Yummy

"Compassionate and unflinching."Gene Luen Yang, award-winning cartoonist and former National Ambassador for Young People's Literature

* "Tightly researched and sharply written. . . This is a graphic novel that pushes an unsightly but hard to ignore socio-political truth out into the open."

* "Comics illustrator DuBurke's gritty black-and-white artwork employs foreshortened backgrounds to bring the action right up in the reader's face, whether it's talking heads calmly discussing their theories on Yummy's disordered personality, families in mourning, or a semiautomatic pointed directly out of the frame. . . Heartbreakingly contemporary."

* "A much-needed look at the terrifying perils of life on the margins that will have all readers pondering the heady question of moral responsibility."

* Framing the story through the eyes and voice of a fictional character, 11-year-old Roger, offers a bittersweet sense of authenticity while upholding an objective point of view. . . the exploration of "both sides of the story" is unflinchingly offered.

"Illustrated with the rough vigor of a Jack Chick evangelical tract, this graphic novel, evoking Yummy's famous mugshot for its cover image, makes for an authentic parable of the dangers of gang life and gang-ruled streets. It's too real to feel preachy, and Roger's narration of Yummy's brief life is realistically stoic and sympathetic."

"Neri's straightforward, unadorned prose is the perfect complement to DuBurke's stark black-and-white inks; great slabs of shadow and masterfully rendered faces breathe real, tragic life into the players. Like Roger, in the end readers are left with troubling questions and, perhaps, one powerful answer: that they can choose to do everything in their power to ensure that no one shares Yummy's terrible fate."