Americus by MK Reed

Name: Caitlin

Grade: 12+

Title: Americus

Author: MK Reed, illustrated by Jonothan Hill

Imagine for a second that you are obsessed with a series of books. Now imagine that in your small town, a group of people want to ban that book because it promotes witch craft and the occult. Sound like anything you've heard before? This is the plot behind MK Reed's graphic novel Americus, which stars a young boy, the twon bookworm, as he tries to survive high school, figure out life, and save his favorite book series, called "The Chronicles of Apathea Ravenchilde." The book was wonderfully truthful and emotional and illustrated beautifully.
Americus is your typical, tiny town. Everyone knows everyone and everyone is gissipy- unfortunately, the townspeople of Americus are also very easy to rise up against something that they don't seem to understand. In this case, it's Neil Barton's favorite series starring Apathea Ravenchilde. As Neil stumbles through his freshman year of high school, he has to learn to find his voice and make it heard to save the series he sees as his only salvation from the crazy people who live in Americus.
The book is all about why books shouldn't be banned. It covers so many different issues along with that, however, including problems with money, divorce, and even how people react towards the gay community. Americus is a story that deserves to be read for all of it;s messages, but it also deserves to be read because it's seriously captivating. I was surprised at how good it actually turned out to be. I loved characters, I hated characters and I really started to with that the Apathea book series was real just so I could understand what all the hype was about. I seriously enjoyed this book to the point that I'm forcing my friends to read it and buying a copy of my own.

Actually, upon googling this title, I found that there's actually a really cool website promoting the book and it's message. Regardless of if you've readhttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif the book or not, I suggest you check it out because it's pretty awesome.

http://saveapathea.com/

Why I picked up this book: It looked like an interesting graphic novel.

Why I finished it: I seriously didn't put it down for the 2 hours or however long it took me to read it.

I'd give this book to: Anyone and everyone.

My Rating: *****