Kasia Babis

Kasia Babis depicts her life growing up in Poland, skittering between teenage antics with her friends, squabbles with her parents, Polish political history, and a growing thread of activism against her high school administration, abortion restrictions, privatization and landlords.

While I found individual elements interesting, mixing them all together made for a frustrating jumble. Things are suddenly introduced and quickly dropped, years are skipped past with the interim events left vague. show more Babis shows herself being an activist and spokesperson as an adult, but never mentions what she does for a job, how she became a cartoonist, or even when or how she got a large arm tattoo. An abusive relationship arises then disappears. Politicians swoop in and out to cause brief turmoil. A side character who pops up sporadically in the story is given a reveal in the epilogue that feels more like a cheap gotcha twist than an organic growth from what was previously revealed. The epilogue also drags back Babis' mother, who had faded from the book long before, for a sappy ending.

While I found this too scattered, I'd still be interested in seeing what Babis does next.

(Best of 2025 Project: I'm reading all the graphic novels that made it onto one or more of these lists:

• Washington Post 10 Best Graphic Novels of 2025
• Publishers Weekly 2025 Graphic Novel Critics Poll
• NPR's Books We Love 2025: Favorite Comics and Graphic Novels

This book made the NPR list.) show less

A nice overview of citizenship and how constitutions work. I thought I would get bored since it does the familiar educational trope of following a teenager around as he talks to people to gather information and opinions for a school paper he needs to write. But he talks to a lot of interesting people in his neighborhood, giving us glimpses of life in Kosovo, Argentina, Kenya and Rwanda in addition to the U.S.

I worry it may have too many talking heads for its target teen audience, but I'm a show more history nerd, so it worked for me. show less

I reviewed this book on No Flying No Tights.