Brave

From my school's library.

Title: Brave
Date: 2017
Publisher: Yen Press
Writer: Svetlana Chmakova
Artist: Svetlana Chmakova
Colorist: Svetlana Chmakova, Melissa McCommon
Letterer: JuYoun Lee

Constant Daydreamer (and future astronaut hero) Jensen struggles to navigate middle school, figuring out his place as he finds his chance to help the school newspaper and begins to drift apart from his art club friends. 

This is a sequel to Awkward (reviewed here), with a new focus character, and an examination of bullying, particularly the idea that the victim of bullying may not always understand that that is what is happening to them. The addressing of the topic is realistic without anything being taken too extreme. There is some justice in the end, but it is realistically incomplete, and the author does a good job of showing that there are not easy solutions to complex problems.

The characters are diverse and nuanced (even the most of the teachers who get screen time), and it was fun to see the same setting from Awkward from a completely different set of eyes.

Rating: 7/10

Awkward

Also read on the flight back to Shanghai. I bought this over Christmas Break at Target in Bedford NH USA.

Title: Awkward
Date: July, 2015
Publisher: Yen Press
Writer: Svetlana Chmakova
Artist: Svetlana Chmakova
Colorist: Svetlana Chmakova, Ru Xu, Melissa McCommon
Letterer: JuYoun Lee

"There are bad people who hurt others for fun. And there are good people who do it by accident."

When Penelope shoves the "school nerder" on the first day of school, she regrets it immediately. But telling him that she is sorry just seems too... awkward. Besides, Penelope has found friends in the art club, and the boy she pushed, Jaime, is in the arch-rival science club.

But they keep finding each other as the school year goes on, and their friendship begins to slowly grow, even as hostilities between the clubs reach a boiling point.

This was an enjoyable story of friendship that featured a wonderfully diverse cast of characters. While the club rivalry felt very over-the-top in a manga sort of way, most of the characters and plot developments in the story felt honest and real.

This was a school story with heart, and Chmakova's artwork, which I enjoyed in Dramacon, was even better here, with a wider range of characters to work with.

Rating: 8.5/10