 | Martian ghost centaur Author: Heagerty, Mat | |
| Price: $16.39 | ||
Summary:
When Louie's dads' restaurant, Squatch Burger, starts to go under and fall prey to a techie start-up, Louie and her best friend Felix decide they'll do whatever it takes to save the town from losing all the people and places that make it special. In hopes that convincing people the Sasquatch is real and to drive tourism back up, Louie and Felix plan an elaborate hoax in hopes of saving the town from the dot-com takeover. In graphic novel format.
| Illustrator: | Mided, Steph |
Full Text Reviews:
School Library Journal - 01/01/2021 Gr 7 Up—Seventeen-year-old Louie O'Connor loves her hometown, the once thriving, now dying tourist destination of Southborough, CA. Before Louie was born, a Sasquatch sighting attracted visitors, but enthusiasm has waned, and techie Leef Smith swoops in, eager to take advantage of the cheap land to build his start-up headquarters. Louie fears for her community, especially her parents' restaurant, Squatch Burger, where she works, so she and her best friend, Felix, team up to introduce a new creature that's sure to draw attention; along the way, she learns important lessons as she feuds and then makes up with Felix and realizes that her Squatch Burger job doesn't define her. Louie is white, Felix is Latinx, and there are numerous BIPOC secondary characters; the story also offers queer representation via multiple same-sex couples, including Louie's fathers. Time lapses are generally conveyed through text boxes, but some transitions are unlabeled and rushed, and pacing can be uneven. Still, the distractions don't detract from the narrative, and clever jokes and cultural references from the past two decades are sprinkled throughout. Basic color block backgrounds focus on the highly expressive and comedic character reactions, giving the tale a playful feel as it leads to the reveal of the titular character. VERDICT Readers will appreciate this campy adventure that has touches of "Scott Pilgrim" and "Lumberjanes" and ends on a valuable message about maintaining boundaries between work and identity.—Alea Perez, Elmhurst P.L., IL - Copyright 2021 Publishers Weekly, Library Journal and/or School Library Journal used with permission.
Booklist - 03/15/2021 Louie has a deep passion for her struggling small town, Southborough, which was made famous years ago by a sasquatch sighting. It's been a tourist destination for many years, and the local economy has depended almost exclusively on tourist income, but business has slowed in recent years. An avaricious tech executive, Leef Smith, smells a deal and is aggressively buying up properties for its new headquarters, Start-up.com, and in an effort to save her dads' restaurant, Squatch Burger, Louie comes up with several schemes—some legitimate and others . . . less so—to make money, eventually making it her mission to save the entire town from being gobbled up and leveled by Leef. Though several montages make the plot line occasionally feel disjointed, this fun story has something for everyone, including thinly veiled '90s pop-culture references, matter-of-fact LGBTQ+ representation, and small town heart, and high-spirited, passionate Louie, who's angry about the opportunistic take-over of her town, is a lively protagonist. Hand to fans of Lumberjanes or The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl. - Copyright 2021 Booklist.
