The Greenies

Mills, Emma and Kennedy, Sarah Nicole (illus.) The Greenies
March 3, 2026 by Henry Holt and Co. BYR Paperbacks
E ARC provided by Netgalley

In this graphic novel, Violet moves to a new town for her mother's work, two hours away from her father. She is near her aunt and somewhat odd cousin, Kris, and has to start a new school in the middle of the year. She's a bit concerned about making friends, so when she is invited to a party under the bleachers by the exuberant Walt and Owen, she goes. While the "party" is fun, it is broken up by a school administrator, and the students remaining there are given detention. It's a bit different, though; instead of serving the days consecutively, Walt, Owen, Violet, Evelyn, and Hana are required to help out Isabel twice a week with her new environmental club. Kris feels left out, and manages to get a detention as well, although she considers former friend Hana "chaotic evil". The group has to pick up paper recycling bins, but Hana talks Violet into dumping the paper on the abandoned fourth floor instead of taking it outside to the recycling. A couple of other groups do this as well, since the code to the closed off floor is fairly common knowledge. They also make posters for a neighborhood clean up and work on community garden plans. Even though her father is two hours away, and Violet is sad that her old friends aren't contacting her, she manages to fit in well in her new school. When they group accidentally punctures the vice principal's tire, the paper on the fourth floor is discovered, and Violet is concerned that she will get into big trouble. She finally confides in her mother about all of the problems she has had settling into their new home, and feels better about her situation. The students decide to continue with the environmental club, and there is a second book in the works. A recipe for zucchini muffins is included at the end of the book. 

Strengths: So many graphic novels are whiny memoirs that it is a nice change of pace to see one that is about middle school students getting into normal scrapes and adventures. Violet has been taught to "fake it 'til you make it" which is something ALL middle school students need to learn. While she might be suppressing some of her feelings, she is also getting involved in groups, making friends, and not constantly on her phone wallowing in self pity, which is great. The recycling club has some good projects. My favorite part was probably the difficult relationship Violet has with her cousin, who goes out of her way to cause herself problems with her behavior, and from whom Violet wisely wants some distance! 
Weaknesses: This started with Violet entering her new school to a "masked protest" that was very odd, and it is unlikely that a school would have space that's not being used that wouldn't be strictly locked down. Also, it seems odd that the detention students were forced to be part of a club. I can only imagine that parent protests if this happened in real life. 
What I really think: I'll purchase this for my school library for fans of Lloyd and Nutter's Allergic and the Holms' Sunny books. Now if we could get some more graphic novels centered around sports like Shah's Wish I Was a Baller, that would be great!