Happily, there is one other child around: Buzz, a groundskeeper’s boy, who turns her on to superhero comics and joins her in starting up a moderately lucrative business recovering golf balls and residents’ (illegal) lost cats. Instead of a trip to the shore with a friend, Sunny finds herself on a solo flight to stay with her genial grandfather-in a development where a trip to the post office is the day’s big outing, Walt Disney World is hours away, and her exposure to senior culture includes being fawned over by old ladies. In the hands of the sibling creators of Babymouse and Squish, even a story inspired by troubling circumstances in their own mid-1970s childhoods offers hilarious turns aplenty. An affirming author’s note delves further into the Holm siblings’ personal experience with familial substance abuse and encourages young readers sharing a similar struggle to reach out (as Sunny eventually does) to the responsible adults in their lives.įrom the September/October 2015 issue of The Horn Book Magazine.Family troubles temporarily strand 10-year-old Sunny in a Florida retirement community.

Straightforward dialogue, captions establishing time and setting, and extended wordless scenes swiftly propel the narrative and will be appreciated by Raina Telgemeier fans.

Matthew Holm’s loose, less-is-more cartooning is easy to read and expressive, if occasionally unpolished. These discussions, and the series of flashbacks they often elicit, ultimately lead readers to the truth surrounding Sunny’s visit: back home in Pennsylvania, her teenage brother is struggling with substance abuse, and Sunny is convinced that she made the problem worse - a misconception Gramps lovingly corrects. Why can’t they save the people they love?”). The two spend their time doing odd jobs for spending money and mulling over age-old superhero dilemmas (“But they’re heroes. Her less-than-thrilling days at the retirement community, complete with early-bird specials and trips to the post office, improve after she befriends the groundskeeper’s son, comics-obsessed Buzz. Ten-year-old Sunshine “Sunny” Lewin had been looking forward to spending August at the shore as usual, but her parents have suddenly sent her to Florida to stay with “Gramps” instead. bicentennial festivities, and a trip to Disney World - but it is much more than a lighthearted nostalgia piece. Set largely during the summer of 1976, this semiautobiographical graphic novel from the brother-and-sister team behind the Babymouse series includes an amiable grandfather, U.S.

Sunny side up by jennifer l holm