A Net in Time

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graphic novel

Agents of S.U.I.T. From Badger to Worse

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Do you remember the Investigator books that I reviewed a while ago?   The Investigators and The Investigators Take the Plunge.  Agents of S.U.I.T. From Badger to Worse continues the series by John Patrick Green.  In this particular case the Badger InvestiGators need to learn to keep within a budget while going about their investigating.  Hmm… Wonder if they can see their way through? 

Agents of S.U.I.T; From Badger to Worse

The Basic Details for Agents of S.U.I.T. From Badger to Worse

Title: Agents of S.U.I.T. From Badger to Worse
Series: The InvestiGators
Author: John Patrick Green & Christopher Hastings
Illustrator: Pat Lewis
Publisher: :01 First Second (Roaring Brook Press)
Pages: 208
Intended Audience: 3-4 grade, ages 6-8
Genre: animal comics, mystery, detectives, children’s book, graphic novel
Available formats: Kindle, Hardcover, Paperback
Received: Hardcover
Reviewed for: Raincoast Books

About the book and Author

Agents of S.U.I.T. is a series written by John Patrick Green and Christopher Hastings.   This series, which continues The InvestiGators Series has a website devoted them.   Animal Characters that take on Human jobs and the lessons they learn whilst doing so.   The Badger investigators have much to learn, you’ll have to read to discover if they learn it in time! 

John Patrick Green and Christopher Hastings have written several Agents of S.U.I.T. books.  John Patrick Green has loved comics and cartoon strips since childhood.  Being silly and including puns as he writes about animals doing human things is something he very much loves to do.  To discover about his quirkiness with lego, check out his website. 

agents of S.U.I.T - FROM BADGER TO WORSE

Taking a Closer Look

In this second book, of a three book series of Agents of S.U.I.T, we again see colourful images light up the pages.  Combined with easily written text, this makes of a graphic novel that is quick to read.   

The first part of the book started off a bit slowly, but quickly built up speed as Bongo and Marsha go undercover to solve the bungalow burglaries in Bora Bora.

agents of S.U.I.T. - badger to worse

The text is very much geared to upper elementary/middle school humour.   I admittedly didn’t really enjoy the humour, but I can see how younger minds might enjoy it.   For an instance of the humour used.  At one point the badgers were called honey badgers (due to some honey they were covered in) and they responded with “We’re European badgers”.  The on-lookers responded with “If You’re a-peein’, find a restroom!  You’ve made enough of a mess already!”

Would I recommend?

I can’t really recommend this book.  I suspect that upper elementary/middle school kids would have a lot of fun reading these books but I didn’t enjoy i.  It bounced around alot and didn’t really make a lot of sense to me. 

But I’m not the target audience.  Agents of S.U.I.T: From Badger to Worse does introduce us into the characters of Bongo and Marsha.  Puns are very much in evidence, and there was a lot of off-beat humour.  I was reading some other reviews and some folks called it “dad-humour” but I would not classify it as such.  More like low-grade kid humour. 

I guess, for me, the book was trying to much to be funny and fun-filled, that it forget to tell a solid, coherent story.  

I’m fairly disappointed that I didn’t really like From Badger to Worse.  I liked the first one in the series if you may recall from my review last week.  Perhaps the third one in the series will be as good as this one.

Agents of S.U.I.T.

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Disclosure: I received this complimentary product Agents of S.U.I.T. through Raincoast Books. Affiliate Links will be used, thank you for your support of my blog, costs you nothing to do so, and it is so much appreciated. 🙂

Agents of S.U.I.T. is part of the InvestiGators Series of books, following up with some of the characters of that series.  This first book focuses on the Cilantro the Chameleon.   She’s getting her first mission!  Oh the excitement of that very first assignment. Her partner will be Monocle.   Let’s dive in yes? 

Agents of S.U.I.T

Basic Details for Agents of S.U.I.T.

Title: Agents of S.U.I.T.
Author: john Patrick Green, Christopher Hastings
Illustrator: Pat Lewis
Series: Agents of S.U.I.T, Book One
Publisher: First Second
Pages: 208
Intended Audience: 7-9 years, grade 2-3
Genre: graphic novel, animal comics, mystery, detective, humorous comic,
Available formats: Kindle, Hardcover
Received: Hardcover
Reviewed for: Raincoast Books

Book and author

Agents of S.U.I.T. by John Patrick Green follows the InvestiGators series.   You may recall that I have written about this series in the past the books InvestiGators Take the Plunge and InvestiGators.  Agents of S.U.I.T. is the first in a series of six books.  

John Patrick Green and Christopher Hastings are the authors.  I was unable to find details about Mr. Hastings, but Mr. Green likes legos, being an artist, and humorous comics. 

Agents of S.U.I.T.

Taking a Closer Look

Agents of S.U.I.T. takes animal characters and gives them human jobs.   You’ll find cats herding sheep, dogs being deputies, and so on.  Cilantro the Chameleon has the job of being a detective, and is battling her desire to do her job the way she wants to, and doing it the way her job wants her to.  It’s hard to know how to fit in you know? 

Fortunately, Pat Lewis provides excellent graphics to help tell the story.  Loads of colour on bright pages delight the eye.   Clearly written text makes it easy to read the story. 

You will discover many puns and humorous situations throughout, perfect for grades 2-4.  Remember the adage of counting sheep so you can fall asleep?   You’ll find it playing an active role in this story. 

I love that the story line makes sense.  A detective sent out on a vague mission, discovers what needs doing, and uses their talents to solve the case. I love that Cilantro makes use of the skills of others to help resolve the situation with the aliens. 

Do I recommend?

I couldn’t find anything in this graphic novel, Agents of S.U.I.T. that was objectional.  Engaging story with a real problem, with characters that reacted differently depending on the scenario.  Having to think through problems and discover solutions by working together.  It’s good stuff packed into a fun read. 

Death & Sparkles and the Sacred Golden Cupcake

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Disclosure: I received this complimentary product Death & Sparkles and the Sacred Golden Cupcake through Raincoast Books. Affiliate Links will be used, thank you for your support of my blog, costs you nothing to do so, and it is so much appreciated. 🙂

So I brought this graphic novel to work and a co-worker said “oh, that looks interesting, can I read it?”   Ergo, I handed Death & Sparkles and the Sacred Golden Cupcake to her and said “have fun”.  So this review will be a mix between her thoughts and mine.  Bear with me eh?  

Death & Sparkles and the Sacred Golden Cupcake

The Basic Details for Death & Sparkles and the Sacred Golden Cupcake

Title: Death & Sparkles and the Sacred Golden Cupcake
Author: Rob Justus
Series: Death & Sparkles, book 2
Publisher: Chronicle Kids
Pages: 368
Intended Audience: 10-14 Years
Genre:  graphic novel, friendship, humourous comic, fantasy, magic, adventure comic,
Available formats: Kindle, Hardcover, paperback
Received: Paperback
Reviewed for: Raincoast Books

About the Author and Book

Author and Illustrator Rob Justus has created a number of books including the two graphic novels in this series.  After working for years as a market researcher he decided to return to his first love of drawing and writing.  He has two sons and lives in Ottawa, Canada. 

This graphic novel continues the story of an unlikely friendship between a unicorn and death.  Unicorns as you can imagine are rather silly, Death, as you can imagine, is a tad bit more serious.  So that sets the ground work for some tension.  Can a dance party help?  You’ll have to read this novel to find out. 

InDepth with Death & Sparkles and the Sacred Golden Cupcake

Personally I found the colours to be rather dark throughout.  But that said, considering the location of the story and that Death is one of the main characters, the colour palette makes sense right?  But at the same time I just wish I liked the art work and colour choices more. 

There is grade school humour throughout.  Some lines are funny (to me as an adult) and the rest just was… age-appropriate I guess.  🙂  I can definitely imagine chortles coming with younger readers. 

Death is very serious minded, and Sparkles is very silly and very dance oriented. But don’t you know how opposites attract?  Happens with friendships all the time and it’s part of the fun in interactions.  🙂 

The story jumps around a bit in the beginning which is a bit disconcerting at times as it goes from past to present and so forth and switches perspectives as well.  The Mole People were unhappy, the unicorns were unhappy and things DEFINTELY got blown out of proportion.   History spoiled the present.  Revenge ended up on the minds of those involved.  Death, surprisingly, is the one who kept a mostly level head. 

A positive part of the story line is the determination of Sparkles to follow through on the family legacy.  Can Sparkle’s horn lead through to a good conclusion?  Can Sparkles turn into a grown-up unicorn?  Well… THAT I’m not going to tell you!   You’ll have to find your own copy of Death & Sparkles and the Sacred Golden Cupcake and find out.