by Gene Luen Yang
The last time I read a graphic novel was in 6th grade.You could imagine the excitement I felt opening this book, thinking it was a boring novel with no pictures, to a page full of colored panels. The story is a narration provided by the author, Gene Luen Yang, documenting the magic of basketball. It takes place in a private high school in California, whose basketball teams are supposedly one of the best in the entire state. As a young boy, Gene never had any strong likings to any sports that require balls; he liked writing comics and stories much more. Now as a math teacher, one day he overhears his students talking about the new selected members of the boys basketball team. He couldn’t understand why people loved watching and discussing people throwing balls in hoops. When he decides that his next book will be about basketball at his school, he takes it upon himself to accompany the team to all their scrimmages, games, and eventually, the state championships.
I love reading graphic novels. I really liked the author’s art style. It’s cartoonish (gives a kiddish vibe), while also being able to adhere to more serious circumstances if needed. The colors are vibrant and aesthetically pleasing, which is helpful for keeping the mood light and happy. The author also had a segment where he drew a kid’s hair a certain way to emphasize that the kid was Punjabi, not African American.
The book also touches on some topics such as racism and sexism, things that the old and new high school players faced. For example, it brings light onto the discrimination experienced by female basketball players when basketball was first invented as well as the discrimination the first few Chinese basketball players faced. I liked how we get to learn more about individual players and we see how each player adds to the team, eventually making one of the best high school teams.
I recommend this book to young and grown adults, mainly because of the very grown-up problems that our main character faces. How will he balance teaching, drawing, and family?
I played basketball once in elementary school and I wasn’t very good at it. When I was reading this book, I realized how interesting basketball was and I was inspired to learn more about basketball by doing a little bit of research online. I even went to the gym to practice shooting some hoops; most of which I didn’t make, but it doesn’t matter.
In the book Drama, Callie loves creating sets and props for her school plays. She’s the designer for the theater team, and she’s driven to make a play worthy of Broadway. Sadly, she can’t make one that good if everyone on the team is not working together. She meets two brothers, named Jesse and Justin. Justin is very outgoing and is a great singer while his brother is more of an introvert while he sings just as good as Justin. They plan to audition for the play, but Jesse backs out, saying he would like to be on stage crew.
