The YA graphic novel All Summer Long knows the soul of tween girls

If you have read a comic book or original graphic in the past ten years that speaks to the soul of girls nine through sixteen you’ve most likely read something by Hope Larson. Larson is an author and illustrator who knows tween girls like Sandra Boynton knows animal board books. All Summer Long sounds like déjà vu from a John Cusak film-set against a different decade, but as long as you included Curtis Armstrong in it then you’d be OK. In this instance though, All Summer Long is an original graphic novel about life, friendships-real and fake, plus growing up and knowing when to be true to you.

This seems like heady stuff for a YA targeted graphic novel. All Summer Long is a snapshot of life for Bina during the summer after seventh grade. Her best friend is Austin and he’s going to summer camp for a month. During previous summers the two of them have had competitions where different things would have ‘fun points’, which would then add up to a summer fun index. This is the first summer since they’ve been 8 years old that they’ll be separate for a period of time and that’s not sitting well with Bina.

Bina is independent, quirky, wants to be cool, plays a mean guitar and is trying to grow into her teenage self. In other words, she’s just like any other girl out there aged 8 and up, plus or minus some certain hobbies. Any girl who is that age and older will be able to relate to Bina and the things she’s experiencing during this time of life.

One day when she’s locked out of her house, Bina sneaks into Austin’s house to get her spare key. In doing so she surprises Charlie, his sister who wasn’t expecting someone to be standing on the toilet when she entered the room. Charlie is older than them and cooler. She might not actually be ‘cooler’, but she certainly older so Bina thinks that she’s cooler.

Charlie and Bina spend some together and they have a couple similar interests. They both like music, but Bina has a passion for groups and can play the guitar, while Charlie seems to only like the bands. During the summer Bina learns that being perceived as cool comes at a price. That price can include being taken advantage of, ignoring your passions or treating your family poorly.

All Summer Long is the stuff that girls will love to read. While the graphic novel isn’t exclusively meant for girls, it’ll certainly appeal more to them than boys. Boys mature slower than girls I tell myself and they’ll be 17 before they want to handle a graphic novel about friendship and aging gracefully through the mine field that is middle school and high school.