Megan Lacera and Jorge Lacera's sophomore picture book, The Wild Ones, is as inclusive and endearing as their much-praised 2019 debut, Zombies Don't Eat Veggies.
All Valentina's life, "the Wild Oaks apartment building has been home." Valentina's best friends Jasmine, Andy, and Xander also live in Wild Oaks, hence their group name: the Wild Ones. The Wild Ones are "obsessed with monsters," specifically the monster they believe is lurking in a cave deep in the nearby Steelburg forest. Colombian Valentina believes the monster is La Tunda; Haitian Xander thinks she's Loogaroo; Irish Andy is convinced she's a Banshee; and Indian Jasmine is sure the monster is the ghost Vetal. But one Saturday morning, the kids hear their grown-ups discussing a "monster-size nightmare": developers are looking to destroy Wild Oaks. The Wild Ones spring into action to save their home and decide to find the monster in the forest in hopes it will help them "scare away the developers for good."
Jorge Lacera's brightly colored digital illustrations, featuring both panels and full-page spreads, are dynamic and energetic, keeping up the excitement and fast pace. Word boxes and speech bubbles help make the graphic novel visually comprehensible to young readers. The Laceras paid attention to detail in both text and illustration; the endpapers, done in a retro, comic book-art style, work as an introduction to each monster. Ultimately, the Wild Ones save the building and get to meet their favorite monsters. Turns out, there wasn't one heroic monster in the forest--there were four. --Kharissa Kenner, children's librarian, Bank Street School for Children