Dylan and Leighton have been best friends for years, but now they've landed at a camp called In Bloom as a result of an incident to do with a classmate. Over the course of the story, filled with flashbacks, readers learn that Leighton is asexual, and Dylan - who everyone thinks is a girl, though they dress in typically male clothing - has a crush on her. Leighton is her parents' golden child, but feels intense pressure, especially after seeing her older sister Caroline shipped off to rehab for drinking. She wants to connect to the Black side of her family, but her mom has cut off contact with them. Leighton's family, and the families of most of her tennis friends, are wealthy, but Dylan lives with their single mom, who works three jobs and struggles to make ends meet. Dylan dreams of being an astronaut to go "anywhere but here," but understands the obstacles.

Dylan's and Leighton's tangled friendship has weight and texture, and they're both willing to sacrifice a lot for the other - and to keep each other's secrets. This is what leads to the accident with their classmate Mandy, who has been bullying them both constantly, but who Leighton's forced to be friends with because Mandy's mom is friends with her mom.

When Dylan and Leighton return to school in the fall, they've both changed (and so has Mandy; and Cricket, from camp, is there too, although they were homeschooled before). It seems as though D&L are headed in different directions, though they still care for each other.

Quotes (no page numbers(!))

I know Leighton's feelings about things more than I know my own. (Dylan)

Our culture teaches us that a person is either good or bad, you can't be both. There's no room for both, for nuance. (Leighton)

"It's not that I don't care about tennis. It's that I don't ONLY care about tennis. Why doesn't anyone understand that?!" (Leighton) ( )

A spoiled rich girl manipulates people and uses her parent's wealth to buy herself out of trouble and maintain her perfect daughter facade.

Set at a juvenile delinquent summer camp the reveal of what got her there -- told through a series of flashbacks -- takes forever, maybe to keep us from hating her completely until the end. The title comes from the paper airplanes she uses to pass notes with her co-conspirator, one of the puppets she has dancing on her strings.

Some will say I'm distorting the story, but one of this girl's lesser sins is literally stealing her best friend's cat. It just gets worse from there, and we're somehow supposed to think she isn't pure evil? Nuh-uh. ( )

Former best friends Dylan and Leighton are stuck in summer camp for troubled youth after a life altering incident happened. If they don’t get a good evaluation at camp, they’ll get sent away to an alternative high school. While participating in activities and chores at camp, both teens reexamine what led them to their current situation.

This was a good read and a good story, but the storytelling was a little difficult to follow at times; it wasn’t always told there was a time jump and you had to distinguish between the color scheme of the pages.

I wasn’t ever the biggest fan of Leighton to be honest. I know she was going through stuff and that she was hiding things from Dylan (they both were hiding things from each other), but I don’t know - I never felt like they were the best of friends like they were supposed to have been. I was also disappointed in the ending of it as I didn’t feel like there were conclusions to parts of the storyline.

I was still a fan of the graphic novel though and will for sure be recommending it to others. I really enjoyed the art and will be suggesting it to some for that reason. The representation and the storyline that some of the characters went through are important to share and I can see others enjoying it.

*Thank you Maverick and NetGalley for a digital advance copy of this book in exchange for an honest review ( )

Thank you NetGalley, Mad Cav Studios and Maverick for early access of Paper Planes by Jennie Wood

Paper Planes by Jennie Wood Is released on May 16th, 2023

3.5⭐️

Paper Planes is a graphic novel that touches on the struggles of adolescence and the struggles of finding one’s own sexuality. I really liked the side character Cricket, my favorite quote from the entire story came from her, on page 88.
The art style gave me Kim Possible vibes, which I really enjoyed. ( )

(Full disclosure: I received a free e-ARC for review through Edelweiss. Trigger warning for depictions of racism and homophobia.)

Leighton Worthington and Dylan Render have been best friends for years. On the surface, the two seem like polar opposites: Leighton is rich and artsy, though her parents are pushing her to abandon her art in favor of tennis; Dylan is a science nerd who dreams of becoming an astronaut, even though they'd be the first in their family to attend college. Whether it's a lost cat or a secret Black grandfather, Leighton and Dylan have each other's backs. But when a case of bullying results in a horrifying accident, the fissures that threatened their relationship break it wide open. The pair are sent to In Bloom, a summer camp for troubled teens. If they don't get glowing evaluations, they'll be attending an "alternative school" in the fall.

PAPER PLANES is told from Leighton and Dylan's alternating perspectives (pro tip: Leighton is the roller skate, Dylan is the space ship), with flashbacks detailing their budding (and then slowly deteriorating) friendship and culminating in the incident that landed them at camp. This is one of the few times were I feel like saying less is more; I don't want to spoil the plot for anyone, since the discovery was part of the joy of reading PAPER PLANES. Suffice it to say that Leighton and Dylan have a lot to unpack here, from their sexuality, to Mr. and Mrs. Worthingtons' perfectionism, classism, homophobia, and anti-Blackness.

What I will say is this: I absolutely loved the panels where Ms. Render helped Dylan pick out an outfit for the Spring Fling, as well as the pages where the In Bloom Gang goes fishing ... only for Leighton to start a rebellion by setting her "catch" free. (Though it's worth noting that catch and release fishing isn't exactly great either, with something between 5-20% - or more - of fish succumbing to their injuries. Still a nice and unexpected sentiment to find in popular media these days; and besides, it's not like Leighton and her compatriots had much of a choice anyway.)

The storytelling here is engaging, with diverse representation and some lovely surprises, and the artwork complements it nicely. ( )