Yeah, the first thing I thought when I saw this book was about virtual reality was, no. But I like graphic novels, especially middle grade ones, so I thought I would give it a chance. I am so glad I did. Because this is not about virtual reality, so much, as about what benefits there are to having it.


Addie has had something happen to her mother, at the start of the book. We don’t learn what it is that happened, until nearly the end. All we know is that she isn’t around anymore, but she is still alive. Apparently she has also written letters to Addie, who doesn’t want to read them.


Her father is a professor, who gets a summer job helping college students come up with some uses for their virtual reality programs. Addie doesn’t want to help them. She doesn’t want to make friends. She doesn’t want to do anything. But Mateo, who is her age, and the college students, make her see the uses for the VR sets.

What I love is that this story builds on you. The mystery of the mother. The mystery of Mateo and his brother, that she never sees. And the people that Addie meets in the virtual reality programs.

Sweet. Sad. Well written. Addie sees that the programs are a good distraction, and can bring people out. With a holocaust survivor, she shows him his old homeland. Though the house he grew up in is gone, he recognizes the mountains. With a young boy, she lets him use her headset to distract him while he is getting chemo.

It is all quite touching, and I chewed it up.

<em>Thanks to Netgalley for making this book available for an honest review.</em>

An entertaining, yet somewhat very serious, graphic novel about teens and, as I saw it, about fitting in, and belonging. It is also about friendship, about school, about family – about all the things that happen in life. The story really comes alive in the first few pages already.
The drawings are nice and the text fits in really well there, both text and images tell the story beautifully.
This is definitely a book I will be telling people about, especially those who have teens and tweens who love graphic novels.
My tween devoured the book in one day. Turns out, the book opened some doors for a conversation about illegal prescription drugs and people misusing/abusing those and why exactly that should not be done. She also said she loved how beautiful the VR was in the book.
We will be looking forward to either part two, or just more books from this author!

2.5, really. I felt like Wendy Mass’s powers were diluted rather than augmented when written for a graphic format. VR is also diluted by illustrations of VR, or at least these. My favorite part was Mass’s afterword about how deeply excited she is about VR and how it’s a daily part of her life. Bonus points, though, for representation of a character in the protagonist’s situation vis a vis her mom, and of her mom, still a little talked about issue in middle grade lit (I can only think of one other book, and of course not the titles)—not mentioning situation here because spoiler.

Happy to have received an ARC from #netgalley, and I’ll still of course be purchasing this for the library—just not thrusting it into hands. (Review pasted from Goodreads)

LO AND BEHOLD is a love letter to the positive potentials of virtual reality. Authored by Wendy Mass, it's no surprise the story is a middle grade home run. Paired with amazing illustrations by Gabi Mendez, this graphic novel will fly off shelves! LO AND BEHOLD would complement STEM course work about the possibilities for VR technology.

Addie isn't feeling up for friendship or fun or a move across the country to a college campus for her dad's new assignment. He works in virtual reality technology. For most kids, that would make her dad the coolest, but Addie doesn't care. She just wants to learn about super old tortoises and wish that things were like the use to be before her mom's injury.

On campus, Addie meets Mateo. She doesn't want to be friends, but he's persistent. She also learns that VR is really cool. For a while, it's the perfect escape from all the things and feelings she doesn't want to deal with. But no matter how much time you spend in VR, reality is still happening. When Addie finally gives friendship a real shot, she learns that she isn't the only one going through grief and more people than just her need a place to escape and find hope.

This is a beautiful graphic novel by Wendy Mass. I really liked the characters and how much we see the changes over the summer. There are some really deep issues talked about within this as well. Addie's mom's went through a lot and we watched how it has affected their family. We learn more as we go along. I liked Addie a lot and how real she was. I can always count on Wendy Mass to write real characters that you can relate to. I liked her relationship with her dad. And I liked how she becomes friends with Mateo. We learn a lot about empathy too, I really loved that and the seeing through others eyes.
All the virtual reality is really cool too!

This is a graphic novel that I can see a lot of middle graders and teens liking and relating to.

Thanks NetGalley for this ARC!