A dystopian YA comic full of adventure, threats, evil corporation, environmental break down causing terrible futures, and an aggravated girl who luckily learnt to use a katana ... this comes from a genre which seems to be super popular in the last 10 years. This comic will please the 14 to 16 age group, but was a little lacking in characterisation. There is a very long karaoke scene which I suppose is meant to make us feel more for the characters, but I would have really preferred another way of getting them to bond and for us to get to know them. In a cartoon music works, without the sound it reads a little weird and pointless.
Depending on the future volumes, this could be a very good series, as it stands I'm not quite sure which way to go. It really depends on how in depth the plot is going to turn out and the character journey. There is nothing very new here, but if you feel angsty like teens usually do, like the hero, this will probably talk to you more.

I don’t want to sound mean, but there was nothing I liked about this comic. The plot was all over the place, the characters had no distinct personalities, and I really didn’t like the art style. And why were there people with animal heads? I think I missed the explanation, if there was one.

Set in a world that could very much be our future. This story had me engaged from the first panel. I literally could not stop reading. I was drawn in by the mystery, by the setting and by the amazing art and character design. I eagerly await the next book and will talk about this book forever!

I do have to appreciate the imagination that’s needed to create the world, plot and character design for a book like this, I think that’s incredible. However, I unfortunately didn’t love it. I wasn’t hooked and I didn’t find myself yearning to find out what happens next. I will say though, it was very fast paced and I did enjoy reading it, it’s just when I put it down I would find it hard to pick it back up again. I think this novel really would have benefitted from a cliffhanger, but I do have to say the two pages of questions regarding what happens in the next book did intrigue me.
Overall, not entirely for me but I really do think there is the audience out there for this book.

(3.5/5) This middle grades graphic novel is a great intro to dystopian sci-fi, and I enjoyed reading it. The art style is engaging, character designs are interesting, and the storyline was a bit too straightforward for me (though I think that's fine for middle grades readers, for whom this graphic novel is intended). The story moves very quickly and jumps between scenes/times with little to no warning, which was sometimes a bit jarring. I will definitely be requesting the sequels, since I think the setup in this book is very promising! Hoping that future installments will give the characters more depth and expand the worldbuilding.

An interesting story full of twists, turns, fun characters and overall a book I would consider reading time and time again.

This dystopic graphic novel is a true page turner. By showing how a potential future looks like if all nature is destroyed and mankind needs to dig deep into earth to find enough food to survive. If that would not be enough, we meet bandits and mutants, scavengers and misfits living underground . And in between young but tough cricket, who is looking for her lost parents. The graphics are stunning and detailed, the story interesting with twists, secrets and conspiracies. Book one successfully creates a connection to the characters and the world - open questions will hook you for book 2. A great start to a new future world underground with a young but strong heroine. I loved it!

Thank you to Oni Press for giving me access to this graphic novel as an E-ARC via Netgalley. All opinions are my own.

Set 200 years into the future the people surviving the past hundred years environmental changes try to live off what’s left. Something that prevails are big companies trying to make money off people. We follow a young girl – Cricket – who is trying to find her family.

The illustrations in this graphic novel are very detailed and really brings Crickets world to life.

Thank you NetGalley and Oni Press for the advanced reading copy in exchange for my honest review.

It’s the year 2223 and the survivors of an environmental cataclysm are living underground in the sewers. It’s the home for frontiers, savages, and mutants.

Our main character, Sarah Higashi aka Cricket, is running away from the Perch, a scientific mining company, with the last secret information she obtained from her teacher before he died of a mysterious disease. Finding her way into the underground searching for her missing parents, Cricket meets the sewerfolk. The journey of finding forgotten secrets begins and the Perch will not stop pursuing Cricket and seizing anybody who assists her.

I enjoyed exploring the sewers through Cricket’s eyes and meeting the sewerfolk. This graphic novel took a while for me to get into. I didn’t understand the main plot until the very end, it felt rushed and needed a slower character build-up. The art is absolutely well done, but the lines on the cheeks made the characters “blush” unnecessarily which I found bothersome.

Knee Deep has the potential to become a great comic if we get more world-building and more character growth and personality, showing a bit of the emotional side would be lovely.

I was super intrigued by this book and it didn’t disappoint. It was an interesting twist on the post apocalyptic genre, and I thought it had many unique aspects setting it apart from other books. My favourite part was the world building. It was richly detailed and pushed me deeper into the story, and allowed me to become more absorbed and invested in the plot. Thank you to Netgalley, the author and the publisher, for a chance to read and review this book.

200 years in the future, a young girl descends underground to try to find her missing parents while fighting off the above ground military and the underground dwellers. Different take on what could happen to our world if the climate truly collapses. Curious to see what happens in book 2.

I really liked this!

I do think that the story could be more original because I was seeing bits and pieces of other movies, games & books on almost every other page, but I feel like the main character is interesting and and endearing enough. The pacing is fine - if anything, I was a fan of how quick and snappy it was and had no issues following what was happening and why / understanding the world we found ourselves in.

That being said, I wanted to read this because the art style really grabbed me, and that is what carried it for me. It is undoubtedly the strongest part for me, and it's the reason I want to continue with the series. I really love the color schemes and their distinguishing qualities depending on time and place. In places, it reminded me of the iconic Atlantis and I LOVED that.

So, to sum it up - the story and writing were just fine, but I loved the art style; it bumped my rating up to 4 stars.

Plot: 3/5
Characters: 3/5
Writing: 3/5

Plot -
We follow a young girl, Cricket, on her adventure through the mysterious sewers under the surface world, where everything she has been taught is a lie. While the book focuses a lot on the start of her journey and we don't see much of Cricket's development as a character (since this is the first book in a series), we do get a lot of set up to what can be expected in future installments. The world building was done through art, flash backs, and character conversations. It doesn't feel overwhelming but by the end of the book, readers have a solid understanding of the world Cricket lives in. It is the start of an intriguing plot and I'm curious to see where it goes.

Characters -
We meet Cricket a teenager who's parents have mysteriously disappeared in a mining accident. She's headstrong and stubborn the opposite of her sister who is prim and proper for lack of better description. Cricket's main schtick is that she was a student of a rebellious scientist John Mathis who dies of a mysterious illness. Most of the characters have a trait and that's all we get to see about them. I would have liked if Flood had fleshed out his characters a bit farther than their archetype but nonetheless, the characters are compelling and drive the story when the writing falls short.

Writing -
The writing is done through the dialogue as much as the art style. Flood shows more than tells when drawing fight scenes or flash backs. The medium helps to convey plot and development throughout the novel. The writing itself felt dry. There were few scenes that felt unnecessary and slowed down the overall story pacing. However, there were really well done scenes that add to the emotional element of the book.

I loved the premise of this comic, a post apocalyptic world with a young girl trying to find what happened to her parents. It’s fast paced and in some places a bit too fast, the character depth and world development was lacking in my opinion. For some reason the main character is able to fight in one scene and be completely vulnerable in the next. I think this comic has a lot of potential but was poorly executed.

Thanks to NetGalley for early access to this book.

Thank You to NetGalley and OniPress for the opportunity to read this ARC in exchange for an honest review. Knee Deep is Joe Flood’s upcoming Middle-Grade Graphic Novel. It follows the story of Cricket who is caught between the dystopian world above ground and those who escaped it to the underground. She sets out on an adventure to find her family and unlock secrets long buried. I loved the art in this graphic novel. Overall, it was an interesting story and I would be interested to see where it goes from here. Dystopian society, science fiction/fantasy, mystery... this ticked a lot of boxes for me. However, I draw some issues with the age range it is written for as there were some scenes depicted that did not seem appropriate for that audience. Some of these instances included what could be perceived as potential sexual harassment from an older male, or a young girl helping a wealthy older man bathe. Then at one point, there were the booty shorts for the main character's uniform - it is even addressed that it's the "cut" of the clothes after portraying the young woman's struggles to put them on. While this story has some great potential, overall I'm not exactly sure it's being promoted to the right audience. In my opinion, it needs to pick a lane. While it's trying to be geared toward a younger audience, some scenes are not appropriate. I say this as someone who typically has a very open mind.

3.5 Stars this has potential, but only the next two in the series will really tell. Half a star off in this ARC version for the couple of scenes of violence towards and the portrayal of women as there for male enjoyment; these are two very small sequences, but for me detract from the whole story. The positive: This comic reminds me of those I read and enjoyed when I was a young teenager. Comics with a fun easily followed story in picture and text, lots of battles with ‘kaboom etc’, which I find is perfect in this setting. Now with an adult eye I see detail and simplicity in the artwork that matches with a story that has secrets and twists and turns. Bar my previous comment I enjoyed reading this and I look forward to seeing where the story goes. Thank you to ONI Press and NetGalley for the ARC. The views expressed are all mine, freely given.

Knee Deep is a fast-paced graphic novel that has tons of potential but ultimately fails to zero in on a singular plot line or character arc. The story has a lot of promise but just was not executed well. The characters are fun, unique, and quite likable, but no character is given a robust backstory, so the reader is left trying to fill in gaps and make assumptions without necessary information. The story also skips around the timeline unnecessarily - except for one beautifully illustrated spread when one character’s experience in the past and the present in the same setting is depicted. Other than that moment, the story would flow much better were it told in sequential order.

The book includes lots of action and fantastic artwork, but the backbone of the story just wasn’t there for me. I finished the book without a good understanding of the characters’ desires or motivations and without any desire to read the second or third installment in the series. Sci-fi and/or graphic novel lovers may want to give this novel a try, but they will likely find themselves confused and/or frustrated with the surface-level (pun intended) treatment given to the plot and characters.

Recommended for Grades 8+

Thank you to NetGalley and the publishers for an advanced copy in exchange for my honest review! 3.5 stars technically!

Knee Deep is an interesting post apocalypse story. It follows Cricket, a young girl trying to find out what happened to her parents after their "disappearance". Her entire family works for PERCH, a militarized mining company, tasked with mining a mineral needed to assure the continuation of human life after the apocalypse. One weird thing is that I noticed the plot description describes the sewer people living in "the bowels of a utopian city that was never completed". The story itself never mentions this, so some of the locations confused me since I thought they were living in the sewers of the PERCH facility, not an entire city. The characters are interesting, and the designs of characters in the sewer can flip-flop wildly between terrifying and goofy. Some things are a bit too much on the nose, however. In the background of the office for the head of PERCH, there's a Nazi Eagle statue, and the owner of Kamikaze Corral is a Japanese man. I winced a bit seeing that Eagle. Sure, maybe the intended audience of middle schoolers won't realize what it is, but as the adult looking over it for them...yikes. Also, cute nod to Gravity Falls with the Dipper hat. The art style was interesting. Not really to my taste, but it was good in its technical aspects. The story just felt very fast and they rushed you through the world-building a bit quicker than I would have liked. It is the first volume so I can excuse it a little bit, since most series like to info dump in the first volume, so they can focus solely on the plot in the next volumes.

Thank you to NetGalley and Oni Press for this ARC I’m exchange for my honest review.

I really enjoyed the artwork for this one. There is a lot of action and world-building
that draws you into the story. It’s weird to read online with the layout but thankfully it wasn’t impossible.

Unfortunately, a lot happens in such a short amount of time that it might be a little hard to read. I didn’t 100% understand everything that was happening. I like Cricket as a main character and I’m interested to see why she’s wanted so badly and if she can find her parents underground.

Knee Deep is a beautifully illustrated graphic novel. Some of the images are jaw dropping and the illustrations were by far my favourite part of this graphic novel. I enjoyed the storyline and I am keen to read further instalments and learn more about both the sewer world and Perch - I want to know more about the Executive Level and find out exactly what is on offer there. I enjoyed the character Cricket and Matthias and I am looking forward to find out more. Overall an enjoyable read.