Gotham High – Blog Tour

Gotham High

by Melissa de la Cruz & Thomas Pitilli
Publisher: DC Ink
Release Date: April 7th 2020

Genre: Young Adult, Graphic Novels, Sequential Art, Superheroes, Comics

Synopsis:

From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Alex and Eliza and The Witches of East End comes a reimagining of Gotham for a new generation of readers. Before they became Batman, Catwoman, and The Joker, Bruce, Selina, and Jack were high schoolers who would do whatever it took–even destroy the ones they love–to satisfy their own motives.

After being kicked out of his boarding school, 16-year-old Bruce Wayne returns to Gotham City to find that nothing is as he left it. What once was his family home is now an empty husk, lonely but haunted by the memory of his parents’ murder. Selina Kyle, once the innocent girl next door, now rules over Gotham High School with a dangerous flair, aided by the class clown, Jack Napier.

When a kidnapping rattles the school, Bruce seeks answers as the dark and troubled knight–but is he actually the pawn? Nothing is ever as it seems, especially at Gotham High, where the parties and romances are of the highest stakes … and where everyone is a suspect.

With enchanting art by Thomas Pitilli, this new graphic novel is just as intoxicating as it is chilling, in which dearest friends turn into greatest enemies–all within the hallways of Gotham High!

Book Links

Author Information

Melissa de la Cruz is the New York Times and USA Today best-selling author of many critically acclaimed and award-winning novels for teens including The Au Pairs series, the Blue Bloods series, the Ashleys series, the Angels on Sunset Boulevard series and the semi-autobiographical novel Fresh off the Boat.

Her books for adults include the novel Cat’s Meow, the anthology Girls Who Like Boys Who Like Boys and the tongue-in-chic handbooks How to Become Famous in Two Weeks or Less and The Fashionista Files: Adventures in Four-inch heels and Faux-Pas.

She has worked as a fashion and beauty editor and has written for many publications including The New York Times, Marie Claire, Harper’s Bazaar, Glamour, Cosmopolitan, Allure, The San Francisco Chronicle, McSweeney’s, Teen Vogue, CosmoGirl! and Seventeen. She has also appeared as an expert on fashion, trends and fame for CNN, E! and FoxNews.

Melissa grew up in Manila and moved to San Francisco with her family, where she graduated high school salutatorian from The Convent of the Sacred Heart. She majored in art history and English at Columbia University (and minored in nightclubs and shopping!).

She now divides her time between New York and Los Angeles, where she lives in the Hollywood Hills with her husband and daughter.

Author Links

Website: https://melissa-delacruz.com/
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/21911.Melissa_de_la_Cruz
Twitter: https://twitter.com/MelissadelaCruz
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/authorMelissadelaCruz/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/authormelissadelacruz/
Tumblr: https://authormelissadelacruz.tumblr.com/

Extra Materials

Excerpt: https://www.dccomics.com/reader/#/comics/446598

My Review

Gotham High felt like the superheroes (and anti-heroes) that we know and love thrown into their tumultuous teenaged years – so you can imagine the drama, romance, and betrayal that might ensue. Our three main characters are the focus on the cover: Selena (Catwoman), Bruce (Batman), and Jack (the Joker). I definitely got Bat and Cat vibes from Bruce and Selena, but I felt that Jack was less Joker-y than he should have been and sometimes just felt like a brand new side character for the plot.

Let’s talk about the best part of the book first: the art. The illustrator was Thomas Pitilli and he was supported by colorist Miquel Muerto, so I want people to go appreciate them. They brilliantly brought the story to life and made it more enjoyable than it would have been if anyone else created the visuals. Everything was bright and vivid, just like the cover. The art drew me into the story and had me devouring the pages. I am so happy I own this graphic novel because I just want to stare at it, go read at it and then tell me if you don’t agree.

The story is pretty entertaining, even if I wasn’t a huge fan of the portrayal of women in the story. I really liked Selena at the beginning but over the course of the story she (and other female characters) became manipulative, unlikable, and cruel in a way that made her more villain than anti-hero. I love how nuanced most versions of Catwoman are so that she can blend the line between good and bad, staying in her shades of gray – I felt like I missed that part of her by the end of this book and that was sad. I am just going to pretend that it was only the first three-quarters of the book and say I loved it.

Another thing that I loved about this book was that the characters were more diverse than in their classic representations. Bruce Wayne’s mother was from Hong Kong, which makes him half-Chinese, Ivy is Korean (or at least speaks Korean as well as Chinese and works in East Med in Chinatown, so I shall assume she is likely Asian even if they are not totally clear), Selena is Latina, and Babs is African-American. In this iteration, Alfred has a husband and is Bruce’s actual uncle. It was fantastic to see a more diverse cast take on these classic characters and bring them to life in new ways. I hope we get to see more from them in their youth and cannot wait to see more from the artists who worked on this graphic novel.