✨ Review ✨ Home #1 by Julio Anta, Illustrated by Anna Wieszczyk

Thanks to Image Comics and #netgalley for the gifted advanced copy/ies of this book!

This was a terrific first installment of this story. It sets the story up in the presidency known for separating families at the border, and the story begins with a heartbreaking series of events. It then pivots a bit to give the main character super powers that he uses to protect himself and his family. I appreciated how this took real rhetoric around immigration and racism and situated it within a story that was more empowering. I'm excited to see how this story develops.

Note the book comes with an amazing (and very thorough) section of resources for teachers

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Genre: magical realism graphic novel
Setting: Texas borderlands region
Pub Date: 2023

A mother and son story of immigration and how our world is in turmoil for immigrants and those seeking a better life.

I didn’t love this but didn’t hate it. It was an average read for me and one that I won’t be returning to.

Julio Anta's new graphic novel will appeal to upper middle school and high school students. The book follow the story of a family crossing the US border. An introduction discusses LatinX comics , The child's super powers came a little unexpected in a serious book about immigration. The book concluded with a educator;'s guide. The resources may be helpful to a teacher using this book but I am not sure a student would use these resources.

I enjoyed reading this graphic novel that focuses on the very heavy issues of immigration and asylum in the USA. Although these are very heavy topics I feel they were well depicted. The story itself took a very interesting twist adding superpowers to the mix, and showing how families are able to stick together even when faced with impossible circumstances. The main story focuses on a young boy who is separated from his mother while they are trying to escape Guatemala. This being the first part of a bigger series, I am interested to see where the author takes the story from here. I rated this 3/5 stars.

I received an advance reader copy of this book to read in exchange for an honest review via netgalley and the publishers.

Home is a graphic novel with a heartbreaking topic at its heart. We follow a mother and her young son as they flee Guatema to seek refuge as asylum seekersin the USA. The book is set presumably when Trump was in presidency and shows the horror these families and children faced being separated from one another.
The first quarter of the book really pulled at my heart. The story is an x-men type story where the boy discovers he has superpowers, and as he learns to control and use his powers, he seeks revenge. This would make a great book for children to read to teach them of the injustice these families were put through unnecessarily and be an example of how we as a human race can do better and not repeat these things. There's also a guide for teachers in this book of how to use this in a classroom to educate children, which was a great thing to include. I would have liked more information on how the boy and his family came to have superpowers as I felt this would have been a great addition to the story.

At its heart, this is a harrowing story of family separation of asylum seekers at the U.S. border under the Trump administration. I can't begin to imagine the horrors these families went through and are still going through. Please, let us do better.
The immigrant family in this story have some sort of superpowers, but we don't have any explanation of these by the end of this volume. I understand the inclusion of these powers in some ways - who hasn't dreamed of having superpowers to be able to fight injustice? The powers feel a little convenient to me, though; it's very fortunate that they each happen to have a random power that's just right for the situation (though I admit to cheering for the family kicking ICE hiney!). The story moves a little quicker than I would've liked, but overall I'd recommend it.
I also enjoyed the section after the story on how to teach this book in the classroom, including lots of discussion questions, though I imagine this book will be banned in the places that most need it.

#Homegraphicnovel #NetGalley

At first glance, Home is a realistic fiction story about a mother and son, as they leave Guatemala seeking asylum in the United States. It even reminded me of Solito, the memoir by Javier Zamora.
That is until Juan, our main character, gets violently separated from his mother at an ICE detention center and he starts to manifest some strage powers.
Then it becomes more like a super hero origin story. As Juan runs and seeks refuge with his aunt and discovers he’s not the only lne in his family with special gifts.

While the story clearly uses real life events, straight from the horrifying headlines and reports of the ill treatment of Central American migrants and the separation of families; it takes on an interesting twist. The premise of the story is so interesting; there is a lot of build up that happens in the second half. I definitely need to find and read the rest to see how this story unfolds.

My only criticism of this incredible graphic novel, is that this is only the first volume and I want to read it all, now!
Juan and his mother have travelled from Guatemala to America, after being forced to leave their home. Their journey is difficult and dangerous. When they arrive and hand themselves over to the immigration authorities to claim asylum, they are separated and locked up.
So far, sadly not unfamiliar; this was the experience of those claiming asylum and still is today, I suspect, though with a lower profile.

This is where things start to change though. Juan discovers that he has some sort of super powers and this gets him out of some trouble but into a lot more.

This is a great graphic novel and I am definitely invested in the characters and what will happen next. I would have loved to share this with the children I work with but as there are a couple of swear words, I won't be able to, which is a bit of a shame as the difficulties Juan and his mother face, particularly with the language barrier, are presented really well and would be a useful introduction to discussion about refugees and the difficulties people face when being forced to leave their homes. I will certainly be recommending it to some of our older ex-pupils and look forward to buying my own hard copy.

I adored this graphic novel. With stories like this, it's easy for readers to feel really helpless and useless and the character we read about feel helpless in this desperate situation. How can you not when families are being separated, it's not clear what the process is, and deportation is a ready and constant threat. But this story resolved some of that helplessness because now there's a way to fight back. You root for the characters as they reclaim their circumstances. I loved that. My only regret is that I have to wait for the next part! I hope there's a next part... there has to be.

Heartbreaking. Family. Intense. Empathetic. Powerful

I HIGHLY recommend this comic if you care about justice.

Wow was this a little different than I thought it was gonna be.

Home was a wild ride and I would say not in a good way. I think that the story and realism in people trying to seek asylum and the treatment they get at the American border is extremely important. People need to know and see how families are being split apart.

However, I was lost when the magic showed up. That took me out of it completely. I would have loved the story without the magic. The art style was also not my favorite,

I will be coming back to this book when I am in the right head space: for now I was not able to finish it unfortunately.

When I requested this, I missed the part that the young protagonist has extraordinary powers so I was so surprised when it was mentioned in the graphic novel!

More of a comic-style, but the art is great and the story is timely and intriguing!

I looked forward to this just somehow it felt kind of flat to me. Like there was so much highlighting the unfairness of border crossing and immigration discrimination at the beginning that was just somewhat brushed over. I wish the powers were explained a little more than they were because I still have questions. Not sure if I will continue on if the comic continues.

Definitely didn’t expect to cry reading a graphic novel this morning but here we are.
Harrowing tale of a mother and son seeking asylum in America and being separated. The story then follows the son as his superpowers appear and he is on the run from Ice.
I loved the rich colors and art. The story ripped my heart out.

Thanks to NetGalley and Image Comics for an eARC.

This book begins with real-world struggles: a mother running for the USA, seeking sanctuary and safety for her son, and being separated at the border and placed in separate detention camps.

It was handled well, with compassion, and I cried.

Then the superpowers kicked in and the fighting starts and it’s the exact kind of fight I miss from X-Men back before the comics-word factions became completely divorced from the real-world ones they were designed to represent.

The bad guys are zealots using their power as an excuse to do harm, and have no problem warping reports from “something’s weird” to “shoot to kill” a kid.

I’m looking forward to seeing how the story plays out.

Julio Anta takes on Trump era immigration policies with a punch when ICE targets a newly arrived immigrant boy with super powers. This is a moving graphic novel that is a must for YA shelves.

I want to start this review by saying that I do not wish to discourage Latin voices from writing comics and other stories about these subjects. I'd like this review to be constructive criticism and genuine hope for more and better stories that are prescient and relevant to my Latin community.

I will start with the positive, which is that I liked the idea behind this comic. I also liked how seriously the story takes the subject of family separation. Having said that, let's be real... for this story, the characters need to feel grounded. The writing is over-the-top and so on the nose as to be a bit insulting. There is absolutely no subtlety and the story suffers for it. In order to make the bad guys menacing the author sacrifices natural speech and human behavior and so the bad guys are just caricatures and not as threatening as they could be. I'm Hispanic, so I'm not here trying to say that ICE needed to be humanized, just that it needed to be less corny. I know I'm going hard, but I truly think this could have been good and just wasn't. I would like to see this author grow into more nuanced dialogue and better-crafted characters.

Home is a very important graphic novel. It focuses on a young boy separated from his mother at the border and his escape from the ICE as well as discovering he has powers. Poignantly written it deals with a sensitive topic in a way that kids can understand. I would highly recommend this book to anyone, especially teachers.

Welcome Back!

Today’s review is another E-ARC graphic novel (thank you so much to the publisher for the E-ARC in exchange for my honest opinions). I picked this one up when I had my reading day, the other day after work, and let me start by saying I really really want to read issue 2, if there is one (I will be doing some research to see if more are coming).

SPOILERS AHEAD

A little boy and his mom are going to cross over the border to come to live in America with his aunt. Recently, his father passed away and the gangs have been trying to recruit the boy, and his mother, grandmother, and the rest of the family desperately do not want that. So after a long journey, they have arrived at the border seeking asylum. However, during their trip, they were unaware of new legal changes taking place at the border and when they arrived they were separated. Now the boy and his mom are fighting to reunite with one another but one night when the young boy is at the detention facility he makes an amazing discovery, he has powers. Now he is on the run from the detention facility, hoping to connect with his aunt and maybe get some help.

I loved this graphic novel so much. Every part of it was interesting. I felt like I was reading the origin story of some awesome new heroes (and here is a bit more of a spoiler, a superfamily because his aunt, father, and cousins were all supers too)! I can not wait to see where this one goes next. I definitely recommend giving this one a try (you may be able to pick it up on Hoopla if your library uses them)!

Goodreads Rating: 5 Stars

***Thank you so much to the publisher for the E-ARC in exchange for my honest opinions