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3.5 AVERAGE
3.5 AVERAGE
emotional
funny
hopeful
lighthearted
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
emotional
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
wow okay I was in for a fun story about friendship and anime and I did get that but I also got that feeling of emptyness and sadness at the end and all friendship are not meant to last and sometimes you from a dark place to another dark place, just a different one. Being a teenager is hard.
(sidenotes I adored all the details and the little things about charaterization alongside the story it was great and nicely done)
(sidenotes I adored all the details and the little things about charaterization alongside the story it was great and nicely done)
This is one of the best coming of age stories I've read in a while. It follows a friend group in the 2000’s and their attempts to sell bootleg anime at their school. What I found so compelling about it was the way in which the authors chose to break the traditions of what you would expect to see in a graphic novel in order to better serve their characters. This breaking of tradition is noticeable in how the sequential art was occasionally broken up by paragraphs that gave insight into the lives of the main characters. This gave them much more depth than they would have had otherwise and made me feel much more connected to them.
The story felt very honest in its telling of friendships, life, and loneliness. The ending in particular made me wish for it to be a little less honest, but it made me feel something, and I think that’s more important to an ending than complete reader satisfaction.
The story felt very honest in its telling of friendships, life, and loneliness. The ending in particular made me wish for it to be a little less honest, but it made me feel something, and I think that’s more important to an ending than complete reader satisfaction.
I like the art style, and the little side bubbles of information about each character give me Scott Pilgrim vibes. I also really liked all of the little anime references throughout the story (I've added some to my watch list), and the way Kelly kept having to correct everyone who called them cartoons. I really enjoyed this book up until the ending, which was ok, just a bit disappointing. I didn't realize until I got to the author's note at the end that these two also created Everything is Tulip, so that seems to be their thing. I feel like they always leave me with a kind of pessimistic view of humanity.
Spoiler
The ending was kind of a downer, which is fine, but this one was really hopeless feeling. I didn't see the point other than just.. sometimes people suck and friendships end. Brooke is too worried about being popular to think about her real friends, Kelly cheats on Brooke with Melissa, and Melissa gets mad at everyone over unspoken things. Maggie is probably the worst of them all. Being all holier-than-thou about selling the dvds, while all along she's been stealing from her mother (and when her friend tells her to stop stealing, she steals more to buy them all expensive jackets?) then she's the one who causes them all to get caught in the end, while she just moves on to following an (apparently) even worse friend group and laughing at her old friends.
emotional
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
August 2023. Disappointing.
A YA graphic novel with queer girl leads who start an illicit business of selling smutty anime to fellow students at their private Christian boarding school, after they discovered they accidentally got a bootleg of that instead of the classic anime they had tried to buy from some guy.
This had a fun premise that ended up being a real downer of a story and felt like it lacked a central point or through line. Everyone’s lives are shitty and get shittier.
Every character has emotionally distant unsupportive parents, struggles with a desire to be popular that is out of reach, little access to money, insecurities about their bodies, seem to be depressed and finding no emotional support or solace from friends or family and are emotionally isolated, etc.
Which yes some of those are regular teen issues but 100% of characters having all of that and seemingly incredibly unsatisfying and unfulfilling friendships too and zero supportive or safe people in their lives?
No “I discovered this friendship is toxic but at least I have my mom” or “My family is dysfunctional but I can rely on my friends.”
There are even side characters going through suicides, revealed to be pedophiles, engaging in homophobic hate crimes, abusing alcohol, and having affairs.
What is the point of all this? Everyone in the world is cruel and selfish and so give up? I’m not clear at all on it.
“The Forest Hills Bootleg Society” by Dave Baker and Nicole Goux.
A YA graphic novel with queer girl leads who start an illicit business of selling smutty anime to fellow students at their private Christian boarding school, after they discovered they accidentally got a bootleg of that instead of the classic anime they had tried to buy from some guy.
This had a fun premise that ended up being a real downer of a story and felt like it lacked a central point or through line. Everyone’s lives are shitty and get shittier.
Every character has emotionally distant unsupportive parents, struggles with a desire to be popular that is out of reach, little access to money, insecurities about their bodies, seem to be depressed and finding no emotional support or solace from friends or family and are emotionally isolated, etc.
Which yes some of those are regular teen issues but 100% of characters having all of that and seemingly incredibly unsatisfying and unfulfilling friendships too and zero supportive or safe people in their lives?
No “I discovered this friendship is toxic but at least I have my mom” or “My family is dysfunctional but I can rely on my friends.”
There are even side characters going through suicides, revealed to be pedophiles, engaging in homophobic hate crimes, abusing alcohol, and having affairs.
What is the point of all this? Everyone in the world is cruel and selfish and so give up? I’m not clear at all on it.
“The Forest Hills Bootleg Society” by Dave Baker and Nicole Goux.
If you've ever gone through a friend breakup, the ending of this will make you emotional.
Also, why was Maggie SO ANNOYING
Also, why was Maggie SO ANNOYING
I was really excited about the concept of this book, but in the end it was OK. The general storyline was interesting, I liked the characters, and the art was great (even if the words were too small because I'm old).
My gripe:
My gripe:
Spoiler
I don't need a happy ending in every story, and I don't need a big red bow on an ending, but this just felt sad and inconclusive. Like these kids worked hard to change their lives, and all their lives ended up sadder and more lonely. It's a bummer ending.
Come for the bootleg premise, stay for the mid-aughts nostalgia. Forest Hills Bootleg Society introduces readers to a four-girl friend group in which two are dating, a third might be entering a love triangle with them, and the fourth is feeling kind of left out. When the group hatches a scheme to sell (mostly sexy) bootleg anime at their two respective schools (including one conservative boarding school), they find their business and personal relationships in conflict. Can the Forest Hills Bootleg Society survive as a group through the trials of small (illegal) business and relationship drama?
With the importance of DVDs high in the plot and various points of conflict and strife, it's only natural that this coming of age comic takes place in the mid-2000s. As a result and combined with some thematic and other factors, though listed as for teens in many contexts, I kept thinking to myself that this really felt more like it was seeking an adult audience over a contemporary teen one. Even outside of the clearly nostalgic details that point to a particular setting in time are layers of complexity and a general sense of nostalgia that I don't see landing with younger readers in a meaningful way. That isn't to say there aren't other elements of the book that teens would enjoy -- just that the meat of it probably won't land quite as well.
The concept of the bootleg society gets pushed to the wayside in favor of interpersonal drama which I found to be a bit disappointing. Where I might have expected the bootleg society to be the main plot and stories around relationships to be a secondary plot, the comic ultimately presented the flip of that. Meanwhile, the resolution of both plots (and a third involving one character's mom) were, for me, unsatisfying. Realistic, maybe, but not very narratively satisfying.
Overall, I enjoyed the art, though I couldn't understand why one character is depicted with what might be assumed to be dyed-white hair in the panels but with light brown on the cover (and a cover blonde enjoys a shade darker than dyed-white in the panels).
There's a lot more to say (the character profile asides! the characters themselves!), but in the name of Instagram character limits, I'll end here. This one was just okay for me, though I'd be interested in other books from this team.
With the importance of DVDs high in the plot and various points of conflict and strife, it's only natural that this coming of age comic takes place in the mid-2000s. As a result and combined with some thematic and other factors, though listed as for teens in many contexts, I kept thinking to myself that this really felt more like it was seeking an adult audience over a contemporary teen one. Even outside of the clearly nostalgic details that point to a particular setting in time are layers of complexity and a general sense of nostalgia that I don't see landing with younger readers in a meaningful way. That isn't to say there aren't other elements of the book that teens would enjoy -- just that the meat of it probably won't land quite as well.
The concept of the bootleg society gets pushed to the wayside in favor of interpersonal drama which I found to be a bit disappointing. Where I might have expected the bootleg society to be the main plot and stories around relationships to be a secondary plot, the comic ultimately presented the flip of that. Meanwhile, the resolution of both plots (and a third involving one character's mom) were, for me, unsatisfying. Realistic, maybe, but not very narratively satisfying.
Overall, I enjoyed the art, though I couldn't understand why one character is depicted with what might be assumed to be dyed-white hair in the panels but with light brown on the cover (and a cover blonde enjoys a shade darker than dyed-white in the panels).
There's a lot more to say (the character profile asides! the characters themselves!), but in the name of Instagram character limits, I'll end here. This one was just okay for me, though I'd be interested in other books from this team.