Graphic Novel Review – Zita the Spacegirl by Ben Hatke (4/5 stars)

Reading Level: All Ages
Genre: Graphic Novel/Science Fiction
Length: 192 pages
Publisher: First Second
Release Date: February 1, 2011
ISBN-13: 978-1596434462
Stand Alone or Series: 1st book in the Zita the Spacegirl series
Source: Borrowed from Library
Rating: 4/5 stars

I had been wanting to read this series for a while, so when I saw the book at the library it was a perfect opportunity to pick this up to read. It was a fun read with excellent colorful pictures. I really enjoyed it a lot.

Zita, and her friend Joseph, find a meteoroid in a field and in the crater they find a device with a red button. When Zita pushes the button (doesn’t she know you are NEVER supposed to push the red button!) a portal opens that sucks Joseph somewhere else. Zita hits the button again, dives through the resulting portal and quickly finds herself in a strange city. It’s a city full of aliens, all of them are trying to flee the planet before it’s imminent destruction by an asteroid. Then Zita spots Joseph being kidnapped by some aliens and rushes to rescue him. Zita must rescue Joseph and get off of the planet before it explodes…can she do it?!

This was a very fun read, I enjoyed it a lot. Zita is super spunky and has a very can do attitude about everything. She is a bit too rash at times and has to learn to think things through better. And like a lot of kids, she can take things too far sometimes.

On her adventure through this strange new planet she meets a lot of interesting new creatures and robots. She ends up making some wonderful, if unlikely, friends.

There are some wonderful twists and turns, lots of action and adventure as well. Zita has to face off with some kind of scary aliens to rescue Joseph too.

The illustration is cartoony, very colorful, and has lots of simple lines in it. While I generally prefer illustration that is more elaborate and detailed, the style of illustration used here works very well for the story and I enjoyed it. The illustrations are easy to follow and I love the colors, they also do a wonderful job of showing character emotions.

Overall this was an excellent middle grade graphic novel. The characters are fun and interesting, there are some good messages about friendship in here. The story is full of adventure and set in a neat world. If you like other graphic novel series like Kazu Kibuishi’s Amulet series or Kean Soo’s Jellaby series I think you would like this series as well. I really enjoyed it and will definitely be reading the next book in the series.

This book goes towards the following reading challenges:
– Graphic Novel Reading Challenge
– You Read How Many Books? Reading Challenge
– 100 Books in a Year Reading Challenge