You Brought Me The Ocean (You Brought Me The Ocean (2020))

Just what my son wanted

“You Brought me the Ocean” is a graphic novel for Young Adults (“DC Graphic Novels for Young Adults”), in four chapters and 170+ pages (give or take a few for chapter breaks).This is a ‘graphic’ novel, with a beginning, middle and end, and with character-development driving the “plot”, such as it is – it is a life being lived story.This is set in a/the DC universe – Superman does a fly by, and Aquaman makes a flashback appearance (and not quite for what you may be expecting).This is a coming-of-age/coming-out story set in the middle of a desert, where a single-mother is hiding from her past, while her son begins to discover his. It all drives inexorably forward, but not in an overly-dramatic way, but in an inexorable but well-paced way.There are hints, rather than clues, placed here and there, some of which are relevant, and some are not – super-heroes/villains don’t come crashing in to save the day – nobody needs saving in that way here, though truth and a bit of justice do make an appearance, as possibly does the American way. As the song goes, this is “life and life only”.

This was a nice coming of age story wrapped up in a superhero origins story. The artwork is nice, a bit different from the norm because it's sketchy with pencil lines, rather than the usual bold digital art that is more prominent in comics - especially superhero comic.When I say superhero, our main character Jake doesn't suddenly because a magical badass that instantly saves people from bad guys, this is very much the beginning of an origins story - almost the origin of the origin story - so don't expect a lot of powers and fighting. This is mostly about a teenage boy who doesn't fit in anywhere and is trying to figure out why.Family, friendships, first crushes and future aspirations are all given equal measure in here. We do get the odd mention of a few heroes - this is DC after all - but this can definitely be read by people who don't like superhero comics and still be enjoyed for what it is.

Oh wow this book was amazing. The art style alone blew me away and the characters were just so relatable and incredible.I blindly went into this not knowing it was a DC comic. I didn't realize it was based around Black Mantra and his son. This added to the love i had for this comic though and I adore that it had two gay main characters. Jake and Kenny were adorable and I loved Jake's bestie Maria.I'd highly recommend this to anyone.