June 11th 2019 by KaBOOM!
E ARC Provided by Edelweiss Plus
Olive doesn't know her Abuela Lupé well, so when she and her adopted siblings Darwin and Charlotte go to help her clean her ramshackle hotel, she hopes to find out more about her, especially why her grandmother and father don't talk much. There is a lot of work to be done, but while cleaning the rooms, the children find a mask. This seems to be a portal to other worlds. Charlotte explores a futuristic space ship, Darwin is plunges into a weird, cartoonish world with a cuddle muffin he names Sunny, and Olive meets up with Brad, a wizard in training in a medieval world. When they eventuall talk to their abuela about it, they find that shortly after Olive's father was born, her husband disappeared, and she is estranged from her son because she spent so much time looking for him. Her daughter also went into the alternate universes to look for her father and found him, but is still having trouble getting him out. Can Olive and her siblings work together to solve the puzzle and retrieve their grandfather?
Strengths: This had a good original story and interesting illustrations. The three different worlds were distinct enough that I never got confused. There was some character development, which is hard to accomplish in many graphic novels. I liked the inclusion of Latinx culture. Olive says at the beginning that she is queer, but this is never developed further.
Weaknesses: Reading an e ARC on my 2011 Nook meant that I had to read this in 4 point font. I apologize for having missed crucial plot points during my struggle! I feel like I missed something crucial about Darwin's and Charlotte's adoption; this felt almost like book two of a series.
What I really think: This is similar to Aldridge's Estranged or Hicks' The Nameless City. Neither one (and fantasy in general, whether novels or graphic novels )circulate very well in my library, so I am debating about this one.
Sounds good. I've requested it from my library.
ReplyDelete