Al My Friends Are Ghosts (Family Comic Friday)

Imagine what life would be like if you were friends with a ghost! That's exactly what happens when Effie stumbles upon an abandoned building that also happens to be a school for ghost children. Join Family Comic Friday as we explore KaBOOM's newest graphic novel: All My Friends Are Ghosts!

All My Friends Are Ghosts
Written by S.M. Vidaurri
Art by Hannah Krieger
Published by KaBOOM!
Pages: 160
Retail: $14.99

Effie is having trouble at school. While she's very creative and loves to write, her English teacher disapproves of her fondness for monsters and mythical creatures. Effie's classmates think she's weird. And her mom is constantly at odds with her walking home by herself. It's all of these issues that make Effie feel very alone.

During one of Effie's walks, she stumbles upon an abandoned building in the woods. But it's not the building that is so fascinating. It's what's inside that inspires; an entire school made up of ghostly students and phantom teachers!

Deciding to dress up as a scholarly apparition, Effie pretends to be a ghost in order to find other kinder spirits. However, it is the very nature of being a lost soul that could end up being trouble for the human girl. For spending too much time in the afterlife could cause Effie to become a ghost as well!

This was a very interesting story by Iron: Or The War After's S.M. Vidaurri. While some of the concepts seemed a little too complex for me, I thought this was a very well thought out graphic novel. Viduarri crafts not just one by two immersive worlds filled with amazing characters and unique situations. If you felt like the ghost school in this book was a lot like Hogwarts for wraiths, you wouldn't be alone. There's even a game called haunt pass that the ghostly students play. But just as with Harry Potter's Qudditch, there are some rules that I really didn't understand. But I think if further books about Effie and her phantom pals are in the works, S.M. Vidaurii has laid a great foundation on which to build upon. 

I also want to give a massive shout out to artist and fellow North Carolinian Hannah Krieger for her work on All My Friends Are Ghosts. This is her first book and she really killed it. (Yes, pun intended.) There are some great action sequences in this book. And I really loved that dramatic pose of the character Caim towards the end of this graphic novel. I expect great things from Krieger. 

All My Friends Are Ghosts is a fanciful tale that families will love. Despite being about ghosts, this really isn't a scary book. It's a book about what it means to have someone on which to call a friend. Why some ghosts don't even really look like ghosts. As they have started to forget their human pasts, some specters start to exhibit the looks of animals and other creatures. It makes for a very fresh take on the human child befriending a spirit story.

This book is recommended for readers aged 9-12 and I think that is a good starting point to judge if All My Friends Are Ghosts is appropriate for the young reader in your life. Some action scenes are intense. Plus, there's some preteen angst and a little bit of potty humor. Yet, overall, it's a graphic novel that will that you and your family to another plane of existence and excitement!

All My Friends Are Ghosts is slated to have dropped in stores just this week. However, some online purveyors list that the book will debut in print and digital formats on March 17th, 2020! If it's not available in your neck of the woods just yet, be patient! 

For more Family Comic Friday and other reviews, check out my blog: Madman with a Book!

Worth Consuming!

Rating: 8 out of 10 stars.

This review was concurrently published on Outrightgeekery.com.