Graphic Novel, 446
Release Date: March 17, 2020
Published by: First Second
Read from: March 24-26, 2021
Stand-alone
Source: Library
TW: Racist comments from people in the stands
For Readers Interested In: Sports, Graphic novels, Memoirs, Award Winners, YAIn his latest graphic novel, New York Times bestselling author Gene Luen Yang turns the spotlight on his life, his family, and the high school where he teaches.
Gene understands stories—comic book stories, in particular. Big action. Bigger thrills. And the hero always wins.
But Gene doesn’t get sports. As a kid, his friends called him “Stick” and every basketball game he played ended in pain. He lost interest in basketball long ago, but at the high school where he now teaches, it’s all anyone can talk about. The men’s varsity team, the Dragons, is having a phenomenal season that’s been decades in the making. Each victory brings them closer to their ultimate goal: the California State Championships.
Once Gene gets to know these young all-stars, he realizes that their story is just as thrilling as anything he’s seen on a comic book page. He knows he has to follow this epic to its end. What he doesn’t know yet is that this season is not only going to change the Dragons’s lives, but his own life as well.
*MY THOUGHTS*
At first I wasn’t going to review this. For one it’s a comic book, and for 2 it’s a memoir. I normally try not to review those, but when they’re good, they’re good. And obviously this one was good, it was a Printz Honor book!
I LOVED the art in this one. For Gene Luen Yang to do both the art and the writing himself, he did a BANG UP job! I wish I could see what his writing process is like. Does he take notes and then type up the whole book first, THEN work on the art? Or like in this story, does he take notes and then do both at the same time? Whatever it is, it’s hella impressive.
I also LOVED his writing style. Amazingly, this is the first book by Yang that I’ve ever read. I was sucked into this graphic novel like no other. It may LOOK like a basketball, and that may be the main theme, but it’s about so much more. It touches on racism, sexism in sports, religious biases, and all. It’s about so much more than just basketball. Books like this make me happy I do more for work than just what I’m assigned to do. Yeah it was on my TBR since I found out about it, but Tournament of Books gave me reason to go ahead and read it. Makes me think if I have any other books I’m on the fence about, I need to grab those and read them too.
The art itself was awesome as well. And so inclusive. I don’t want to spoil anything, but I do want to point out something I thought was really, really cool of Yang to do. *SPOILER* He corrected a person’s hairline in the middle of a scene because they asked him to. He said that doesn’t really depict him and he said Ok and fixed it. IN THE MIDDLE OF A PANEL. *END SPOILER* That made me feel some type of way. So respectful. And the fact that he didn’t try to hide it, I thought it was pretty cool. It could also be because it was already so far along in the book that he didn’t want to go back and change it all, but showing the reader that he respected him when so many people were already being so hateful and rude to him, made me still like it.
There’s so much about this book that I never would have known without reading it for my organization. I’m not saying I never would have read it, but it would have taken me a lot longer to get to it. So to all of you, on the fence about this book or that book, pick it up now before you regret it like me!
Overall, I give this
