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Kids’ comics remain one of the book segments that is still growing, and certainly for comics publishers, it’s a great way to get the younglings hooked so they will grow up reading comics. School Library Journal has a list of thirty-nine graphic novels that kids can’t resist:

The following 39 comics are titles that kids will actually want to read—without any well-meaning prompting from parents, educators, and summer reading lists. In other words, these are books that kids will read just for the joy of it.


The list for older grades seems a bit arbitrary, but the list for younger readers is a solid grouping of books that range from manga (CHI’S SWEET HOME) to epic (THE UNSINKABLE WALKER BEAN). Looking at the list also gives a nice snapshot of publishers who are committed to the younger crowd.

Along those same lines, Forbidden Planet spotlights one of the best selling comics of the decade the Babymouse Series by Jennifer L. Holm and Matthew Holm.

This is one of those books that slips under the normal radar of comic people, a new type of comics that bypasses the normal shops, is unmentioned by the comic press. And yet it sells. It sells by the bucketload. In that respect you can file it in the same category as things like Wimpy Kid, Dork Diaries, Geronimo Stilton, Captain Underpants and others – hugely successful series, all with some comic elements. But Babymouse is proper comics.


BABYMOUSE has 14 volumes in print and just spun off into a new series, SQUISH THE SUPER AMOEBA.

IN addition to being one of the best selling graphic novels series out there, this is another example of WOMEN ARE ALREADY DOING COMICS — both series are written by Jennifer Holm. (Brother Matthew draws them.)

1 COMMENT

  1. Hooray for Babymouse and kids’ comics! It’s so interesting that these books feel like a marginalized sub-genre of the comics industry, despite vastly out-selling “mainstream” superhero comics. Maybe because their readers are less inclined to post outraged comments on websites.

  2. And… there’s even a Babymouse costume bookstores can rent for in-store appearances!

    (But run for the exits if anyone dresses “up” as Captain Underpants!)

    And then there are the superhero prose novels, like Zoe Quinn’s “Caped Sixth Grader”! “The Adventures of Blue Avenger” by Norma Howe! Barry Lyga’s “The Astonishing Adventures of Fanboy and Goth Girl” and “Archvillain”! (Wow…that will make you question your perception of heroes and villains.) “Hero” by Perry Moore! Catherine Hinks’ Evil Genius trilogy!