The Missing Mola Lisa

July 1, 2017

Gr 2-4-Quillan, a hedgehog, and her best friend Ray, a rat, are second graders at Elm Tree Elementary School. Ray enjoys magic, and Quillan adores disguises, but what they both love best is solving mysteries. When Leonardo da Squinty's famous Mola Lisa is stolen during a class trip to the local art museum, Quillan and Ray attempt to recover the painting and apprehend the thief. This is a funny, action-packed mystery, divided into short chapters that move the narrative along quickly. The characters are quirky and amusing, but the art style is unappealing and childish. The vocabulary is appropriate for the intended audience, but the images will appeal more to preschoolers than to elementary schoolers. The brightly colored illustrations are cartoonish, and characters are outlined in thick black ink, with very little expression. Backgrounds are extremely minimal, and shading is nonexistent. The speech balloons are also unsightly, stacked on top of one another for ease of reading without any thought to the overall look of the panels. VERDICT Skip this title and instead hand chapter book readers looking for mysteries the "Boxcar Children Graphic Novels."-Kelley Gile, Cheshire Public Library, CT

Copyright 2017 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

July 1, 2017
The mystery has always been a strange type of story. It often takes a terribly traumatic moment--a murder or kidnapping or theft--and turns it into a puzzle to be solved. Happily, the crime in this graphic novel isn't particularly traumatic.Students on a field trip are at the museum when the painting's stolen right in front of them. It's one of the most famous paintings in the world, the Mola Lisa. (All the characters are animals, and--unfortunately--they have jokey names like Mr. Shrew and Ms. Boar.) There's no doubt that this is a puzzle, because the clues are laid out like game pieces. A shiny piece of confetti and a receipt from a magic shop are sitting on the floor of the museum. Readers new to the genre will find this refreshingly direct, but more seasoned ones will wish the story were a bit less schematic. The detectives have only a few character traits. Ray Ratzberg, for example, is a rat who loves cheese. Most of the jokes, sadly, are on that level, though the name of the school, Elm Tree Elementary, is a clever tongue twister. Even puzzle fans may be disappointed that there are so few suspects to challenge them. The problem with the story isn't just that it's been reduced to a puzzle, but that there was so little else there to be reduced. (Graphic mystery. 6-12)

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October 15, 2017
Grades 2-5 Q and Ray, two young animal detectives, have a very big case to solve for their first book. On a field trip to the art museum, the famous Mola Lisa is stolen right in front of them! It's up to our two plucky inspectors to retrieve the priceless painting and catch the thief. The simple story and word choice make this ideal for the junior chapter-book set, and Tricia Speed Shaskan does a great job adding some small twists to make the ultimate solution to the mystery less obvious. Reluctant readers, however, might have some trouble with this one; although graphic novels are often a go-to for struggling readers, there's a lot going on with each page. Word bubbles are numerous and often staggered, which could make focusing a challenge. That said, the simple cartoon illustrations are buoyant and bright, which adds to the lighthearted feel of the overall story. Q and Ray are off to a good start, and any aspiring sleuth will be eager to see where the pair goes from here.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2017, American Library Association.)

July 1, 2018
Friends Q (a hedgehog) and Ray (a rat) are elementary students with a flair for investigation. Set in a world full of various anthropomorphic animals and rife with puns, the new series seeks to pair early-chapter-book mystery with comic-book illustrations and layout. However, the generic cartoony art style and panels over-packed with dialogue balloons make these first graphic novels dispensable.

(Copyright 2018 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)