Empire State

February 7, 2011
Jimmy's first crush/best friend Sara has moved to New York to encounter the wider world. So Jimmy, a socially awkward man-child who likes reading hard sci-fi (the kind with rocket ships) and has no idea what a latte is, embarks on a perilous bus trip from his home in Oakland to Brooklyn to profess his love to her. He soon learns that the only thing worse than sharing a small bus with random ex-cons comparing notes on their prison experiences is crashing on a couch in a small Brooklyn apartment with Sara and her new boyfriend, Mark. Sara and Mark do their best to welcome Jimmy to the grown-up world, showing him different parts of the city and trying to broaden his limited horizons, but there's a real question as to whether their gentle coaching will take. Shiga (Meanwhile, Double Happiness) walks a fine line between sappy rom-com and maudlin love-lost tale, but largely succeeds in maintaining a balanced middle. He's aided by a crude yet geometric penciling style that draws the reader very effectively into Jimmy's point of view. He also displays a wicked sense of comic timing, which is equally effective at portraying awkward pauses and slapstick physicality.

July 1, 2011

Gr 9 Up-Jimmy, an Asian man, and Sara, a Jewish woman, are best friends. They live in Oakland, but Sara dreams of working in the publishing industry and moves to New York. They have a long-distance friendship at first, but when Sara sends him a tote bag from the Strand bookstore, Jimmy decides to travel across the country to see her again. He has romantic ideas about Sara, and about New York itself. He wants to meet her at the top of the Empire State Building at sunset, just like in Sleepless in Seattle. He takes a bus rather than a plane because he wants to see more of the country, but the trip and the destination don't turn out to be what he expected. At first Jimmy is a young man who signs his paychecks over to his mother, who then gives him an allowance. He is happy with his library job, and happy in Oakland. But Sara inspires him to be brave, and to make choices he never would have made before. Shiga uses a simple, cartoon style to illustrate this book. The story is alternately saturated in red and blue tones that don't make sense at first, but readers will soon realize that the colors of the pages indicate chronological shifts in the story. This is a semiautobiographical book that was inspired by a cross-country Greyhound bus trip, and it will be most appreciated by readers who are ready to savor this quietly emotional journey.-Andrea Lipinski, New York Public Library

Copyright 2011 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

March 15, 2011
Shiga, creator of the mind-exploder Meanwhile (2010) and the hard-boiled, library-cop pastiche Bookhunter (2007), offers a more personal story here. With loosely arranged panels populated by Shigas distinctive, hunched-over figures, this dialogue-driven comic stars nerdy young Oakland librarian Jimmy, whose blatant inexperience with this whole being-grown-up thing isnt limited to just matters of the heart. Im an adult. I should have a newspaper subscription. I should be smoking a pipe and attending the opera regularly. When his one friend moves back to New York, he goes on a surprise cross-country trek to see if just maybe he can inspire a Sleepless in Seattle moment with her. The mildly disastrous results might have been soul-crushing if they werent handled with Shigas terrifically wry wit and Jimmys cheery ability to roll with the punches, even when they land a bit harder than expected. Though the sweet spot for this geeked-out graphic novels readership is probably early twenties, readers well on either side should also find plenty that speaks to them.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2011, American Library Association.)