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From the Classroom: Using Graphic Novels to Explore Transitions

By on February 24, 2025   /   Articles, From the Classroom  

Let’s face it – students in the middle grades face lots of transitions. These can be moment-to-moment transitions (i.e. we’re best friends and five minutes later we aren’t), place-to-place (i.e. moving or starting a new school), and body-to-body (i.e. what is puberty doing to my body?!). Authors Rene Rodriguez-Astacio and David Low recommend using Superhero Graphic Novels to help students navigate these transitions as the graphic novel medium, with spaces between panels, force middle grade readers to fill in the gaps which can contribute to them doing the same in their transitioning lives.  And superheroes, in particular, are super popular with this age group!  Below are some superhero graphic novel titles, how they can support middle grade readers with all the transitions they face, and how teachers might consider using them in the classroom.

Spider-Man

cover of Miles Morales Shock Waves graphic novel with miles morales running in center of the cover.

In Miles Morales Shockwaves, Miles Morales, a biracial middle grader, helps raise funds for Puerto Rico to support his mother’s lost family home after an earthquake. He organizes a block party sponsored by Harrison Snow, CEO of Serval Industries. Miles (as Spider-man) is led to uncover a conspiracy when it is revealed that Snow is providing financial support to Puerto Rico to excavate valuable crystals unearthed after the earthquake. Rodriguez-Astacio and Low recommend that teachers provide some background on the relationship between the U.S. and Puerto Rico, especially in light of the 2020 earthquakes and the 2022 devastating hurricane. This graphic novel explores the various transitions associated with identity, place, and family, something middle schoolers may be facing.

Ms. Marvel

Cover of Ms. Marvel, Stretched Thin with Ms. Marvel running away from a helmeted villain.

Ms. Marvel’s super power is her ability to contort her body, but in Ms. Marvel – Stretched Thin, Kamala Kahn wakes up with big feet and a lack of control on how to fix them. This funny image is a great metaphor for the awkwardness of puberty and the various ways middle schoolers often don’t have control over their bodies. All the various ways Kamala’s body contorts throughout the book relates to the coming-of-age themes in the book and middle schoolers accepting new responsibilities, often with great struggle. Ms. Marvel can relate as even though she may do one thing well, her inability to excel in every aspect of her life leads her to feel like a failure. Kamala feels like she is stretched “too thin” when trying to be successful at everything and she is also literally stretched thin! Teachers can use graphic novels like Ms. Marvel (or the Hulk or the X-men) to examine the literal and metaphorical representations of body change and how gender, race, class, and power create different contexts with which transitions occur and are interpreted.

Finally, Rodriguez-Astacio and Low remind us that graphic novels should be seen as more than “transition books” for reluctant or resistant readers. Graphic novels are great for interpreting deep issues and themes. In the comments below, share what types of books you use to help with all the transitions your middle grade readers face on a daily basis!

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Author Interview with Emma Otheguy

By on February 21, 2025   /   Author Interviews  

When I had the pleasure of meeting Emma Otheguy, I got a taste of her passion for introducing history to young readers. In addition to writing early readers and picture books, she is the author of middle grade novels, Silver Meadows (Knopf, 2019) and Sofia Acosta Makes a Scene (Knopf, 2022). I am excited to share our recent discussion featuring the launch, both in English and in Spanish, of her upcoming book, Cousins in the Time of Magic. (February 25, 2025). In this time travel adventure, three cousins get transported to 1862 to play an important role in the Battle of Puebla, the reason we celebrate Cinco de Mayo today.

 

 

Interview with Emily

(This interview has been edited for length and clarity.)

 Jen: Cousins in the Time of Magic comes out in THREE DAYS! Can you tell me about how you came to write for young people?

 

Emma: I was always interested in children’s books. I read a lot as a child. I also took multiple courses with the children’s author Donna Jo Napoli when I was an undergraduate. I thought I was going to be a history professor and went to graduate school to get a doctorate. One of the things that was really exciting about being in graduate school is that I started to learn a lot about Latin American history, which as we all know is not well represented in our school curriculums here in the United States. That’s really concerning because Latin America is our nearest neighbor, a quarter of the people in the United States are Latinos, and a high concentration among them are young people. I think there’s a real need for everybody to learn this history. I felt that it was affirming and meaningful to learn the history of my own people. I really missed doing something that was creative and something that had a public focus. When I first started writing, I wrote straight fantasies for children, things that had nothing at all to do with what I was studying. I also wrote my first published book Marti’s Song for Freedom, which does have a colonial Latin America theme. It was partially an escape, and partially a way to make public all of the amazing things I was learning.

Jen: When did the history bug bite you?

Emma: I was always interested in history. My parents came to the United States as exiles from Cuba. They talked a lot about their culture and about their understanding of the events that precipitated them coming to the United States. I think that being a child of immigrants always comes with a story. This interest in the stories of the past naturally led me to an interest in history. I also had really incredible teachers in high school A handful of teachers at my school went above and beyond on a level that is incredibly rare. Now as a parent, I read to my children and I see stories as a vessel for what we want to tell our children, whether it’s an immigration story or another type of story.

Jen: What are some of the ways that you bring history alive for your readers?

Emma: The key to Cousins in the Time of Magic is that the readers meet kids their own age who are like them. Jorge, Camilla and Siggy are contemporary kids who live in Miami in the modern day. They travel back in time and meet kids their own age in the historical time periods they are visiting. The whole journey and all of the historical themes are revealed to the reader through the eyes of children. This is a powerful connection because this is how kids are able to socialize and connect with the experience. The other thing that I think really made Cousins in the Time of Magic accessible to kid readers is the illustrations. Poly Bernatene really brought the characters to life. Kids reading the book see the characters expressions on their faces, and their body language. I think the pictures add another layer of connection and immediacy, as well as excitement and an emotional depth to the character’s experiences. The style of the illustrations adds a kind of wonder and magic to the book. They also make it easier to visualize certain historical technologies, such as a telegram test transmitter and an ironclad.

Jen: What are some ways you approach difficult topics such as colonialism and racism?

Emma: My hope is that kids get sucked into this big exciting magical adventure and are swept along by the story. There are those bigger historical issues that a kid might not pick up on the first time reading through, especially a younger reader. My approach to talking about difficult topics in history with kids is to be up front and to use words that they can understand. It’s not complicated to talk about things like racism and colonialism, right? It’s actually fairly simple. Europeans made a lot of money enslaving people and growing crops like sugar. That’s why they wanted to hold onto power, and hold onto these territories. In some ways because it is so basic, it is the most simple thing in the world to understand. It’s greed. The reason adults make these concepts complicated is that we’re trying to sanitize events for children. We don’t want to tell kids, yeah, there are emperors and they want to colonize people and hold on to power because they want to be powerful. Kids understand that. It’s never easy to talk about racism or the history of slavery for kids. Part of what made it clear to me that this was the path we need to follow was thinking about who those narratives serve to protect and who I was trying to speak to. I’m just trying to be really honest. I also think that if kids don’t know what racism and colonialism look like, because we’re constantly trying to sanitize it and make it more palatable to them, then we can’t expect them to notice it when it starts to sneak up on them and their own lives.

Jen: What surprised you most while writing this book?

Emma: I was surprised how hard it was to find research material for my book. I very rarely meet somebody who, when I say, “I’m writing a book about Cinco de Mayo,” who says, “Well, what’s that?” Everybody knows it’s a holiday but very few people know the history. It wasn’t that big a thing in Mexico, it’s a much bigger deal here in the United States. It was so hard to find relevant books in the United States. Eventually I went to Mexico where my cousins lived. We went to Puebla, so I got to see the sights in real life with my own eyes. I went to a bookstore and brought home a bag of books written in Spanish. That is how I did the research for the Mexico part of the book.

Jen: I know you have never been through a time traveling portal, but what parts of this book are closest to your life? Are you close with your cousins?

 Emma: The place where the kids begin their adventure is inspired by two houses. One is my grandmother’s house in Miami, where I spent a lot of time with my cousins playing in her yard and running around. The tinajón, the big clay pot that the kids climb into to time travel, was inspired by my father’s house, and the house my father grew up in in Cuba. He had a painting that my grandmother had made of that house so I always had this image in my mind. That’s where the premise of the portal came from.

Illustration by Poly Bernatene in Cousins in the Time of Magic

I’m close with cousins on both sides of the family. One of my cousins who lives in Mexico was very helpful with the research for this book, because he hosted me. My cousins in Miami were also helpful. I kept texting them things like, where would these kids live and, what street would this be near? I’m lucky to have a lot of different cousins all spread out in different places, Jorge, the youngest cousin in the book, reminds me of one of my uncles, who must have broken more bones than I can count. He’s my mom’s youngest brother and always kind of doing athletic and somewhat headlong things.

 

 

 

Jen: Jorge, Camilla and Siggy all embrace their Latino identity. Can you expand upon this aspect of the book?

Emma: The three cousins are growing up in a predominantly Latino city, and they spend a lot of time with each other. All three of them are bilingual, they’re all Latinos on both sides, although their parents come from different parts of Latin America. On the one hand they experience this real pride and comfort with their Latino identity. On the other hand, they live in a society and in a moment that tends to project hostility toward Latinos. So my vision for the book is that by learning about their own history and especially learning about their people’s role in the establishment, founding and shaping of the major moments in US history, they start to feel more pride of identity that goes beyond just their experience within their own community. I also wanted them to have the valuable experience of traveling back in time and meeting other kids who are Latino and who speak Spanish.

Jen: Can you give an example of how this appears in your book?

Emma: I highlight this in a scene where the cousins are in their magic boat and they’re trying to make land. They are in Virginia on the peninsula during the Civil War era. A boy runs into their boat shouting in Spanish. He’s a Union drummer boy, but he’s Cuban American. He’s a fictional character, but there was a well-known Union officer who was Cuban American and who spoke Spanish. I made this child up so that the kids would have an experience that really existed in history. Although we don’t talk about it, a very large percentage of the Union army was foreign born or second generation. Another important piece of this character’s identity is that the kids learned to counter the narrative that there is something new or different or odd about Latinos in the United States.

Jen: What are some of your favorite middle grade novels?

 Emma: This question is hard for me because I read so many different books and it’s always hard to choose one book or one author. I’m thinking about my own colleagues in children’s literature. Tammy Charles is one of my critique partners and so I read absolutely everything she writes. I’ve gotten to read some of her work in manuscript form. I feel like Angela Cervantes is somebody who’s a colleague and has always been one step ahead of me. She wrote Gaby Lost and Found, an incredible that book came out shortly before my first book came out, so I’ve always been following her path and her trajectory. Those are just two authors I love to read and I could probably go on and on and on, but I’ll just give you those two.

Jen: Is there anything else that you would like readers to know about Cousins in the Time of Magic?

 Emma: I want them to know that I consider this history to be vital. Any time you write about a group like Latinos that are not a majority group, you run the risk of your book being put on the shelf in the corner. You run the risk of tokenism. You run the risk of your book being trotted out at Hispanic heritage month and never again. This history is especially relevant to Latinos, but I think that everybody should know this history. I don’t think it’s incidental. I didn’t go dig up a story so that I could find a way to fit Latinos into the history of the United States. It’s actually the real history. So I hope that kids read it and it reshapes their understanding of the United States. I hope this is not too ambitious to say, but this is my hope.

Jen: Now that your wonderful book is out in the world, what’s next?

Emma: I’m working on another manuscript about the cousins that will take them to meet some really important Latino intellectual figures in the 20th century.

Illustration by E.L. Konigsburg in From the Mixed-Up Files of Basil E. Franweiler

Jen: Do you have any connection to the book The Mixed Up Files of Basil E. Frankweiler?

Emma: It is one of my favorite books I grew up on that train line that E.L.Konigsburg talks about. That moment when the kids are on the cement platforms of the Metro-North train is a moment that always made an impression on me as a kid coming into the city from the suburbs. I think she captures so well going to the Metropolitan Museum of Art like I did with a lot of my friends growing up. Konigsburg once said she had never seen kids who were so comfortable on the outside and so uncomfortable on the inside. This made a big impression on me.

 

 

 

 

 

No MUF interview is complete without a lightning round so …

Favorite place to write? Lately any one of the many coffee shops in Astoria, Queens

Dark chocolate or milk chocolate? Milk chocolate!

Superpower? Getting rid of stuff! My family lives in a small apartment but I have never once complained of not having enough storage. I’m ruthless.

Dream job when you were a kid? I was lucky that the grown-ups in my life rarely asked me this question as a kid. I got to focus on what I liked to do, especially reading, so for many years I was pretty sure I would grow up to be a fairy, a princess, or a mermaid!

Jen: Where can readers find you if they want to reach out?

You can connect with me through my website https://emmaotheguy.com/childrens-literature/

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Exploring Loss, Choices, and Magic with Megan Reyes

By on February 20, 2025   /   Author Interviews  

Today on the blog, we’re excited to host Megan Reyes, author of several exciting fantasy series for kids, including Llama Quest and the Heroes of Havensong. I had the pleasure of reading the newest book in the Havensong world, the third installment in an epic fantasy that follows four unlikely heroes who are bound by the Fates to save their world—and magic itself—from being destroyed. Read on to get insight into this latest adventure from Megan Reyes.

Cover of The Fifth Mage by Megan Reyes

Thanks so much for joining us here at the Mixed-Up Files, Megan! This book was such a quintessential fantasy adventure, full of magic (or should I say Magics?), dragons, prophecies, and a band of dedicated friends who are also unlikely heroes. On your website, you mentioned that Ender’s Game is still one of your all-time favorite books, but do you have any other favorites that watered the seeds that would grow into the world and characters of Havensong?

Thank you so much for inviting me to chat today! When it comes to Heroes of Havensong, there were a few authors who inspired me greatly: Kelly Barnhill (The Girl Who Drank the Moon, The Witch’s Boy), Jonathan Auxier (Peter Nimble and His Fantastic Eyes), and Shannon Messenger (Keeper of the Lost Cities series). Each of these authors are magical when it comes to crafting fantastical stories.

You mentioned that you’re an outliner, though you do allow your characters to take the story where they like. Were there any unexpected or surprising changes when River, Blue, Wren, Shenli, and the others started running around in the plot?

Absolutely! I do love a good outline, especially when I’m working with a series. But, like you said, even though I usually have an idea of the basic plot bullet points, my characters sometimes surprise me. This usually happens when I’m writing dialogue between characters. One example, off the top of my head, is Blue mentioning in Book 2 that wood carving used to be one of his hobbies, back in Gerbera. Honestly, I didn’t know this about him until I was writing the sentence! This hobby ends up tying into his love of music and certain musical instruments. I love when little surprising details like that make their way into the story.

Themes of loss, grief, and overcoming come through strongly in almost all of the storylines in this book, but there are many great reflections of what it means to be a hero or a villain, accepting all parts of yourself, and doing the right thing even when it’s the most difficult option. Are these threads ones you planned on for this point in the series, or did your characters reveal them to you?

I knew certain things would be happening to cause grief to each of the four Heroes. But honestly, I didn’t know how they would deal with their grief until I started writing. Particularly River, in Book 3, deals with what it means to walk through grief, feeling as though hope and joy are both a thing of the past. And poor Shenli! I have put him through some difficult situations throughout the series that have forced him to make impossible decisions. But I believe this is a reflection of all of us. We all have to make choices, and those choices will have consequences on others. The best we can do is be true to ourselves and follow what our gut is telling us is the right thing to do. But this is often easier said than done.

With so many fantastic plot threads being woven together with characters who all have their own motivations and goals, how do you balance the internal and external conflicts and make sure everyone has plenty of time to shine?

It is a lot to keep track of! This is where my outlining comes in handy! My outlines for each book include the main cast of characters (both major and minor) and what each of their internal and external conflicts will be. Then I’ll organize everything by chapter, making sure each character gets their turn to shine. Also, my incredible editor, Liesa Abrams, helps me find the very best nuggets of story for each of my Heroes. She asks great questions as we go through our rounds of edits.

In this book, the third of the series, we get to learn a lot more about the characters and their destinies. River in particular discovers a lot about herself in this installment, but so many of the kids seem to have a gift or ability that makes them profoundly unique. It seems like the book is saying that all kids have something special about them. Was that an intentional theme?

It was intentional, yes. And this has been a fun journey for me to see who each of the four Heroes have grown in self discovery. For example, River starts out in Book 1 fairly confident in who she is. But her fierce independence sometimes leads to stubbornness, so she has to learn to trust those around her to help. Later, when she learns more about her abilities, she has to learn that there are different ways to be strong. There is physical strength, sure. But more so, she learns what it means to be emotionally strong: to make space for her feelings and what it means to be true to herself. In a similar way, all four Heroes learn about their strengths and what it means to trust yourself and know your own worth.

Were there any aspects of the world you wish you could have spent more time with? I personally thought the sand sharks were fabulous (and so unexpectedly polite)!

Hah! I love the sand sharks too. I’d love to go dune surfing! In my mind, the world of Haven is so much bigger and more detailed than I could ever put on the page. If I could, I would love to explore the Mountain District and visit the Lands Across the Sea. There are so many more adventures to be had!

I loved this quote from Alma, the Fourth Mage: “There is a language to magic. It is communicating all the time, for those who know how to listen.” Do you think readers can find magic in our world this way, too?

Yes! I absolutely believe we can find magic in our world. To me, magic is a mix of joy, beauty, and wonder. Recently, I came across a term called “glimmers.” Glimmers are tiny moments of joy that are discovered in everyday, ordinary things: Looking up at the moon on a peaceful night, listening to the sound of rain on the roof, smelling freshly-cut grass, or feeling your cat purr happily as they sleep in your lap. All of these moments of joy–these “glimmers”–are glimpses of magic in the real world.

Of course, we have to talk about one of the most memorable lines from the book: “Friends make the best rainbows.” It’s so true! Could you share with us a little about the origin of this gem?

Aww, thank you. To me, a rainbow symbolizes hope and joy, after (or sometimes even during) a storm. And that’s what my friends have been to me, particularly these last few years. There was a season in my life where I had a rough go of things. It was a painful and difficult time and sometimes it seemed like hope was lost. But then a friend would call or send me flowers or show up at my door. They were my hope and joy during life’s storm. And in that way, my friends have always made the best rainbows.

It definitely seems like the four heroes have more dates with destiny in their future! Can you give us any clues as to what they might be up to in the next book?

This is a bit tricky to answer because the fate of any book series is left up to the powers that be at the publisher. At this moment, there are no hard plans for a fourth book, but that doesn’t mean there won’t be sometime in the future. I have all my fingers crossed that we’ll get to see Blue, River, Wren, and Shenli again someday!

You mentioned it took ten years to get a literary agent and hundreds of rejections before you broke into the industry. If you could give writers any advice on how to keep writing even in the face of rejection or overwhelming odds, what would it be?

It’s true! At the time I signed with my agent in 2020, I had written five different books, and received over 250 rejections from agents over the span of ten years. There were a lot of no’s before getting my first yes. As you can imagine, this was very dejecting at times!  My advice to writers is to always have something new to work on. And also: write the story you’re most excited to tell. If you’re feeling stuck on a particular manuscript, maybe play around with some ideas for a new story. You can always go back to the first one, but it helps me when I’m focusing on something I’m really excited about. Sometimes all it takes for the spark to happen is to dive into something new. And as long as creating stories is bringing you joy, keep writing! Do it for yourself. And you never know what “yes” might be around the corner.

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