Daily Graphic Novel Recommendation 154

Wandering Island
by Kenji Tsuruta, translation by Dana Lewis, lettering by Susie Lee and Betty Dong
Genre notes: adventure, coastal life, lost city
200 pages
ISBN: 1506700799 (Amazon)
This book's cover is truth in advertising in a way. Wandering Island definitely features both a) a perhaps-too-lanky young woman in a bikini and b) her aeroplane. It's definitely got much more going on (otherwise I wouldn't likely be recommending it), but the bikini woman and the plane are both inescapable constants.
Wandering Island feels kind of like an adaptation of Miyazaki's Castle In The Sky. Mikura Amelia is a letter-carrier pilot in a chain of hundreds of small islands off the Pacific-facing coast of Japan. She loses her grandfather but discovers his quest to find Electric Island, an apparently mobile island city. Wandering Island is about loss, obsession, and finding a purpose. There's also a cat. And Tsuruta's illustrations are lovely and remind me a bit of Daisuke Igarashi's.
Good Ok Bad features reviews of comics, graphic novels, manga, et cetera using a rare and auspicious three-star rating system. Point systems are notoriously fiddly, so here it's been pared down to three simple possibilities:
3 Stars = Good
2 Stars = Ok
1 Star = Bad
I am Seth T. Hahne and these are my reviews.
Support me by buying my art on Etsy
Review copy submission may be facilitated via the Contact page.
Browse Reviews By
Other Features
- Popular Sections:
- All-Time Top 500
- All the Boardgames I've Played
- All the Anime Series I've Seen
- All the Animated Films I've Seen
- Top 75 by Female Creators
- Kids Recommendations
- Daily Recommendations
- What I Read: A Reading Log
- Best Books of the Year:
- Top 100 of 2020-22
- Top 75 of 2019
- Top 50 of 2018
- Top 75 of 2017
- Top 75 of 2016
- Top 75 of 2015
- Top 75 of 2014
- Top 35 of 2013
- Top 25 of 2012
- Top 10 of 2011
- Other Features:
- Why I ❤ Zita the Spacegirl
- 31 Days of Comics
- Bookclub Study Guides
- Sitemap