Silk

Isaiah Roby

June 4

"Farz and his family are Silki-charmers; they follow the giant, spiderlike creatures known as "Silkis" through their jungle home, harvesting their precious silk. It's been their family's tradition for generations. But Silkis can be dangerous and not everyone wants them around. Farz may be ready to try a different life, but he doesn't want the Silkis to disappear forever."

I got an ARC of this book.

Remember how wild I was about Maze? I do. It is a book I have talked about a bunch since I read it. The more I think about it and talk about it, the more I enjoyed Maze. So when Roshan emailed me, I jumped at the chance of the book despite being in the middle of summer session in school. I was READY.

This book has a drastically different feel than Maze. It doesn't have that Star Trek feel. Instead it stands on its own as a sci-fi. It focuses on one city and the new laws outlawing a type of ranching/harvesting animal products. The MC is a guard who grew up ranching and his family still does. So he is locked into this legal and familial issue. Does he do his job knowing that the law is wrong or does he support his family knowing it could end his career? That is a bit more than I was expecting from a older elementary/younger middle grade graphic novel. This could have easily been an adult graphic novel if the ideas were expanded just a bit. It gives the same feeling as Katherine Applegate when it comes to content, which is a high compliment from me.

The art was distinct and I enjoyed seeing different species. I do wish there were more of the silkis on page. They were so cool and I wanted to know more about them. I am a fan of this art style, it really brings things to life without being scary or too stylized. It works really well for this sort of story.

Overall, I am a fan of Roshan and for good reason. This is the sort of graphic novel that gets me excited to read graphic novels. Fresh ideas, cool art, and alien spiders that make me want to cuddle them despite their danger.

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