An absolute delight and so hilarious. This book was somehow incredibly deep yet still so light and innocent. I would 100% watch this as a cartoon; it is so cute and funny! Luis and Pablo’s friendship is so sweet and makes me so happy. I hope get to see more of them!

This is a fantastical, imaginative, and creative sweet and humorous animal story sure to be a hit with kids ages 7-10 who love animals and out of the box humor.
The art is full of interesting details especially of the scenery of the forest and the city and readers will find lots of details to pour through.
There is excellent messaging about friendship, going outside of your comfort zone, and appreciating what’s in your own backyard.
Give this to fans of Frog and Toad, Skunk and Badger, and The Eyes and the Impossible.

Wow, I enjoyed it so much!
It was humorous, thought-provoking, and deep, all while being silly and fun. I laughed out loud and even had to share parts and quotes with friends because, wow, it was that good.
In some parts, I had to pause for a moment and reflect...
The characters were fun to get to know (and sometimes uncannily relatable—I mean, really, how do we distinguish a light meal from a large snack?)
The art was clear, with vivid colors and a nice flow.
Overall, an incredibly enjoyable read.

3 stars

I wasn't sure what the bewilderness was, but after reading this book, I believe that is the state I entered while engaging with this material. That's not necessarily a bad thing. It's just...different.

The illustrations are charming, and this - along with the expectation of some good friendship content and maybe some dashes of ecocritical motifs - drew me to this graphic novel. I did get what I was hoping for to some degree, but there are some other unexpected inclusions that have left me feeling a bit conflicted about the read overall. The most challenging element is that the audience for this is somewhat unknowable. This is a known children's author, but the content is pretty dark at times (and strange?), and this doesn't quite read like a typical children's graphic novel. It's also a little rudimentary for the average adult reader. I'm not sure who I'd recommend this to based on this audience confusion. Along with the audience issue, the plot just takes some bizarre turns. At times, the journey feels forced and a bit slower than I'd have preferred.

Readers looking to read about the bewilderness, and perhaps take a trip there themselves, will enjoy this peculiar experience.

Gordon has a lovely style and the artwork in this book is really beautiful and fun. Unfortunately, the story was a bit hard to pin down. I feel like it walked a line between an older reader and a younger one but not successfully. Maybe it was because it took a very long time to get into the book, well long by graphic novel or picture book standards. The first 10 - 20 pages really didn't go anywhere that made sense to me, and the fact that the two characters kept referring to each other by their names and nicknames alternately made for a confusing start. Once things got rolling, effectively once they got on the bus to the big city, the story took a bit more of a turn and picked up. In the end, it was a good book, but it definitely had some growing kinks to work out still in order to really move out of my 3 star rating pile.

There were some fun scenes, great artwork, and an interesting story that wasn't too complicated. Just hard to follow at times even with the assumption that the world building was fine.

This story was so much fun. I love friendships where one of them is grumpier but they clearly love each other. The story itself had me giggling, and the pictures are so cute.

As I do with most graphic novels, I saw the adorable cover art and knew I had to read this. Plus it's about two forest friends who go on an adventure? Sign me up!!

The art is definitely my favorite thing about this book! I love the sketchy, loose outlines paired with the warm colors, and especially the textures and details of the colors! My favorite parts were the trees and nature details!

Aside from the gorgeous art, the story itself is so cute! Pablo and Luis are such delightful characters and their dynamic was adorable! If you love the sunshine x grumpy dynamic, you will love these two! Pablo reminded me quite a lot of myself...

Apart from these two they also have some amazing friends, my favorite being Ray, the "friendly neighborhood behemoth" aka their local cryptid who never really knows where he is.

This story is all about finding joy in what you have, and sometimes you need to have a little adventure outside your comfort zone to truly see how wonderful your life is!

"Into the Bewilderness" is a middle grade graphic novel by Gus Gordon. Luis (a bear) and Pablo (a mole) live in the forest and are best friends. When Luis gets free tickets to a show in the city, they go on an adventure. The artwork was cute and funny, but their friendship seemed prickly at times with Pablo constantly making digs at Luis. A suggested additional purchase for graphic novel collections.

Into the Bewilderness is highly awesome. The book is packed with silly characters spewing delightful nonsense (like Roaming Ray, the Sasquatch maybe?)

It’s a kids’ graphic novel intended for ages 8-12, which means no foul language, violence or other unwholesome content. The banter between Luis and Pablo gets a bit mean-spirited at times, but ultimately their friendship outshines any negativity.

Much of the humor in this graphic novel will likely resonate better with parents, rather than the 8-year-olds it is intended for. But hey, the humor connected with me, so who cares about darn 8-year-olds!?

Much of the adventure unfolds without words. Gordon’s immersive illustrations bring the bewilderness to life on every page. This is a book that could be read and studied over and over again, simply by enjoying the elaborate artwork.

Into The Bewilderness is a graphic novel for ages 8-12 that follows two best friends, Luis the bear and Pablo the mole. Luis has been searching for culture and knows he can find it in the big city, but will he be able to convince his best friend to come along? While reading this graphic novel I wasn’t really sure what age group this was for -the humor is off and typically pretty mean instead of funny (and the characters don’t apologize for their mean behavior/ leave a lesson from it). This really put a sour taste in my mouth. A positive to me was the art - it was really the only reason I was motivated to finish this book!

Thank you to NetGalley for the opportunity to read Into The Bewilderness

This snarky, existential bear was so fun to read. I loved the characters and the setting was so inventive.

This one wasn't quite for me. I'm not sure what I was expecting, but not this. Maybe something more whimsical?