25 Comics and Graphic Novels to keep your kids reading comics - Part 2: Tween, Teen and YA Recommendations

Following on from Part One of our huge round-up of cool comics for kids, we're concentrating on the older end of our two part article, this time with a huge selection of comics and graphic novels to entertain your tweens, teens and young adult readers. Keeping kids reading as they mosey on through their teenage years is super-tough. There are so many more distractions and other things that they want to focus their spare time and attention on, and with national figures suggesting that kids in general - particularly teens - have far less free time away from school / study duties than ever before, it's sometimes difficult to keep 'em interested and engaged with reading for pleasure.

This article represented a tougher challenge anyway, not just because of the vast difference in experience and maturity between the ages of 11 and 19 (and beyond), but also because quite often the comics and graphic novels featured here are definitely not something you'd be happy for a Tween to read, but may be slightly less grumpy to let your 15 year olds loose on.

So bear with, bear with! Please don't berate me on Twitter if you don't agree with the categorisation of anything that appears in this list, it's merely a guide, a radar boost, and a roundup of stuff we (well, mostly I) have enjoyed from the last decade of catching up with comics.

There are so many, many more I could've included but I've tried to make this a fairly eclectic (read: bonkers) list comprising new stuff and classics in equal meaure.

Note that if I think a particular title contains excessive violence, sexual content or swearing, I'll do my best to flag this next to the title of the comic / graphic novel in question, but read this article with the assumption that you need a fairly thick skin and a level of maturity to read any of these.

Enough yakking! Let's kick off then with our selection of 25 awesome comics and graphic novels with some for Tweens, Teens and YA (with a rough guideline age recommendation of 11 up, and some titles flagged for mature content - is that enough advisories? Hope so!).

1) Battle Angel Alita by Yukito Kishiro (Kodansha Comics) (Violence, Nudity, Swearing)

Yukito Kishiro's timeless cyberpunk classic definitely deserves a mention in this roundup, purely because it's a technically dazzling slice of cybernetic science fiction that barely pauses for breath. With the original volumes now reprinted and presented in classy hardcover editions, there's never been a better time to discover the story of android Alita, rescued from the scrap pile by Dr Ido and restored to her former glory as a death-dealing protagonist of the Panzer Kunst fighting style.

The main story arc shift gears effortlessly from almost pinocchio-like 'fish-out-of-water' stuff as Ido and Alita form a strong bond, through to uber-violent confrontations with insane warrior androids who want to watch the world burn, and in particular would very much like to see the lofty sky city of Zalem (which hovers, sentinel like, above the scrap-heap world Alita finds herself in) come tumbling down.

Kishiro's artwork is stupendous, with the tightest ink work, fantastic designs and thoroughly absorbing characters that are trademarks of the series. Though there's about three different story arcs and a series based on Mars too, the classics begin with the above Volume one as a good starting point. (bonus: these often crop up on ComiXology fairly cheap, and if you read them digitally you might not completely mess your brain up trying to decode classic manga "right to left, bottom to top" strip formats you'll find in these).

2) Beautiful Darkness by Fabien Vehlmann and Kerascoet (Drawn and Quarterly) (Infant mortality, Violence, grisly bits)

Definitely do not be lulled into a false sense of security by the cover of this book, it's definitely NOT the sort of thing you want to share with your little ones, in fact I've not even let my 11 year old daughter anywhere near it yet so definitely bear this in mind before jumping in.

"Beautiful Darkness" by Vehlmann and Kerascoet seems to offer up a cutesy-pie fairytale world at first glimpse, before that world comes crashing down amidst the story's chosen backdrop - the dead body of a little girl lost in the woods, and her gradual decomposition as the main story progresses.

At first reading you'd be mistaken in thinking that the book deals with a fairly vapid fairytale, a young beautiful maiden named Aurora vies for the attention of a vainglorious prince, eventually shunned by this complete dolt (who does get his comeuppance in a rather grisly way).

The story descends into a "Lord of the Flies-like" struggle for survival as the cute characters soon realise that their resources (and in most cases, their intelligence) are limited, and the seemingly innocuous woodland creatures they share a home with are nothing less than base, bloodthirsty animals acting on their own survival instincts.

Aurora's transformation from whimsical girly-girl to outright revenge-seeker during this story is never anything less than compelling, and the finale is both cheered for and horrific in equal measure. I guarantee you'll never have seen anything like this before, it's a work of warped genius.

3) Tamsin and the Deep / Dark by Neill Cameron and Kate Brown (Phoenix / David Fickling Books) 

No warnings on this one, so it's pretty safe for your tweens / pre-teens, though does deal with a goodly dose of dark celtic magic. There is swearing in here, but it's dealt with in an extremely clever way - and bear in mind that this strip did go out originally in kids comic "The Phoenix" so I'll stick with my 'no real warnings here' thing.

"Tamsin and the Deep" and "Tamsin and the Dark" both chronicle young Tamsin's fairly ordinary life, annoying older brother, and daydreamy existence in a fairly boring and ordinary Cornish village. But all that is set to change as Tamsin discovers that legendary monsters are real, and she may be the only person on the planet powerful enough to live up to the legacy of Arthur and Merlin, and keep the world safe from dark forces intent on crushing the barrier between our world and theirs.

It's sublime stuff, perfectly observed and pitched to feel contemporary, but dipping into celtic legend and magic enough to keep you guessing and on the back foot as Tamsin's character evolves, and she begins to realise that her role as The Last Pellar isn't something to be undertaken lightly.

Dark, gripping and utterly fan-flipping-tastic stuff.

4) 2000AD (Rebellion Publishing, various artists and authors, plenty of violence and swearing (if you know what "Drokk" means)


As a surly kid, I remember buying the very first issue of 2000AD way back on the 26th Feb 1977, mostly because my usual comic of the time (Krazy Comic - remember that?) wasn't in stock at our local newsagents and I had 10p burning a hole in my pocket. The first issue - complete with plastic space spinner - was absolutely stunning and ended up with me being totally hooked for the next 13 years. Not really sure what happened in the 90s but rediscovering this comic as a grown-up, and reacquainting myself with the likes of Judge Dredd and all the other fantastic strips that feature in the modern 2000AD has been a real trip over the last year and a bit.

Jumping back in, I'm thrilled to see that the comic is every bit as classy, relevant and downright reeking of quality as it always has been (and those Kingsley boys know a thing or two about preserving the legacy of awesome Brit comics, acquiring a ton of amazing IPs such as Misty, Scream and others).

But here you'll find a hectic mix of fantasy and sci fi, horror and downright surrealism to match anything you might have imagined or heard about this hugely influential comic. Still awesome, still packed with thrill power, and still absolutely essential.

5)  "My Favourite Thing is Monsters" by Emil Ferris (Fantagraphics) (Violence, Sex, Swearing)

It just took one look at the cover of this book to make me leap in and buy it, rendered in the most amazing biro-art style I've ever seen - and paying homage to the sort of "Monster of the Week" B-movies that Universal Studios used to churn out.

It's actually the story of 10 year old Karen Reyes whose truly monstrous appearance belies a curiosity and intelligence way beyond her years.

When a tenant in her building dies under mysterious circumstances, Karen decides to play detective and investigate, and soon uncovers that Anka (the deceased classy lady she once befriended) had a horrific and trouble past, set against the backdrop of Nazi Germany.

Karen finds out more about Anka through tapes she recorded while alive, and soon the plot becomes even more complicated as Karen's own brother is seemingly not quite as innocent as he appears - nor is Anka's husband.

Come for those amazing visuals and exquisite details - there's nothing else quite like this out there in comics - and stay for a thoroughly absorbing and multi-layered plot that dances between allegory and growing pains as Karen becomes more aware of her world, and the darkness that tinges it at every step. We're currently on the edge of our seats waiting for Volume 2 (which is hopefully arriving in September this year) but can fully see why these take Emil so long to complete, they're gorgeous stories.

6) Spider-Man: Spiderverse by Christos Gage, Dan Slott, Olivier Coipel, Michael Costa (Mild Violence and icky bits)

Arguably one of the most groundbreaking titles to hit Spidey-dom, and part of the inspiration for the stupendous Oscar-winning "Into the Spider-Verse" movie, this whopping great big collected volume gathers together the silken threads of multiple Spider-Man characters and story arcs into one delicious multi-hued edition.

Someone's hunting Spider-Men and Spider-Women (and for that matter, Spider-Pigs!) across different parallel realities, and the spiderfolk that are left have gathered together to try and stop the nefarious Inheritors - super powerful beings that see the Spiders as nothing but a tasty snack.

There's a huge collection of creatives who contributed to this series, yet it's a fantastically coherent piece of work. Though the movie went off on its own path of dealing with the idea of multiple Marvel universes all inhabited by different versions of well-known heroes, this book does more to solidify that idea into something completely unmissable and essential for any would-be comic collector.

7) Batman: The Dark Knight Returns by Frank Miller, Klaus Janson and Lynn Varley (DC Comics) (Violence, Sex, Swearing)


I have a real love-hate relationship with Frank Miller's stuff but there's no denying that "The Dark Knight Returns" rode the wave of comic coolness when it dropped like a bomb back in 1986. Back then I was still completely obsessed with 2000AD, and Batman comics were in a huge slump. This graphic novel changed everything though, not only making Batman darker and grittier than he'd ever been before, but showing even more of his frailties and flaws, his more human (and fallible) side, something comics always seemed to steer well away from with well-established superhero types.

Of course this graphic novel opened the floodgates for decades of 'gritty, dark' comics, with virtually every comic creative taking a long hard look at their own characters to see where they could perform the same trick.

Subsequent Miller outings with the Bat haven't quite lit the fire as brilliantly as this did, and it was obviously hugely influential on the later darker tone of Christopher Nolan's movie treatments of Batman. Don't shiv, pick it up!

8) Paper Girls by Bryan K. Vaughan, Cliff Chiang and Matt Wilson (Image Comics) (Violence, Swearing)

Sure, Netflix's "Stranger Things" might have made 80s retro 'cool' again, but this comic goes one step further, hopping across different timelines to weave a fantastic story of four 12 year old  papergirls drawn into a cataclysmic fight for survival.

Erin, Mackenzie, KJ and Tiffany set out on their paper route in Stony Stream as usual - but as Halloween draws to a close, the world changes around them - and they realise that the shady characters mooching around the neighbourhood aren't just bored teens in costume.

When they discover a strange machine in a basement, the real trouble begins - and soon the four girls are forced to dig into their own inner strength just to stay alive, and examine the true meaning of friendship as they often end up shoulder to shoulder, facing off against a world - and enemies - both familiar and unfamiliar.

The storyline timehops effortlessly, even going back to the very origins of paperboys and girls as the four try to make sense of the messed-up machinations of a nefarious set of foes who keep dicking with time.

There are so many brilliant moments in this comic series, ranging from the all-too-familiar feelings around your last days of childhood, and the horror of finding out what sort of adult you'll grow up to be (yeah, I think I'd be pretty horrified if I'd seen my future self at the tender age of 12) make this one of the most original and dazzling titles I've seen in the last decade. Completely unmissable and essential stuff.

9) Crowded by Chris Sebela, Ro Stein and Ted Brandt (Image Comics) (Violence, Sex, Swearing, Zero-Hour Gig Economies)

Without a doubt, my favourite comic of 2019, now taking a bit of a break before it picks up again this year - but giving you ten solid volumes of near-futuristic craziness that you definitely need to get in on before they turn it into a movie (Rebel Wilson is attached as creative / star for a movie treatment, make of that what you will!)

Charlie Ellison is an ordinary everyday lowlife, flitting from app-driven job to app-driven job in a world framed as 'ten minutes into the future' but increasingly looking, sounding and feeling very much like our own.

Some might describe Charlie as annoying, but annoying enough to become the subject of a REAPR campaign? REAPR is an app-driven crowd-funded assassination scheme, and Charlie finds herself hunted by just about everyone on the planet.

In desperation she turns to Vita, the lowest-rated bodyguard on the DFend app - and the two strike up an unlikely alliance as Charlie's bounty begins to hit six figures. Will the duo survive and perhaps find a quiet moment for more than just a strained friendship?

Crowded is a work of genius, in fact it's one of those comics that uses such an effective core idea that you'll wonder why no one thought of it sooner. Charlie is funny, annoying, sexy and vulnerable all at the same time while Vita is focused and super-smooth, deadly and skilled - but like all teflon-coated bad-asses she has a heart of gold tucked under that stylish yellow biker jacket. You'll not find a cooler comic series to get into on the ground floor so grab up those first 10 volumes and see what the fuss is about!

10) Motor Crush by Brenden Fletcher, Babs Tarr and Cameron Stuart (Image Comics) (Violence, Sex, Swearing, Drug Use)


Did you spend way too much of your misspent youth playing Road Rash on the Sega Megadrive? Ever wondered what it'd be like if someone based a comic around motorcycle combat, sexy badasses and a strange drug that heightens the senses and reaction times?

Motor Crush (like most of Image Comics' catalogue) is just effortlessly cool. Domino Swift is the lead character, by day she's a competitor on the superfast world motorcycle racing league. By night she can't resist the lure of illegal street races, often fuelled by an addictive drug known as Crush.

Domino's past catches up with her as she begins to find fame in her legit day job, and her night-time illegal activities have greater implications for her home, her friends and her surrogate family.

Frenetically paced and brilliantly sexy (mostly thanks to Babs Tarr's incredible characters and drool-worthy sense of fashion), the series has gone from strength to strength and shows no sign of slowing down for stop signals.

11) Saga by Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples (Image comics) (You name it, it's in here and I'm warning you about it. Violence, alien ballsacks, TV headed robots boning, the list is endless)



Honestly, I will quit with the Image Comics love-in but had to squeeze this one in, simply because there has never been anything quite like it in comics, and I doubt there ever will be.

"Saga" is the sort of science fiction that flatly refuses to be pigeonholed, but in essence uses a theme that feels instantly familiar. Two warring worlds, a pointless conflict, and a bond between two lonely soldiers on either side that turns into something truly epoch-making.

It's extremely difficult to sum this comic up, suffice to say that it's sexy, deviant-baiting, grossly disturbing and heartwarming all at one and the same time as main characters Marko and Alana fall in love and become parents while being relentlessly pursued across the galaxy by deadly foes.

The only frame of reference I could possibly compare "Saga" to is a mix between a grown-up version of Farscape (that wonky old sci-fi show) and Lexx (in fact the earliest episodes of Lexx are very close in tone and feel to Saga at times, I wonder if they were an influence on Brian K. Vaughan when he was creating this).

Fiona Staples seems to be able to literally illustrate any scene (I mean once you've seen a sexy arachnic assassin making sweet love to a chunky bald lance wielding homicidal maniac you've pretty much only seen the tip of the iceberg of the sort of stuff you'll find in this comic series). Though taking a break, we're promised it'll be back sometime later this year. Don't expect a decent movie treatment though, I doubt hollywood would be capable of making anything this cool stand up on screen.

12) Hark, A Vagrant! and Step Aside, Pops! by Kate Beaton (Jonathan Cape) (Swearing, Sex references)

 No one should be allowed to be as funny as Kate Beaton, it's not really good for the nation's health to laugh until you sincerely feel like you've hurt something inside.

So imagine Horrible Histories if it was written by a Canadian girl who swears like a docker, and treats literary characters with the lack of respect they so richly deserve. Kate effortlessly flits between comic strips about historic characters, pop culture, and derpy teens with ease, producing strips that are probably not safe to read in polite company, if that polite company is alarmed by loud guffaws and laugh-crying.

No subject is sacred as Kate lays waste to Superman & Lois Lane, Jane Eyre and Mr Rochester, Napoleon, Lord Byron and countless others. Worth picking up both "Hark! A Vagrant!" and "Step Aside, Pops!" just for the utterly sublime book cover stuff that comes later on in each.

Not difficult to see how she adapts so well to writing for kids (See "King Baby" and "The Princess and the Pony" - both of which are utterly awesome picture books) with such a brilliant and subversive observational eye for gut-busting humour!

13) The Perry Bible Fellowship Almanac by Nicholas Gurewitch(Violence, Sex, Swearing)

I can't remember how I found the web comic version of The Perry Bible Fellowship but dipping into the weird collection of irreverent one-shot panels and strips tickles the darker corners of my humour for sure.

There have been a couple of collected editions printed, encompassing most of the strips but this whopping great big almanac tenth anniversary edition is arriving on the 20th of January so it seems like a good opportunity to mention it here.

Imagine Gary Larson's sweetly innocent (by comparison) Far Side gone bad, left at the back of the fridge, or hanging out with the wrong crowd at the Mall and you'll get a flavour of the sort of humour you'll find in here.

Gurewitch is the sort of person you feel slightly guilty for finding funny when in polite company, but will read later on while laughing your tailbone off. Like Kate Beaton's strips, Gurewitch spares nothing, no-one, with his steely wit and gaze. "Today is my birthday" is one example of his genius, with a happy-go-lucky character leaping out of bed to celebrate their birthday while death in the second panel silently moves one more bead along an abacus. Dark, subversive and wickedly funny.

14) Porcelain by Benjamin Read and Chris Wildgoose (Improper Books) (Violence, Swearing). 

I'm not sure if there's such a genre as "Bone China Punk" but this book could've been invented purely to coin that phrase. "Porcelain" by Benjamin Read and Chris Wildgoose is a superb darkly gothic and highly original tale of a young orphan who is taken under the protective wing of an alchemical genius with a dark secret - the power to bring porcelain figures and animals to life.

"Child" enjoys her amazing life at first, wanting for nothing, but when the dark secrets of his alchemical process for imbuing life to the lifeless is revealed, he must pay the ultimate price.

This first volume ushers in a series where we follow Child's life as she grows up and (mild spoilers) assumes the porcelain maker's mantle, and becomes a rebellious force, resisting the army's attempts to procure a porcelain army to send into battle.

Brilliantly written with art to die for, it deserves a huge amount more attention than it gets, and is worthy of inclusion in our hot list.

15) Monstress by Marjorie Liu and Sana Takeda (Image Comics) (Violence, Nudity)

Another amazing comic series, collected into glorious volumes and completely unmissable, "Monstress" by Marjorie Liu and Sana Takeda takes place in an alternate post-industrialised world where magic is more prevalent than machine.

A young girl discovers that she possesses a psychic link to a dark and violent monster, and finds herself drawn to doing its bidding amidst the backdrop of a world shattered by war.

Witches and magic are frowned upon, even outlawed, but the girl and her miscreant band of followers embark on an epic quest to discover the true nature of her powers, and perhaps her own origins.

With a touch of The Dark Crystal or Labyrinth about it at times, yet completely and utterly original, this is one of the most beautifully illustrated comics you'll ever see with Takeda's artwork nothing short of luxurious, worthy of framing and sticking in any art gallery you care to mention. It twists and turns plot-wise like a curved dagger, but spares time for moments of heartfelt sensitivity. Just eye-poppingly amazing stuff!

16) The Umbrella Academy by Gerard Way and Gabriel Ba (Dark Horse Comics) (Violence, Swearing)

Another comic that's spawned a hit Netflix show, Gerard Way and Gabriel Ba's "The Umbrella Academy" is far more fantastical, surreal and essential in its original comic form.

Kicking off with a colossal battle involving an animated Eiffel Tower, seemingly brought to life to wreak havoc on Paris, the tale chronicles the fate of seven orphans all born on the same day at the same time across the world, all but one seemingly imbued with a mystical power of their own.

The orphans are collected together by a seemingly benevolent benefactor, Sir Reginald Hargreaves, to become a superpowered force for good.

Klaus, Allison, Vanya, Diego, Luther, Ben, and Number Five are trained to work together as an elite team of superheroes and assassins, but each child has their own flaws - which come to light as the graphic novel digs its treads into the snow and starts to gain traction.
Tillie Walden  is one of the most important talents working in modern comics - and effortlessly demonstrates why she was one of the youngest ever Eisner Award nominees with this sprawling science fiction space epic that - for someone so young - could almost be a piece of career defining work (but we're pleased to say that we predict Tillie is only just getting into her stride!)

"On a Sunbeam" at first feels like one of those comics you're going to need to read through a dozen or so times before you're going to understand its layers and nuances.

Yet the themes it explores are familiar, heart-wrenching, joyful, sad and relatable all at the same time, covering a lot of ground - and in a comic with 544 pages, plenty of space to go into great depth in the way the story unfolds.

This is the story of a young girl named Mia, and her chronicle begins as she embarks as a crew member of the Spacecraft Aktis. Its mission: to repair ancient buildings in monuments tucked into the dark cloak of space. Mia's attention wanders, and her memory constantly floats back to a time when she was a pupil at a space-going boarding school (and if "Space-going boarding school" isn't the phrase that hooks you into buying this, there's really no hope for you) and her closeness and eventual love and infatuation with a fellow pupil.
24) "Lone Wolf and Cub Omnibus Volume 1" by Kazuo Koike and Goseki Kojima (Dark Horse Comics) (Violence, Sex, Nudity, frequent head chopping and disembowelment)