Next Stop

Juvenile graphic novels, carefully melding words and images, lighting up more center's of a younger reader's brain, can be ideal for introducing complex situations and relationships. Debbie Fong's Next Stop.
Pia, Fong's protagonist, is a kind of quiet kid. She's on a week long desert tour. Her dad was supposed to come but he broke his leg. Most of the attractions at the stops—a cactus petting zoo, the world's biggest melon—seem meh, even for adults. The passengers seem to be on the trip for the final stop, a magical underground lake with the ability to make even impossible wishes come true.
Pia certainly has those wishes. Her tour experiences are interspersed with flashbacks going further and further back to the tragedy that hurt her family so deeply that they had to move…
…a guilt and grief that run so deep she's hoping the lake will in some unimaginable way help.
On a purrrsonal note, I planted a bunch of sweet alyssum seeds in Eugene's garden. They're doing great. Some of the plants are an inch tall. They'll have such lovely white flowers.
A great big shout out goes out to Diane who gave me the seeds.
Jules Hathaway