Hilo: The Boy Who Crashed to Earth

This exceptionally enjoyable graphic novel is a cracking adventure sci-fi story with brilliant artwork and is genuinely funny. The author is an award-winning cartoonist who has worked on various comic strips like Batman, Justice League and Star Wars and this is the first in the series of ten books. The story finishes on a clever cliff-hanger that just begs for reading more in the series.

The story is set in America and features DJ, who believes that he is the one member of his large family who is not good at anything, apart from being friends with Gina – then Gina moves away. Then one day, DJ spies a bright light in the sky and something crashes to earth. In its wake, it leaves a huge crater and in the middle, DJ discovers a boy who has no memory of who he is, or where he has come from. Having taken the boy home, he tries to eat trainers, discovers burping, remembers that his name is Hilo and appears to pass out on the floor.

As he sleeps, he dreams of some of the circumstances that brought him to Earth and realises that he has a purpose on the planet. There are some brilliant interactions at school as DJ tries to keep Hilo’s origins secret from friends and family but then Gina returns and life gets even more interesting as the three friends fight to save each other from mysterious robots and work out how to protect the earth from Hilo’s nemesis – Razorwark.

Highly recommended for Year 2 and above.