Mooncakes

Mooncakes is a heartwarming and playful graphic novel about love, family, and witchcraft. It follows Nova Huang, a teenage witch who works at her grandmothers' bookstore and investigates supernatural occurrences in her small New England town. When she reconnects with her childhood best friend, Tam, who has recently turned into a werewolf, they must work together to defeat a powerful demon that threatens their town.

Mooncakes is a delightful story that celebrates diversity and inclusion. Nova is a deaf witch who uses hearing aids and non-verbal spells, and Tam is a bisexual werewolf. The two girls fall in love as they work together to save their town, and their relationship is one of the highlights of the story. And more, Nova has two show more grandmas in a relationship with each other, too.

Mooncakes is also a visually stunning graphic novel. Wendy Xu's art is vibrant and expressive, and it perfectly captures the magic of the story. The characters are all well-developed and relatable, and the story is full of humor and heart. show less

Mooncakes is about Nova Huang, a teen witch working at her grandmother's bookshop helping to loan out spell books and investigating anything supernatural in and around their town. One night she goes into the woods to investigate sightings of a white wolf. She ends up running into someone she least expects: Tam Lang, a werewolf and her childhood crush! After battling a horse demon, the duo go back to Nova's grandmother's for help. As their feelings are rekindled, Nova and Tam use witchcraft, magic, occult rituals, and family in their journey of self-discovery.

I never knew I needed a graphic novel where one of the main characters is a queer, hard-of-hearing witch who has a relationship with a nonbinary werewolf, but along came Mooncakes show more and I couldn't be more happy. I absolutely loved everything about this book - the representation; both main characters are Chinese-American, the amount of LGBTQ characters, the references to Nova's hearing aids! Tam uses they/them pronouns and as soon as one of Nova's grandma's learns about it, she apologizes, corrects herself, and then uses them. Everything about this novel is precious, wholesome, and delightful.

The artwork in the graphic novel was clear and amazing. The color scheme of everything made me crave fall. I could feel the cool breeze through the panels and everyone's outfits always looked so cozy!

Mooncakes is an adorable graphic novel, filled with a sprinkle of magic, great representation, and cute art. It won't disappoint! show less

So. Freakin. CUTE! Give me witches, and werewolves, and forest creatures, and horse demons, but make it queer - I am so in, because magic has no rules! Xu and Walker waste no time throwing us into the deep end with this magical little graphic novel, starting off with the unexpected return of werewolf Tam into the life of witchy teen Nova. The pair were besties in their childhood, but Tam’s family made them move away, yet in true fairytale style the forces of evil can’t keep them apart! Well, maybe a possessed horse (and the cult who raised it) can try, but together these two harness the power of the forest creatures, Nova’s grannies, and Tam’s unexplored wolf magic to vanquish the demon. Well, technically they didn’t so much show more as vanquish it as defeat the cult and discover that the demon wasn’t so demonic when it had a little understanding, but that’s kind of the whole point. Throughout, the author and illustrator play with many of the magical tropes that we all know and love, but they give it their own unique twist. Nova’s deafness actually has some interesting magical side effects (much to the dismay of the cult leader), their bevy of forest creatures are absolutely adorable, and I thought their themes around werewolves and nonbinary states of being was extremely well thought out. Illustrate the story with a careful blend of artwork that is cute without falling into the underwhelming tropes of cartoons, and we have a perfectly well-rounded addition to the magical-teen genre of graphic novels! show less

A super cute and charming graphic novel with excellent representation (bisexuality, non-binary identity, disability, Chinese heritage), a genuinely sweet romance, and refreshing take on witches and werewolves (it's amazing to me that with how often werewolves are used as LGBTQ metaphors, next to none are presented as non-binary/gender-fluid... despite the werewolf literally being a creature whose body is non-binary/in flux... you've already committed to this metaphor, folks, give me some non-cis werewolves, please!). Tam, Mooncakes' non-binary werewolf is accordingly a nice change of pace and easily the most interesting character in the novel.

It was indeed Tam who initially sparked my interest in this graphic novel, as my dissertation show more is on recuperation of the figure of the monster in queer YA and I'd been dying for more texts with non-cis rep (especially for werewolves). Mooncakes seemed a timely answer to my little grad student prayers. It did not disappoint and I would love to see more with these characters.

Thank you to the publishers and NetGalley for providing me with an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review. show less

This was adorable. Seriously, you take a look at that cover and you'll get exactly what you expect. A queer witch and werewolf who were friends as kids are reunited as young adults to defeat a few bad guys and fall (back) in love. Both love interests are Asian and queer. Nova is a Hard of Hearing witch living with her two grandmas following the death of her parents. (Older queer women FTW!) Tam is a non-binary werewolf who has run away from an abusive situation only to end up in a magical forest fighting a demon horse.

Everything about this book is queer. The only time anything is even mentioned is when the grandmas use the wrong pronoun for Tam (having not seen them in nearly a decade) and are immediately corrected. Then they use the show more correct pronouns and it's not a thing at all. There is kissing. There is an old couple who banter and bicker in such a realistic way.

There are adorable magical woodland creatures and a scary demon from *mystery.* Without spoiling things, there's a complicated magical reason why Tam and Nova have to work together to defeat the demon and other bad forces in town. There's a scene where Nova's family gathers for a holiday and her parents join in as ghosts and it's full of food, but also very moving. And Nova's best friend, Tat, is a magic skeptic but she still helps out. Because that's what friends do.

This is a longer graphic novel, coming in at 250 lovingly illustrated pages, so it gives enough time to develop the characters and the plot. There's quite a bit of foreshadowing but it's still surprising in the end, which is fast paced and full of magic and betrayal. And it has a Happily Ever After!

My only complaint is that one of the main characters is named Tam and another is Tat. If the characters weren't on the page, I had a hard time remembering who was who. Seriously, that's my only complaint, so consider this a highly recommended book.



Suzanne received an early digital (partially uncolored) copy of this book for review from the publisher.



Content Warnings: Abusive parents, captivity, grief, violence show less

Arc provided by Netgalley. All opinions are my own.

To get this out of the way, I don't normally read comics or graphic novel or even Manga(though I think it the best of the three), because I don't find them immersive like an actual book. Probably because my brain has to not only read but look at the pictures to understand what's happening and it's too much work, especially when I like to see the story unfolding for myself in my mind. I did not have that issue here. The art and how it was done was perfect, setting the scene, introducing that character and all that stuff I often find that this medium struggles with. So props the the illustrator. I can barely make a stick man look real and you managed to create a whole world and magic show more system and communicate it to the reader. Well done.

Next the story. It was quick paced because of the medium, but didn't feel rushed at all. Everything had a natural development and I felt myself wanting more. More of the world, the magic, the backstory; just more. The plot was intriguing and simple, but it was still engaging. The dialogue felt natural and none of the progressive themes felt in any way forced. It just felt the natural progression of the life of a werewolf and a witch who were childhood friends.

The flashbacks were really well executed, there was enough of them to allow me to understand what was going on and have an interest to learn more, but not so much that they became the story or felt like they were taking it over. It was great.

I definitely recommend this book, even to those, who like me, can be picky when it comes to graphic novels. It's enjoyable, immersive and well-written. show less

A young witch living with her grandmothers and helping out in their magic/book shop is reunited with her school crush and together they fight against an arch demon that's hanging out in the local woods.
I loved this one both for the story, which was excellent and well-told, and for its representation of disabilities and LGBTQ+ folks as normal and completely NBD. So good.