Saturday Morning Cartoons- Sea Legs

Bakes, Jules and Smith, Niki. Sea Legs

February 4, 2025 by Graphix
E ARC provided by Edelweiss Plus

Janey and her family have a nomadic life in the early 1990s, living on a boat and sailing around the Bahamas and other temperate locations. They've recently spent an extended period of time living in Florida, where Janey was able to attend a public school. Her best friend, Rae, is devastated that she is leaving, since phone calls are hard to make from a boat, and at this period of time, were expensive! The two agree to write letters, but even those result in a delay of communication. Janey isn't as thrilled as her parents for their latest outing, especially when she realizes that being on land for so long has made her lose her sea legs, and she is sea sick for the beginning of her trip. She does remote school, which involves a packaged curriculum and papers to be physically mailed to a teacher, but also works a lot with her mother. She is lonely, and wishes that she had other children to talk to. Eventually, Janey's boat, the MeriMaid, is near the Valhalla, and there is a slightly older teen girl, Astrid, aboard. Janey's thrilled and wants to spend time with the other girl, even though she's not entirely pleasant. Janey finds out why; Astrid's mother has left, her father has remarried, and his new wife also left, leaving two small children behind whom Janey babysits. Not only that, but the one time that Janey visits the Valhalla, the father is drunk. Astrid admits that their boat doesn't even leave the harbor. The girls do have some adventures, but Astrid is always pushing Janey to do things outside her comfort zone that are often downright dangerous. When a big storm is predicted, Janey is sent to her grandmother's, where she has to wait to hear how her parents are doing. Hurricane Iris is devastating, and followed closely by Hurricane Marilyn. While her parents are fine, the boat takes a hit, and while there are rumors that Astrid and her siblings have been sent to their mothers' homes, Janey realizes that she won't ever see Astrid again. 

Strengths: This is based on the author's own childhood, so has lots of interesting details about what it is like to live on a small boat! I appreciated the diagrams and explanations of things like drinking glasses with round bottoms and a stove that stays level even though the boat is rocking! The relationship with Astrid seems very true to life; children need to be around other children, so it makes sense that Janey would have gravitated towards Astrid even though the two didn't really get along, and Astrid was not nice. Keeping in touch with Rae was also realistic, and a good lesson for modern children in how communications have changed. Above all, this was a nice, virtual vacation to a sunnier climate!
Weaknesses: The illustrations show emotions in a manga inspired, over-the-top way which I don't personally like, but which students don't mind. It also seemed a bit odd that the father was often shown without a shirt; I suppose this happens on boats, but in suburban neighborhoods it is not common. 
What I really think: This is a change from the slew of graphic novel memoirs that concentrate on the authors' tween angst. While the angst is there, we also get a slice of a completely different way of life. This will be popular with readers who enjoyed Lloyd and Nutter's Squished or MacLeod's Continental Drifter.