“Gayle!”

From Ira Marcks’ Shark Summer. 

After moving with her mom to the tourist island of Martha’s Vineyard, Gayle was okay with the move at first when she was the star pitcher of the baseball team. However, when she smashed into her best friend Lex while trying to catch a pop fly ball in the championship game, Gayle is left with a broken arm and a lost game. In the weeks since the game, Lex and Gayle have been ignoring them each other while Gayle and her mom get ready for their first summer in Martha’s Vineyard preparing to open her moms homemade ice cream stand. The island is full of excitement though as it is the location for an exciting film shoot about a killer shark. When Gayle meets the cinema-obsessed Elijah who is visiting the island with his reporter father, the two kids decide to make a movie about the summer and enter it in an amateur film festival so Gayle can pay back her mom for the medical bills. Gayle and Elijah are unsure about what their film should be about until they meet Maddie, who is obsessed with the legend of Captain Atwood and his phantom shark. So with the help of an old movie prop specialist, the three kids begin traveling the island interviewing residences and searching for clues to prove that Atwood’s terror is real.

This graphic novel is impressive in that it provides readers with a solid story that flows quickly despite its length. While Marcks’ illustrations vary greatly between different characters, the animation is captivating and a perfect glimpse at an island summer. Shark Summer is an interesting graphic novel that will easily attract young readers interested in mildly scary stories.