Teen Titans: Raven
Teen Titans: Raven book cover

Teen Titans: Raven

Paperback – July 2, 2019

by
Price
$12.76
Format
Paperback
Pages
192
Publisher
DC Ink
Publication Date
ISBN-13
978-1401286231
Dimensions
5.98 x 0.42 x 8.97 inches
Weight
12.8 ounces

Description

From School Library Journal Gr 7 Up–Seventeen-year-old Raven grieves the loss of her foster mother, but she can't remember her at all—the car wreck that took her mother's life took Raven's memories, too. Raven moves to New Orleans to live with her foster mother's sister, Natalia, and Natalia's daughter Max. At school, Raven is overwhelmed by the deafening anxieties of her classmates. Not only can she sense their emotions but when she wishes ill on the school mean girl, she discovers that her dark thoughts actually come true. Raven and Max must learn what's causing these strange abilities. Meanwhile, Natalia knows a sinister force is operating on Raven and seeks the counsel of the spirit world. Garcia's ambitious origin story of a Teen Titan is funny and unequivocally feminist. Her Raven is curious and kind, but the star of this tale is Max, whose fierce loyalty, unending patience, and strong moral compass make her the best friend we all wish we had. Raven's romance with the all-too-perfect Tommy Torres initially feels tacked on but ultimately finds a place in the increasingly complicated plot. In Natalia's appeals to the spirit world, Garcia presents an empowering representation of New Orleans African American spiritual life. Picolo's gorgeous illustrations are dynamic and nuanced. Particularly lovely is the New Orleans scenery; the ornate balconies and crumbling graveyards evoke the gritty beauty of the city. Raven's style (a chic, violet-tinged bob; dark hair and nails; combat boots) will appeal to budding punks. VERDICT Lovers of superheroes will appreciate this complex origin story.—Anna Murphy, Berkeley Carroll School, Brooklyn "Kami Garcia shows off her stellar storytelling skills in this fantastic first installment of Teen Titans. Once you start reading Teen Titans: Raven , you won’t want to stop.” —Stephanie Garber, #1 New York Times bestselling author of thexa0Caravalxa0series“As someone who spends half her life inside Rachel’s head…it was impressive to see her so effortlessly come to life on the page! If you love Raven, this is a must-read!” — Teagan Croft, actress portraying Raven in thexa0DC Universexa0series Titans “Kami Garcia's Raven shows us that family bonds are made by more than blood, and that the ties of sisterhood are more powerful than the scariest demon. It's the heart of this awesome kickass “girl power" superhero book that keeps you reading and rereading and desperate for the next installment.”xa0 —Ellen Oh, author of The Prophecy series, and Cofounder and President of We Need Diverse Books “I continue to be inspired by Kami Garcia’s authenticity and keen ability to create raw and empowering stories full of strength, truth, and love.” — Jenniferxa0Niven, New York Times bestselling author of All the Bright Places and Holding Up the Universe “With Teen Titans: Raven , writer Kami Garcia and artist Gabriel Picolo have created a new and different look for Raven, yet she still shares the DNA of the mystical heroine created in 1980 by me and artist co-creator, George Pérez. Explore and enjoy!” —Marvxa0Wolfman, co-creator of Ravenxa0"A fast-paced adventure that weaves mystery, romance, and girl power. Kami Garcia’s Raven is perfect for die-hard Teen Titans fans, but will definitely pick up new fans along the way.” —Zoraida Córdova, award-winning author of The Brooklyn Brujas series"Garcia’s ambitious origin story of a Teen Titan is funny and unequivocally feminist.xa0Picolo’s gorgeous illustrations are dynamic and nuanced.xa0Lovers of superheroes will appreciate this complex origin story." — School Library Journal "Well-paced and thrilling; readers will fly high with Raven's tale." — Kirkus Reviews "Picolo’s spare, effective use of color and slightly edgy art helps situate the story in a supernaturally tinged world of high-school drama.xa0…Garcia’s exploration of the connection between memory and identity offers a promising entrée to the Teen Titans series." — Publishers Weekly" Kami Garcia has taken an iconic Teen Titans character and turned her into a beautiful warrior. Garcia has brought wonderful depth to this Teen Titans powerhouse." —Annie Carl, The Neverending Bookshop Kami Garcia is the #1 New York Times and USA Today bestselling coauthor of the Beautiful Creatures novels, which have been published in 50 countries and 38 languages. She is also the author of five solo novels, including two Bram Stoker Award nominees. Her forthcoming graphic novel Teen Titans: Raven , illustrated by artist Gabriel Piccolo, is the first title in her Teen Titans series for DC Ink. Find Kami online at kamigarcia.com.Gabriel Picolo is Brazilian comic artist and illustrator based in São Paulo. His work has become known for its strong storytelling and atmospheric colors. Picolo has developed projects for clients such as Blizzard, BOOM! Studios, Harper Collins, and DeviantART. Read more

Features & Highlights

  • A
  • New York Times bestseller!
  • USA Today
  • and
  • Publishers Weekly
  • bestseller!When a tragic accident takes the life of 17-year-old Raven Roth's foster mom--and Raven's memory--she moves to New Orleans to recover and finish her senior year of high school.
  • Starting over isn't easy. Raven remembers everyday stuff like how to solve math equations and make pasta, but she can't remember her favorite song or who she was before the accident. And when impossible things start happening, Raven begins to think it might even be better not to know who she was before.But as she grows closer to her new friends, her foster sister, Max, and Tommy Torres, a guy who accepts her for who she is now, Raven has to decide if she's ready to face what's buried in the past...and the darkness building inside her.From #1
  • New York Times
  • bestselling author Kami Garcia and first-time graphic novel artist Gabriel Picolo comes this riveting tale of finding the strength to face who you are and learning to trust others--and yourself.

Customer Reviews

Rating Breakdown

★★★★★
60%
(2.8K)
★★★★
25%
(1.2K)
★★★
15%
(708)
★★
7%
(331)
★
-7%
(-331)

Most Helpful Reviews

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The Five Stars are for Gabriel Picolo

Gabriel Picolo has been making Teen Titans art for years; these characters are basically his children. For DC to hire him on a Teen Titans book, and then again for Teen Titans: Beast Boy, coming Summer 2020, must have been a dream come true for him, and even just as a fan of his work, this has been incredible to see.

Then there’s the writer, Kami Garcia, who in her acknowledgements states she needed to be convinced to write a graphic novel, much less a Raven story.

Make NO mistake, the art is an absolute treasure, and this book can still be immensely appreciated and enjoyed based on its art alone. However, this contrast in the artist and writer’s interest, willingness, and dedication to these characters is hard to ignore, and is why the story falls flat.

While typically a story in this medium should be judged on its writing and art together, DC Ink and DC Zoom’s line of YA graphic novels makes that very hard to do. It seems as though DC just slapped together a bunch of novelists and artists, expected the novelists to be good at writing in an entirely different medium, and expected the artist to just illustrate whatever the author wrote. When instead, DC should have carefully paired up artists and writers with good synergy, who would work together to create a story where they both played to each other’s strengths.

But what we get is KAMI GARCIA in huge lettering on the front cover and a barely noticeable credit to Gabriel Picolo. It’s also worth mentioning that Picolo was not allowed a foreword like Garcia was, which I thought was extremely unfair.

While the reader does not need any prior knowledge of the Teen Titans or Raven to understand or enjoy this story, the team producing it should still understand core aspects about these characters, which Gabriel Picolo absolutely does. Kami Garcia, however, barely wrote a Raven book. So much of this story has nothing to do with Raven, and it’s clear that that’s because Kami Garcia doesn’t know who Raven is. Garcia adds a bunch of original characters and concepts that have nothing to do with Raven or the real story at hand, that it ends up reaching a climax with poor build-up and an even poorer resolution.

Back to the art, while Gabriel Picolo’s art is phenomenal and really the only reason you should buy this book, and you should, something seemed off. I don’t know if it was the editor, or Garcia herself, but Picolo’s art and coloring is very subdued compared to the Teen Titans art Picolo’s fans are used to seeing on his socials. They are vibrant with colors that pop, where this book is gray and maybe sometimes purple. The pictures included with this review are an example of a subdued page, followed by those that exhibit Picolo's strengths as a colorist. These few panels where things are more fully colored, you can see Picolo’s skill shine through; perhaps his vibrant pages could have even brightened Garcia’s dull writing.

More on that, though, is that in the sneak peek we get for Teen Titans: Beast Boy, there’s already a noticeable difference in how it’s colored. So maybe Picolo has more freedom in the next one.

Kami Garcia is still the writer for the next one, which is very unfortunate, but I’ll be buying the graphic novel regardless, because these are fantastic lookbooks of the characters, and it’s incredibly satisfying getting to Gabriel Picolo’s art in this officially licensed capacity. He’s come so far, and that’s worth supporting no matter who writes the book.
110 people found this helpful
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Disappointing

I'm honestly very disappointed with this book. Raven has always been my favorite titan and I had high expectations for this new series. The art looks great, but the story is lacking/shallow. I know it's tough to tell a story in the restrictions placed by a comic, but the stakes never felt very high, the characters received little to no development, and a lot of the dialogue (and "texting") was more distracting than it was beneficial. Oof.
I hope this is just a springboard to better titan stories.
20 people found this helpful
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Not as good as I'd hoped...

So, to provide some context for this review, I'm a middle-aged male and I've been reading comics for a long, long time. So, I am not the target audience for this book and that should be kept in mind.

I appreciate that DC is creating comics for new readers and I think the concept behind this book is great. They've re-imagined this character and updated her for a new audience. This version of Raven is much more contemporary and interesting than the one that exists in "in-continuity" DC comics. That's a good move on their part and in that sense I think this book is a success.

My problem with "Raven" is that I don't think it's actually very well-written. The characters are two-dimensional, the dialogue is very on-the-nose, and there's nothing particularly innovative or nuanced about any of it. It doesn't read like actual people talking; it's all fairly stereotypical. (Especially cringe-worthy was the scene where one teenager calls out another on her "homophobia.")

The art is also a bit lackluster. I really like the cover and I actually really like how most of the art is sort of faded out and color-less but then occasionally there's a splash of color. But the faces and the "movement" of the characters is a bit sloppy at times. I'm not sure if Gabriel Picolo has done comics before, but he doesn't seem to have a good handle on how to layout an interesting page. The individual panels are okay, but the overall effect is a bit lackluster.

All told, this isn't a terrible book and it may be that young adults will like it more than I did. I think they did a lot of things right in re-imagining this character for a contemporary audience but personally I found it a bit uninspired.
16 people found this helpful
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Buy This Book!!! Best Comic I've Read In Ages!!

I can't say enough good things about this comic book! I remember watching Teen Titans Go when I was a bit younger, and I always loved Raven. This book brings this remarkable character into a new light, one that I can connect with even more now (I'm a 15yo female). I've been a fan of Gabriel Picolo for years now, and I'm so excited that his Teen Titans art is making its way into such fantastic books. I highly recommend this to anyone who loves DC, introverted female heroes, and the color black.
14 people found this helpful
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Loved it

I love this comic. I love the art and Picolo's use of color to bring more attention to raven so that she isn't lost in the muted tones around her and to better show her emotions around her. I've always loved Kami Garcia's writing so no surprise i do very much enjoy the way she portrayed Raven and her different take on Raven's story. I enjoyed the story through and through and can't wait for Beast boy.
13 people found this helpful
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A new beginning

One of the things about characters in comic books is that they get periodically re-invented. A new artistic team comes on board, an old story line gets refreshed, a character gets updated - there are lots of reasons. When your character's identity is as a teen age hero, it is a necessity - they only have a limited number of years to be a teen age hero after all.

How well have Kami Garcia and Gabriel Picolo pulled this off this new origin story for Raven, AKA Rachel Roth? It covers a lot of familiar territory: a person coming into adulthood, trying to discover just who they are, what they can do, what they really want - there's plenty of drama in that alone.

But that's not enough. Add in a large dose of tragedy - the story opens with her foster mom telling Raven she's going to finalize adoption, despite some dark news they just got about her background when a car crash robs her of both her mother to be and her memory.

Three weeks later, she's in a new city with her late foster mother's sister, in a new school, and with a would-be sister. She can't remember what she likes in music, clothing, or much else, though she's still able to do well in classroom stuff. She's a stranger to herself, and isn't even sure if the person she was is someone she'd like. She just doesn't know.

She starts to hear voices, see strange shadows. Things seem to happen around her that can't be explained. Her new family seems to have knowledge of things beyond those of ordinary people - and there are others who seem to be keeping her in their sights. But she's also making friends, discovering things she likes, even starting to explore sexuality and romance.

Garcia and Picolo do a masterful job setting up the story line, building to a big reveal and setting the stage for more to come. Along the way we begin to get a sense of who Raven is as she begins to discover her true self, and it's a story that makes us want to care about what happens next. While there are some cliche story elements - like the High School mean girl - they're not overplayed and they don't always go the way you'd expect.

The artwork is largely black, white, and shades of gray, with touches of spot color and the occasional color page. It's a style that supports the story line of a young woman trying to tread a line between light and shadow, knowing she has ties to both she can't escape.

Raven is a character in DC's Teen Titan's universe. If you've been following her before, this new imagining of her story may or may not suit, but I think you'll find it worth a look. If you are new to Raven and the Teen Titans, the story has a lot of development ahead. At some point she'll be meeting up with them and mixing their story with hers.

It promises to be an interesting ride.
13 people found this helpful
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Favorite titan and favorite artist!

This book was gorgeous in art style and i’d Been waiting for it to show up in my mailbox since preordering it. The story was cute and cool but there were moments where I wanted a little more explanation for some events (I won’t say what to avoid spilling spoilers). Aside from that I enjoyed it and it’s nice to see my favorite titan have a new beginning in origin!
12 people found this helpful
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Dont waste your money

I was super hype a new teen titans series was coming out, but in my opinion, this is the worst.
The concept of a more modern day teen titans is great dont get me wrong, but the execution was horrible.

There are so many cliches, the characters are super bland and extreamly different from the original, and everything seems so stereotypical.
It basically reads like a fanfiction made on wattpad by a 14 year old in an emo phase.

The only reason why I'm giving it some stars is because I love the artwork and the book was physically good quality.
10 people found this helpful
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It was okay...

For someone who didn't know anything at all about Teen Titans or Raven, I enjoyed discovering a new character. But this was disappointing. As far as the plot is concerned, there was no tension and it was extremely predictable, which made for a rather boring read, it took me three days to finish this, which is way too long for something this short.

I thought the characterization for Raven was pretty good for the most part. I liked her and wanted to know what was going on. The side characters were all pretty flat though. Popular bully. Cardboard cut-out friends. "Hot" guy who's too nice, so of course he has a very easy-to-figure-out secret. Typical nice mom types. Raven's new friend, Nola, had a secret that didn't come up until the halfway mark or later, and I still don't really understand the point of her "abilities." It didn't seem very useful, and since they introduced it so late, it felt incredibly random.

The ending felt rushed and sudden. Like Raven gets her memories back, and then immediately realizes she has powers and uses them to do a whole lot of nothing, which made the entire plot feel kind of pointless.

I didn't really like this. It wasn't very engaging. The build-up wasn't very good. There was too much teen drama and angst that didn't feel natural at all. But I like the concept of the plot, I just wish it had been executed better.
10 people found this helpful
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Boring. If you’re 15 you might like it

The book arrived in really good condition. However the story is pretty terrible. Each line of dialogue feels like a 30 year old trying to sound like a modern day high school student. The artwork is also pretty hit or miss which stinks because Gabriel Picolo is actually really skilled. If you’re still in high school you might like it. But I sure don’t.
9 people found this helpful

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