Sisters
The graphic novel Sisters, written and illustrated by Raina Telgemeier, illustrates the adventures of Raina, her mom, and younger brother and sister as they road trip from California to Colorado for a family reunion. Woven through this storyline are entertaining flashbacks of how Raina reacts to the birth of her younger sister and then her younger brother. The flashbacks continue throughout the story as it introduces the reader to the various pet mishaps the family endured over the years. The flashbacks seamless merge into the present storyline with the most recent mishap with the current pet in the house or perhaps maybe with the car?
I read this book because it circulates in and out of the school’s library. The fourth grade students love anything written by Raina Telgemeier. I wanted to have something to talk about with them. When I see someone check it out, I asked them to tell me what they think the funniest part is when they return the book. In return, I share with them what I think is the funniest part. For me, the funniest part is when the chameleon is overwhelmed with crickets and is dead in the tank the next morning, in case you were wondering. Her mother’s expression and reaction to this event made me laugh out loud.
Raina Telgemeier won an Eisner Award for Sisters in 2015 for the Best Writer/Artist.
N.A. (N.D.). List of Women Eisner Award Winners. Retrieved from https://womenincomics.fandom.com/wiki/List_of_women_Eisner_Award_winners
Telgemeier, R. (2014). Sisters. New York City, NY: Scholastic.
Telgemeier, R. (2014). Sisters. New York City, NY: Scholastic.
Noodleheads See the Future

Noodleheads See the Future, by Tedd Arnold, Martha Hamilton, and Mitch Weiss received the Geisel Honor Award in 2018. It is Illustrated by Tedd Arnold and It is a graphic novel for the beginning reader with panels, gutters, speech balloons, and captions. The speech balloons are written with large simple text and are read the same as a graphic novel. Each page has two to three simple panels with gutters separating them. The panels are illustrated with only a foreground and background. The elimination of the mid-ground follows the simplicity of the text and illustrations so the reader can access the storyline. This graphic novel is a great stepping-stone to prepare early readers for more complex graphic novels in their future. The plot is divided into three chapters. Each chapter contains an author’s note at the end of the book explaining the authors’ resources for where their inspiration from “folktales about fools from around the world.”
Arnold, T., Hamilton, M., & Weiss, M. (2017). Noodleheads See the Future. New York, NY: Holiday House Publishing.