Starred Review ALA Booklist (Sat Jun 01 00:00:00 CDT 2019)

Starred Review A group of boys on bikes sets out to learn whether the lanterns cast down the river in their town's annual ceremony actually turn into stars like the legends say. The titular pact: no turning back from their quest. Who ends up breaking the pact and who doesn't is only one element of this richly imagined and complexly emotional story that would be spoiled by too thorough a plot summary, though the story's power rests less in surprise than in the moment-to-moment unfolding of the journey. Andrews visualizes his concept with a tone and texture that produces an unassuming but profound strangeness: A telephone on top of a boulder in the middle of a stream? All the constellations in the sky interpreted by a talking bear? This embeds the fantasy in an earthy, handcrafted reality, apparent right up to its rough panel borders. It also empathizes with its relatable protagonists utious white Ben and guileless, brave, dark-skinned Nathaniel a deep way, understanding that being annoying is often the result of reaching out and that being an asshole often stems from fear. It may owe some of its eerie melancholy and occasional menacing absurdity to the likes of Lewis Carroll and Shaun Tan, but its message is distinctly its own: What you imagine to be the end of the journey may be satisfying, but the adventure actually goes on as long as you keep riding down the road.

Starred Review for Kirkus Reviews (Mon Feb 06 00:00:00 CST 2023)

Two reluctant friends—and a talking bear—journey deep into the night in search of answers. ­The night of the annual Autumn Equinox Festival unfolds as the villagers cast hundreds of lanterns down the river in honor of a local folk legend. For Ben, this year will be different from the rest. He and his friends make a pact to follow the lanterns until the unknown end of their voyage. One by one Ben's friends give up and return home, all except for Nathaniel, whose love for the cosmos and nerdy ways ostracize him from the group. In spite of his misgivings, Ben decides to uphold the pact with Nathaniel. A third, unexpected member joins the adventure when the boys come across a talking fisherbear who's on a quest to fish as his ancestors did. The trio eventually loses track of the path, and an unplanned encounter with the feisty Madam Majestic leads to even greater escapades. To shed more light on the story risks spoiling Andrews' marvelously melancholic, earnest graphic novel, at its core an exercise in whimsical self-reflection. This story's a quiet one in which danger flickers and hope flares at odd but fruitful moments. The core relationship between Ben (a dark-haired, light-skinned, bespectacled boy) and Nathaniel (a dark-skinned boy with puffs of hair) never veers into pure mawkishness. Likewise, the primarily blue and red mixed-media pictures underscore how nighttime sometimes promises transformation.Brilliantly enchanting. (Graphic fabulism. 10-14)

Kirkus Reviews (Fri Oct 04 00:00:00 CDT 2024)

Two reluctant friends—and a talking bear—journey deep into the night in search of answers. ­The night of the annual Autumn Equinox Festival unfolds as the villagers cast hundreds of lanterns down the river in honor of a local folk legend. For Ben, this year will be different from the rest. He and his friends make a pact to follow the lanterns until the unknown end of their voyage. One by one Ben's friends give up and return home, all except for Nathaniel, whose love for the cosmos and nerdy ways ostracize him from the group. In spite of his misgivings, Ben decides to uphold the pact with Nathaniel. A third, unexpected member joins the adventure when the boys come across a talking fisherbear who's on a quest to fish as his ancestors did. The trio eventually loses track of the path, and an unplanned encounter with the feisty Madam Majestic leads to even greater escapades. To shed more light on the story risks spoiling Andrews' marvelously melancholic, earnest graphic novel, at its core an exercise in whimsical self-reflection. This story's a quiet one in which danger flickers and hope flares at odd but fruitful moments. The core relationship between Ben (a dark-haired, light-skinned, bespectacled boy) and Nathaniel (a dark-skinned boy with puffs of hair) never veers into pure mawkishness. Likewise, the primarily blue and red mixed-media pictures underscore how nighttime sometimes promises transformation.Brilliantly enchanting. (Graphic fabulism. 10-14)

Publishers Weekly (Fri Oct 06 00:00:00 CDT 2023)

Creepy yet benign, this leisurely graphic novel opens on the autumn equinox, when a community sends paper lanterns down a river. Five boys and a bullied tagalong science fanatic named Nathaniel make a pact to find out where the lanterns go. They pedal their bikes along a deserted road, but the vow proves daunting, and Nathaniel and the narrator, Ben, are soon alone on a bridge at the edge of town. They pledge to soldier on, unaware of a hulking shadow creature that rises from the river below. Ben approaches their subsequent adventures with trepidation, while Nathaniel greets every vertiginous cliff and bottomless lake with a gleeful grin. They take up with a fellow traveler, a stylish anthropomorphic bear who seeks to catch the floating lights, which are rumored to turn into fish en route to the stars. Andrews (Nothing Is Forgotten for adults) crafts a phantasmagoria of events that recall animation from Studio Ghibli and Cartoon Saloon. Scenes unfold beneath the Milky Way in twilit dark-blue and charcoal-gray panels, while flashbacks and industrial interiors in glowing ember hues amplify a simmering sense of threat. Picaresque episodes and a dreamlike resolution conjure a giddy sensation, like staying up all night. Ages 10-14. (June)