Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to read a graphic novel

Now in its second year, MCB’s Reading Challenge offers monthly prompts, events, and prizes to motivate Massachusetts residents to hit the books and read outside of their comfort zone. In April, readers were encouraged to pick up a book about nature or the environment, while February’s assignment was to read a book with a color in the title.

In anticipation of May’s challenge to read a graphic novel, Tufts Library in Weymouth hosted an author event featuring three award-winning Massachusetts graphic novelists, Joel Christian Gill, Dave Ortega, and Phoebe Potts, who travelled to the South Shore to inform and entertain a robust hybrid audience.  They read excerpts and shared personal reflections about their inspiration, illustrations, and the mechanics of shaping graphic narrative

Joel Christian Gill, cartoonist, historian, and Chair of the MFA in Visual Narrative at Boston University, discussed Fights: One Boy’s Triumph Over Violence. Named one of the best graphic novels of 2020 by The New York Times and winner of the 2021 Cartoonist Studio Prize, Fights is Gill’s personal reckoning with his father’s early death and an inspirational coming-of-age memoir of turning away from violence to choose a fulfilling life.

Artist, comic storyteller, and actress Phoebe Potts discussed Good Eggs, a charming and honest graphic memoir about her efforts to have a family. Her ability to mix humor and heartbreaking anecdotes in this story led to the development of Too Fat for China, her award-winning one-woman show relating the agony and ultimate triumph in her quest to adopt a child.

Dave Ortega, a lauded illustrator and instructor, is passionate about narrative storytelling through comics. He spoke about Días de Consuelo, a tender biography of his grandmother’s young life during the Mexican Revolution, and the struggle and hope of her immigration experience. The book was named Best Young Adult Nonfiction Book at the International Latino Book Awards.

A lively Q and A indicated the interest and curiosity of the graphic novel genre and the evident camaraderie of the three authors. Audience member Ryan Mihaly of Florence was curious to know the authors’ rationale to fill a page with a single large image or use silence, without speech balloons, to allow the image to tell the story. Gill explained he thinks to scale, with quiet moments small and important ones emphasized; Ortega feels these choices intuitively, and pointed out that we’ve been telling stories for ages: our ancestors looked at the pattern of stars and saw constellations. Potts, as a comedian, related these choices with telling a joke, composing the structure and timing in a way that feels natural.

In closing, MCB Program Manager Karolina Zapal indicated there will be more author events related to the Reading Challenge. “We’ve gathered a panel of authors to appear at Springfield City Library in August before the September challenge to read a debut book by a Massachusetts writer,” said Zapal. “With thousands of readers from all over the Commonwealth and more than 150 Partners promoting the Reading Challenge, we’ll continue to design fun and relevant events related to the program.”

For more information about the Reading Challenge, and to see book recommendations and reader choices and comments, see the challenge page.