Zita the Spacegirl [Paperback]

Ben Hatke (Author, Illustrator)

Book Description

Release date: February 1, 2011 | Age Range: 8 and up | Series: Zita the Spacegirl (Book 1) | Lexile Measure: 310L (What's this?)

Zita’s life took a cosmic left turn in the blink of  an eye.

 

When her best friend is abducted by an alien doomsday cult, Zita leaps to the rescue and finds herself a stranger on a strange planet. Humanoid chickens and neurotic robots are shocking enough as new experiences go, but Zita is even more surprised to find herself taking on the role of intergalactic hero. Before long, aliens in all shapes and sizes don’t even phase her. Neither do ancient prophecies, doomed planets, or even a friendly con man who takes a mysterious interest in Zita’s quest.

 

Zita the Spacegirl is a fun, captivating tale of friendship and redemption from Flight veteran Ben Hatke. It also has more whimsical, eye-catching, Miyazaki-esque monsters than you can shake a stick at.

Editorial Reviews

From School Library Journal

Grade 2–5—While exploring a meteoroid crater, young explorers Zita and Joseph discover an unusual device featuring a conspicuous red button. Zita's curiosity compels her to press it, only to discover that it summons an alien creature that instantly abducts Joseph. The fearless heroine follows him to a planet inhabited by Scriptorians, who intend to use him as a ritual sacrifice to prevent the destruction of their planet. In her quest to save her friend, Zita assembles a cadre of unusual cohorts: a giant mouse that she rides; an oversize bloblike creature named Strong Strong; a Heavily Armored Mobile Battle Orb known as One; and Robot Randy. Together they head off to the Scriptorians' castle to rescue Joseph. Along the way, she meets Piper, a fellow earthling traveling through space who becomes an important player in the story. Aptly named, he is part Pied Piper and part inventor but always a smooth talker who alternately assists and sabotages the mission. In order to save her friend, Zita must ultimately risk her own chance to return to Earth. With echoes of The Wizard of Oz, this charming, well-told story has a timeless "read to me" quality that makes it perfect for one-on-one sharing. Adults will enjoy the subtle humor and inside jokes, and children will love intrepid Zita and her adventures. The art is simply delightful: a realistic heroine surrounded by a world of bizarre creatures. Fans of the Flight anthologies (Villard) will cheer for the return of Zita.—Barbara M. Moon, Suffolk Cooperative Library System, Bellport, NY
(c) Copyright 2011.  Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Booklist

For no reason at all, a little red button crashes to earth while Zita and her pal Joseph are out cavorting around. Of course, no one could resist pushing a mystery button, which pops open an interdimensional portal that whisks Joseph away. Zita follows and lands on a delightfully bizarre alien planet, where she sees Joseph being captured by a tentacled, scuba-headed creature. She makes some allies, takes off after him, and zany mishaps and dashing adventures ensue. Any story in which one can escape prison with a tube of “doorpaste” (just like toothpaste, except that it makes magic doors appear when smeared on a wall) obviously puts more stock in wowing imaginations than satisfying logic, and it needs solid cartooning chops to back it up. Fortunately, Hatke’s got them, and he doles out an increasingly loony and charming array of aliens, robots, and unclassifiable blobs and hairy things for Zita (herself a cross between Ramona Quimby and a Matt Phelan waif) to encounter. It’s fun, plenty funny, and more than a little random. Kids will love it. Grades 3-6. --Ian Chipman --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Age Range: 8 and up
  
• Paperback: 192 pages
• Publisher: First Second (February 1, 2011)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 9781596434462
• ISBN-13: 978-1596434462
• ASIN: 1596434465
• Product Dimensions: 6.1 x 0.6 x 8.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (36 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #10,526 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #21 in Books > Comics & Graphic Novels > Graphic Novels > Science Fiction
  • #69 in Books > Children's Books > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Comics & Graphic Novels
  • #71 in Books > Children's Books > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Science Fiction

More About the Author

Ben Hatke is an artist, writer and comics creator. He is the creator of the Zita the Spacegirl graphic novels and a contributor to the Flight Anthologies. Ben learned painting through studying the Italian Masters and by training at the Charles Cecil Studios in Florence.

He lives and works in Front Royal, Virginia with his lovely wife and growing family. He loves swords and whistles and juggling and adventures. Breakfast is his favorite meal of the day.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

26 of 26 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars There's a stargirl waiting in the sky February 14, 2011

By E. R. Bird HALL OF FAMETOP 500 REVIEWER

Format:Paperback

I run a bookgroup for kids between the ages of 9-13. Like a number of American children in the 21st century, these kids have an overwhelming palate for good graphic novels. I can hand them "Robot Dreams" or "Ghostopolis" or "Rapunzel's Revenge", it doesn't matter. Whatever the title, they devour these books in less than an hour and come hounding me for more. The market simply doesn't exist to satiate their perpetual GN hunger. In fact, far fewer really worthwhile comics for kids come out than you might expect. For every "The Secret Science Alliance" there are twenty cheapo faux mangas ready to clutter up my library's shelves. Fortunately, if you look in the right places you're bound to find something new and interesting. Now there is nothing seemingly original about some of the aspects of "Zita the Spacegirl". The storyline is familiar, the characters give you a sense of déjà vu, and the art feels very Matt Phelan/Raina Telgemeier-esque. That said, what author/artist Ben Hatke does well is dip into a wellspring of familiar ideas to bring us a new world that truly is its own beast. "Zita" earns her stripes. Good thing too, since your kids will undoubtedly be clamoring for more of her adventures when they get their sticky paws on this first.

Here are some basic rules governing meteoroids. Should you happen to find one in a field and should it happen to contain a device with a big red button, do NOT press that button!... It would have been useful for Zita to take that advice when she found the meteoroid and device with her friend Joseph. Needless to say, a button was pushed. After creating an inadvertent rift in space, Joseph is pulled through the hole by a set of furry tentacles. Zita, daunted but intrepid, follows. Her mission? To find Joseph, wherever he might be, and bring him home. Along the way she befriends a host of strange characters like One, the battle orb with self-esteem issues, and Mouse (real name Pizzicato) a large rodent who prefers to communicate with short printed notes. Along with a couple others, Zita sets out to fulfill her mission. What she may find, however, is that while she wins her temporary battles, she may end up losing the war.

Children's science fiction is only now attempting to slip into the shoes left by fantasy. The standard Alice in Wonderland / Wizard of Oz storyline where a girl finds herself in a new world and befriends strange creatures used to be the territory of your Wonderlands and Ozes. With the appearance of books like "The Search for WondLa" and "Zita the Spacegirl", however, sci-fi now waltzes merrily in the same spheres. We've finally hit the point where girls can explore not just alternate worlds but alternate planets as well. I don't know quite what to make of this. It is interesting to note that like her predecessors Zita does want to find home but we don't know why. She never mentions her parents or friends. And after seeing all the cool friends and characters in space, what's the lure of Earth? Hopefully this is something that will be covered in other books in the series. Otherwise, Zita's ultimate goal is a little less than gripping.

Of course there are some pretty familiar looking figures in this book. Mouse is your large mammalian mode of transportation, like The Cowardly Lion or Iorek Byrnison. Strong Strong is your basically sweet but gigantic companion, like Ludo in "Labyrinth". That leaves Piper as the character you don't know if you can trust (your Han Solo, if you will), Randy as the coward who is more than he seems, and so on. I'm being facetious, but the fact of the matter is that while none of these characters are particularly new in terms of the storytelling, it doesn't really matter. Sure they're rote, but they're reliable. There's a reason so many storytellers like to use them in their books. And while I have seen them appear in lots of works of fiction and film, I've never seen them in a graphic novel for kids before. Not really. The "Amulet" books are a little too much like the "Bone" series when it comes to companions, and "Jellaby" includes only one lovable monster. I do get a lot of kids asking me to recommend books just like those, though. For them, "Zita the Spacegirl" is a kind of answer to a prayer. Even if the friendships are different, the exciting tone stays the same.

Ben Hatke has a style that at first reminded me of Raina Telgemeier more than any other graphic artist working today. It's something about how he draws Zita. Telgemeier is behind books like the graphic adaptations of "The Baby-Sitters Club" or "Smile". Then I thought a little bit more about it and felt that Hatke's book felt a lot like the style of Matt Phelan, particularly when it came out his graphic novel "The Storm in the Barn". Yet here the comparisons stop. In spite of the supernatural element to Phelan's tale, both artists keep well within the realm of the realistic. Hatke, in contrast, has a penchant for combining the cute with the weird. He'll throw in a realistic creature like Mouse (a Beatrix Potter influence, perhaps?) alongside Zita and her sometime manga-esque expressions. Throw in adorable critters along the lines of Walt Kelly (or, more recently, Jeff Smith) and you've got yourself a "Zita". His landscapes are also worth noting, making good use of claustrophobic city dwellings as well as vast junkyards and sweeping vistas. I was particularly taken with how nicely he breaks up the action. Hatke isn't afraid to include wordless sequences to set the pace, or to switch up the panel size and jump cuts when we're in an action scene. Sometimes I did have a bit of a hard time following one fast-paced moment to the next (Zita gets on an elevator in one scene so quickly that I had a hard time figuring out where she was without the normal visual clues). But generally it works to the book's advantage.

Yup. It's fun. Fun is good. With any luck there will be more in the series too, so those of you who live in fear that the books will just end without reaching their natural conclusion will have to hope that Hatke will not leave you disappointed (I watched too many episodes of the "Dungeons & Dragons" cartoon as a kid so I know that particular brand of disappointment). Still, if you have to take it on its own, "Zita" makes a pretty good series title on its own. This is definitely something you can hand to your kids, boys and girls alike, secure in the knowledge that they'll take a lot of enjoyment out of the experience. A sweet tale.

For ages 8-12. Read more ›

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars A MUST READ! February 2, 2011

By A. Reader

Format:Paperback

I heard about Zita the Spacegirl through a friend's blog, and even though I'm not a big comics person I decided to check it out. I'm so glad I did! This book is a joy of a ride--with a spunky character you totally root for (and who has depths to her that so many characters in this genre unfortunately don't have); a gang of pals, each one unique and funny and intriguing (a giant mouse with a mysterious past, for example); a plot that keeps you turning the pages without even noticing you're turning them...

The art is brilliant and brilliantly colorful, with terrific world-building and new details you find even on, say, the third read. This is a comic for both boys and girls, and adults too. No wonder it's gotten such good reviews in the press/blogs/Goodreads/MTV.com, etc. I can't wait for the sequel! Seriously, check this one out.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars wonder & whimsy February 1, 2011

By S. Torode

Format:Hardcover

Ben Hatke has been one of my favorite young artists for a while, so I was excited to see this full-length Zita book up for pre-order on Amazon. And--wow to Amazon's service--my copy arrived on the release day, Feb. 1.

It's a visual feast from beginning to end, and a great story kids of all ages will love. At times it reminded me of "The Iron Giant" and Miyazaki's "Spirited Away"--here's hoping for a Zita movie next.

Get it in hardcover--it's worth it!

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars I Love It! February 1, 2011

By Aimee Brown

Format:Paperback

What do you do when you find a little device with a big red button sitting in a hole? You get the device and push the button! At least, that's what Zita does. The next thing she knows her friend Joseph is gone, taken by who knows what! Zita follows, determined to save Joseph. Far from home, across the universe, on a far away planet, Zita meets monsters. But, she also meets friends who help along the way.

I LOVED this book! It took me forever (maybe a slight exaggeration here) to finally get my hands on it though. My kids swiped it up right away and it didn't surface again for days! My youngest (8) read through it twice and loved it. This is a graphic novel and one of the first ones I've read and owned. I won it through First Reads on Goodreads. I know, lucky, huh? This book was funny. I laughed right out loud several times. Which for me, is something. This is a "fun for all ages" kind of book. One you just love to share.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Worth Every Penny June 7, 2011

By A. O'Neill

Format:Paperback

The other 5-star reviews are right on target here; I would only add that anyone who says this work is meant for children doesn't know how to enjoy a good graphic novel. While it's entirely kid-friendly, "Zita" wasn't created just for children; rather it was made with a child-like spirit.

Every page is its own little delightful work of art, a menagerie of fantastical creatures that immediately make you wish they were real, and living in your backyard. Not one single panel bores or begs to be skipped over. If you have any love at all for adventure, whimsy, or creative storytelling, "Zita the Space Girl" is worth every penny.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars A great comic for kids (esp. young girls) April 23, 2012

By Charles Sumner

Format:Paperback

As a comics fan and parent of an 8yo girl, it's depressing sometimes how few good adventure comics there are out there that appeal to both girls and boys. There's lots of adventure stuff for boys, but comics for girls don't get nearly as much love. With that said, I was delighted when I stumbled across Zita the Spacegirl. This is a charming book that's great for all ages and genders. Zita is an adventuresome girl who goes through a space portal to rescue a friend and finds herself trapped in an alien world. Themes of friendship, faith, and trust are explored, but never in a preachy manner as the book is also focused on fun, humor, and adventure (and the art is great too). My daughter loved it and my wife (who only dabbles in comics) was charmed by it. We're all looking forward to volume two!