Tower of Treasure by Scott Chantler: This book is a fun find. This adventure story is set in medieval times and is about a trio of misfits who get caught stealing but end up uncovering a bigger mystery. This is Book One of the Three Thieves series published by Kids Can Press. The story is fast-paced and has beautiful coloured pages. This would make an excellent gift for any child aged 8-12. Look for Book Two, The Sign of the Black Rock to be released in August 2011.
The second book I read this week is Natsume Ono’s Not Simple. This is a very interesting story written in a backwards-through-time style. It tells a very gloomy story about the life of a young man. What I liked about this book was its unpredictability. Although the reader knows how the story ends from the start, it drives you to read through the story to find out why it ended the way it did. Natsume Ono’s illustrations are unique (not a typical manga style) and helped create the book’s underlying atmosphere of sadness, and emphasize the sense of isolation many of the book's characters experience.
This book highlights how graphic stories can generate powerful emotional responses, sometimes by the use of images alone. Not Simple is not light reading in its subject matter, but appeals to the social psychologist in me. I can envision it generating interesting conversations around its portrayal of the many societal issues it touches on.
A great find. Rated for Older Teens, it is published by Viz Media/Viz Signature Ikki.