Hello ! This month we're reading a comic. It's called The Blue Road: A Fable of Migration text by Wayde Compton, illustrations by April dela Noche Milne. Here's a synopsis:

In this stunning graphic novel, Lacuna is a girl without a family, a past, or a proper home. She lives alone in a swamp made of ink, but with the help of Polaris, a will-o'-the-wisp, she embarks for the fabled Northern Kingdom, where she might find people like her. The only way to get there, though, is to travel the strange and dangerous Blue Road that stretches to the horizon like a mark upon a page. Along the way, Lacuna must overcome trials such as the twisted briars of the Thicket of Tickets and the intractable guard at the Rainbow Border. At the end of her treacherous journey, she reaches a city where memory and vision can be turned against you, in a world of dazzling beauty, divisive magic, and unlikely deliverance. Finally, Lacuna learns that leaving, arriving, returning -- they're all just different words for the same thing: starting all over again. 

You can read about the comic here in a feature with a Canadian newspaper: https://vancouversun.com/entertainment/books/the-blue-road-is-a-delightfully-subversive-young-persons-tale-of-migration

This comic may be difficult to get depending on where you are since it is published by a Canadian distributor, so here are my recommendations:

1. Purchasing: I have linked the book to this post, bookshop has an paperback version. Or buy directly from the publisher, they have an epub excerpt you can view before you purchase: https://arsenalpulp.com/Books/T/The-Blue-Road

2. Borrowing: I recommend putting in a request at your local library, purchasing a copy through bookshop (linked below in this post)

3. Lending: If you prefer an e-copy and you're having difficulty accessing it, I have added an epub version you can access in the discord.

If you do end up reading it by epub and can't financially support the cartoonists, I highly recommend and rating the comic on goodreads and storygraph, it helps the comic get on other people's radar.

You'll notice our first 2 reads of the year are aimed at young readers and are not particularly long. That's by design. I read a variety of genres and dense books all year long, but the ones that get less love because they're short are the ones I want to highlight and read together. I hope that interests you as well! There's a lot we can dive into and discuss together in a comic, if you never have before I recommend joining this month.

The poll is up in the discord now to vote on the next discussion date. Join the discord to vote!