Ebo’s in the world: they humanize the immigration journeys from news reports and widen the circle of those who both know and pay attention to this struggle. That said, I wish that there had been some people of color, or those who had experienced migration involved in the making of the book. The term “illegals” has been thrown around countless times in America’s political sphere in the past decade to dehumanize and stoke hate. That hate has real consequences. Education and empathy are a huge step towards dispelling those negative forces, and this book will contribute to both. I also wish that there were more resources tied to it to encourage interested readers to continue their research. It would pair well with graphic novels based on true stories, such as Unwanted: Stories of Syrian Refugees or When Stars Are Scattered.

The art in Illegal is beautiful, particularly the landscapes. For a book about migration, there is not much movement in the illustrations – panels focus instead on conversations that take place in one location, and then the next panels are set in a new place. The story overall leans much more on text than art as a storytelling device, and this works, though the art is lovely enough to draw in readers. There are lots of blues and purples: for the ocean, during rainy scenes, or during nighttime (the most convenient time for smuggling).

In all, this story will humanize migrants and build empathy, and though it has no direct call to action, it will make the empathetic want to help children like Ebo and Kwame.

Recommended for: middle and high school libraries and classrooms, readers who loved Alan Gratz’s Refugee, and fans of well-made adventure graphic novels.

the unwanted: stories of the syrian refugees

In my spare time, I like to read fiction. If you’re familiar with my blog, you’ll know I especially lean toward the science fiction and fantasy end of the fiction spectrum. However, as a teacher, I must often read beyond my personal preference to find texts that will inform as well as entertain. Add that to the fact that my students prefer graphic novels (and why wouldn’t they – they’re accessible texts!), and I find myself searching graphic novel lists for nonfiction to incorporate in my classroom library. One excellent nonfiction graphic novel I read a few years ago (and put on the bookcase afterward), The Unwanted: Stories of the Syrian Refugees by Don Brown, has been quite popular with my 9th and 11th grade students.

In the tradition of Don Brown’s critically acclaimed, full-color nonfiction graphic novels The Great American Dust Bowl and Sibert Honor winning Drowned City, The Unwanted is an important, timely, and eye-opening exploration of the ongoing Syrian refugee crisis, exposing the harsh realities of living in, and trying to escape, a war zone.

Starting in 2011, refugees flood out of war-torn Syria in Exodus-like proportions. The surprising flood of victims overwhelms neighboring countries, and chaos follows. Resentment in host nations heightens as disruption and the cost of aid grows. By 2017, many want to turn their backs on the victims. The refugees are the unwanted.

Don Brown depicts moments of both heartbreaking horror and hope in the ongoing Syrian refugee crisis. Shining a light on the stories of the survivors, The Unwanted is a testament to the courage and resilience of the refugees and a call to action for all those who read.

Don Brown’s book is haunting nonfiction that outlines the ongoing conflict in Syria and shares individual anecdotes of Syrian refugees fleeing that violence. He keeps the context streamlined – this is not a sprawling war epic, but a general timeline peppered with vignettes to personalize the sheer scope of the war and its consequences. In retelling personal stories of some of the 6 million refugees, Brown does not delve too deeply into sectarian or religious divides, but instead outlines the enormity of the need, and the proportionally tiny U.S. response. The Unwanted is a brutal indictment of American self-absorption.

 

I don’t know what you remember about your teenage years, but I remember having a rapacious curiosity about the world – wanting to know (or experience) all of the things my parents had deemed me too young for, or had perhaps purposely left out of my education. I see that same thirst for knowledge in many of my students: they’re angry at the state of the world, constantly taking in new information, and want to know WHY they were never told about some of the deep inequalities and tragedies of the past and the present. They want to know why we don’t tell the dark secrets – why we aren’t honest. I believe that books like The Unwanted are exactly the sort of texts that we can and should share with children. I don’t mean to prove that we do care, or to absolve ourselves, but to keep stories alive, and to look the truth straight on and without flinching.

 

Brown clearly means for this title to be educational – it is especially suited for use in politics and current events (even years after its first publication!!) units. The content is sobering, tragic, and at times violent. I can envision pairing it with Elie Wiesel’s Night, or in a graphic novel unit with Marjane Satrapi’s Persepolis or Art Spiegelman’s Maus.

 

As a graphic novel, it’s important to address the art style. Brown uses pen and ink with digital paint in washed out colors – a palette of browns and grays for the most part. This color scheme matches the seriousness of the content. Brown’s illustrations are quite spare – facial expressions are not very clearly depicted, and the linework at time feels sparse as well. When first reading the book, I did not love the art style – but I came around – I think it is as necessary and important to the storytelling as the anecdotal, vignette-style prose.

 

In all, The Unwanted is one of the most honest, unvarnished graphic novels for young adults on the refugee experience – and I’ve read a fair few. Its honesty asks something of its reader. I think the world needs more books like it.

 

Recommended for: readers ages 12 and up; it is necessary reading.

the magic fish

I know I’m not the only book lover in the world who justifies their reading purchases to themselves in creative ways [insert laughing crying emoji]. Mostly I do so by telling myself that when I’m done with it, I’ll put it in my classroom library! The only trouble is, sometimes it takes many months (or years!) for me to work my way through those books I promised were “for the kids.” That was the case with Trung Le Nguyen’s debut graphic novel The Magic Fish. I preordered it back in October 2020, and I’ve been hanging onto it at home ever since, thinking it would be my next read. It finally made it to the top of the pile over the weekend, after the last day of school for the year. I am happy to say it’s stunning and emotionally authentic, and sad that I waited so long to pick it up. And it will DEFINITELY go on the shelves in my classroom in the fall. 

 

Tiến loves his family and his friends…but Tiến has a secret he’s been keeping from them, and it might change everything. An amazing YA graphic novel that deals with the complexity of family and how stories can bring us together. 

Real life isn’t a fairytale. 

But Tiến still enjoys reading his favorite stories with his parents from the books he borrows from the local library. It’s hard enough trying to communicate with your parents as a kid, but for Tiến, he doesn’t even have the right words because his parents are struggling with their English. Is there a Vietnamese word for what he’s going through? 

Is there a way to tell them he’s gay? 

A beautifully illustrated story by Trung Le Nguyen that follows a young boy as he tries to navigate life through fairytales, an instant classic that shows us how we are all connected. The Magic Fish tackles tough subjects in a way that accessible with readers of all ages, and teaches us that no matter what—we can all have our own happy endings.

The Magic Fish is a masterpiece of art and narrative. It interweaves the stories of Tiến, a Vietnamese-American boy growing up in the Midwest who doesn’t have the language or knowledge to tell his family he is gay, his mother Helen, who immigrated from Vietnam many years ago and made a life for her family in America, and various retellings of fairy tales, inflected by multiple cultures, and underpinned by gorgeous artwork of couture-inspired princess dresses. Visually, it is gorgeous, and it is also incredibly lovely in the fine crafting and interconnection of the major narratives. It is, I think, one of the most beautiful books I’ve read in the past 10 years.

 

Tiến’s story is perhaps the baseline for the book, though he shares many pages (and time) with his mother Helen. They read books together in the evenings to practice their language skills. Those books are full of fairy tales, and as several of the characters remind each other, fairy tales change in the retelling – there is no one right way to tell a fairy tale. This truth mirrors the story of Helen’s immigration to America – that there is no one “true” immigration story, and that each one changes in its retelling and memory.

 

The two main fairy tales in The Magic Fish are Cinderella (and its close cousin Tattercoats) and The Little Mermaid. The retellings are interspersed alongside Tiến’s tension and confusion about how to express his truth to his parents, his mother’s memory of home and her longing to return to her mother, and her wish to reconnect with a past that she feels is slipping away. Author Trung Le Nguyen treats all of these strands of story with deftness and authority, and the whole is bittersweet, layered with meaning, and true in the way that sometimes only fiction can be.

 

One of the things that I noticed immediately in the reading was the way that color signifies a change in scenery and time-space. Blue is the palette of fairy tales, yellow the palette of the past (especially Helen’s world pre-Tiến), and red is the present for Tiến and his family. Beyond this signaling of worlds, the focus of the art is the intricately detailed linework. Seriously, it is mesmerizing and intense. The detail in the illustrations of hair alone is incredible, and then add in the dresses, crafted with couture classics in mind and with seriously magical details, flounces, and draping – it’s really unbelievable.

 

Of the many marvelous things about this book, the art is of course the most obvious, given the medium. But I am now intensely interested in the depth of the narrative – the symbolism of the sea, peaches, princesses, and celestial imagery, the choices in the treatment of language (Vietnamese indicated by “<>” within speech bubbles), and the afterword, which features musings on comics as an art form, and fairy tales as immigration stories. I want to teach this book – it is multimodal and rife with connections and allusions. I’m sure I’ll be rereading it again this summer and considering how I could incorporate it in my high school classes.

 

The Magic Fish is a profound, magical working of art and story. I can’t recommend it highly enough.

 

Recommended for: art lovers, comic readers, those interested in the best of young adult literature, and fans of fairy tales and beautiful dresses.

when stars are scattered

In 2018 I started volunteering at an immigration legal aid clinic. I wanted to find a way to help, and I needed to focus on positive change rather than my rage over how the US treats immigrants. Sometimes a happy side effect of helping others is that you see yourself more clearly, too. Soon after, I went back to school to become a teacher. And now I’m evaluating graphic novels about immigration to share with my students! The important things circle around (if you're paying attention!). This brings me to today’s book review: fantastic middle grade graphic novel When Stars Are Scattered by Victoria Jamieson and Omar Mohamed. Omar’s story is poignant, relevant, and beautifully illustrated: it’s well worth the read!

Omar and his younger brother, Hassan, have spent most of their lives in Dadaab, a refugee camp in Kenya. Life is hard there: never enough food, achingly dull, and without access to the medical care Omar knows his nonverbal brother needs. So when Omar has the opportunity to go to school, he knows it might be a chance to change their future . . . but it would also mean leaving his brother, the only family member he has left, every day.

Heartbreak, hope, and gentle humor exist together in this graphic novel about a childhood spent waiting, and a young man who is able to create a sense of family and home in the most difficult of settings. It’s an intimate, important, unforgettable look at the day-to-day life of a refugee, as told to New York Times Bestselling author/artist Victoria Jamieson by Omar Mohamed, the Somali man who lived the story.

Meet Omar and Hassan, brothers who live in Dadaab, a huge refugee camp in Kenya. Forced to flee Somalia’s civil war when they were little, now every day in the camp they follow the same routine: pray, wait for water, clean the tent, and play. When Omar is offered the chance to attend school, he must balance his dreams with what he always thought of as his future: caring for Hassan, who has medical needs and does not speak, and waiting for their mother to find them. Omar loves school, but he worries that his thirst for learning means abandoning Hassan.

When Stars Are Scattered is a heavily autobiographical graphic novel about former refugee Omar Mohamed’s experiences as a young boy and teenager, illustrated, fictionalized, and co-told with celebrated graphic novelist Victoria Jamieson. At its core, When Stars Are Scattered is a story of two very different brothers growing up together, and the ways that they learn to trust each other and those around them. It’s also a story of experiences in a refugee camp, the privation of daily life and vanishingly small chances of resettlement, and how hope and despair can develop side by side. And lastly, it’s entertaining, bittersweet, and deeply authentic. I have read several refugee and immigrant graphic novels recently (The Unwanted, Illegal, Escape from Syria, Alpha, Undocumented), and this one is the most personal and accessible I have found. I think my students will eat it up.

The book is organized into three parts, or time periods: childhood, early teens, and late teens. At the end of the book Mohamed and Jamieson share real-life photographs of Omar and Hassan and others mentioned in the narrative, and add a small epilogue to tell you what happened “after the story.” This will please any reader who likes resolution to their stories, and it offers parents and educators a chance to connect Omar’s story to news stories and laws around immigration today. In addition, Mohamed and Jamieson discuss how they met and decided to tell Omar’s story together – interesting information for aspiring writers!

I want to touch on what I found most impressive about the book: that it is deeply personal, literarily valuable, and also offers a big picture view of refugee camp life that children and teens will relate to. Managing and balancing these three elements takes enormous talent and speaks to Jamieson and Mohamed’s skill. When I told my uncle about this book yesterday, he said, “That doesn’t sound like something that kids would just pick up on their own!” And if it was just the subject matter, he’d be right. But this is a story is told with heart-wrenching honesty, in an accessible and enjoyable format, and readers of all ages will root for Omar and Hassan to finally find “home.” I can see myself using When Stars Are Scattered as an additional reading suggestion when I teach The Odyssey in parallel with immigrant journey photo essays, and recommending it as choice reading to any of my students, full-stop.

Really quick before I wrap up, let’s talk about the art! It’s very colorful, and in Jamieson’s regular style (slightly rounded heads that are bigger than bodies). The focus is on human figures rather than landscape, and because there is so much story packed into the book, most pages are full of traditional comic panels. The occasional full-page illustration helps moderate the pacing. Visual and text elements that wouldn’t be immediately recognizable to an American audience are explained either in footnotes or as part of the story. As always in a graphic novel, the illustrations make or break the book. The book is fantastic, ergo… the art is perfectly suited to this story!

In all, When Stars Are Scattered is an engaging and necessary addition to any graphic novel library. Omar’s story (and all refugee and immigrant stories) is relevant for young people, and Jamieson and Mohamed have crafted a tale that will entertain, inform, and melt readers’ hearts.

Recommended for: all fans of graphic novels and comics, but especially the 10-15 year old crowd, readers and curators interested in a personal story of refugee life, and anyone who leans towards the nonfiction section when they get to pick their choice reading.