Laika

Author: Nick Abadzis

Illustrator: Nick Abadzis; colorist Hilary Sycamore

Peach’s Picks Rating:

Year of publication: 2007

City of publication: New York

Publisher: First Second

ISBN: 1596431016

Author website: http://www.nickabadzis.com/

Illustrator website:http://www.nickabadzis.com/
No personal website located for Hilary Sycamore. Information about her can be found at http://firstsecondbooks.typepad.com/mainblog/hilary_sycamore_guest_blogger/

Media used for illustrations: Earth tone color drawings, comic book style with linear panels

Annotation: Laika, a dog acquired by the Soviet space program, was the first living creature to orbit earth. This book blends fact and fiction to tell the story of the historic event.

Personal reaction to the book: This is a tear-jerker about Laika, an abandoned puppy living a hard life on the streets of Moscow. She is captured by dogcatchers and delivered to the Soviet Institute of Aviation Medicine. Her fate is determined by the ambitious, almost ruthless engineer, Chief Designer Korolev, who selects Laika to be the first living creature sent into outer space. Yelena Dubrovsky, the lab technician responsible for caring for the dogs at Institute of Aviation Medicine, and Laika form a special bond. Laika is launched into space on Sputnik II on November 3, 1957, surviving only a few hours of the flight. The graphic novel is composed of small, tightly packed panels drawn with pencil and colored with earth-tones. The use of these colors creates a sense of darkness and brooding throughout the story, setting up the conflicted emotions of Yelena and foreshadowing Laika’s death. The text is presented in bubbles containing especially small print. The pages are numbered creating easy reference points. The story is broken into four chapters at logical breaking points. The main characters as well as the secondary characters are well-drawn with depth of expression and emotion. The reader experiences the personal and political struggles experienced by Korolev, Dubrovsky and others. I found the panels difficult to read because they are small, closely spaced and contain small text. However, I believe this will not trouble most secondary school readers who will enjoy the book as a dog story, historical fiction and graphic novel rolled into an appealing package. An afterword by the author extends the historical context of the story.  A bibliography is included. Students unfamiliar with the Cold War and the competition between Russia and the United States race to outer space may need some background information to fully understand the story.

General curricular connections:

• History / Cold war
• Space travel
• When studying the Cold War, pair with The Green Glass Sea and White Sands, Red Menace by Ellen Klages
• Use in secondary literature circles

Recommended grade levels:
School Library Journal recommends the book for grades 7 and up
Booklist recommends the book for grades 8-12
Peach's Picks recommends the book for grades 7 and up

Awards/Recognitions:
2008 Eisner Award - Best Publication for Teens
2008 Nominated for Eisner Award – Best Reality-Based Work
2008 Top Ten Great Graphic Novels for Teens
Starred review in School Library Journal
Junior Library Guild Selection

Notes: This book was selected from "The Top Ten Favorites List / Summer Session 2009", San Jose State University, School of Library and Information Science, LIBR 271A, Genres & Topics in Youth Literature, Professor Partington. This entry meets the assignment criteria to review graphic novels/fiction.

Repetition: The phrase “I am a man of destiny” is repeated throughout the book.

Repetition: The moon is shown and focused on throughout the book

Onomatopoeia: Page 8; “Koff” to represent coughing

Onomatopoeia: Page 8; “ZZZZ” to represent snoring

Onomatopoeia: Page 45; “PLAF” to represent Laika crashing into a box and garbage can

Onomatopoeia: Page 48; “THWAP!” to represent the dog catcher’s net coming down

Symbolism: Page 129; The red hammer and sickle symbol of Communism

Book cover picture retrieved from: http://us.macmillan.com/laika