ARC Review: Taproot by Keezy Young

Special thanks to Oni Press for providing an ARC via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review!

Goodreads: Taproot
Publisher: Oni Press
Publication date: 28 June 2022
Genre: Young Adult Graphic Novel

Panda Rating:

_{(3.5 pandas)}

Blue is having a hard time moving on. He’s in love with his best friend. He’s also dead. Luckily, Hamal can see ghosts, leaving Blue free to haunt him to his heart’s content. But something eerie is happening in town, leaving the local afterlife unsettled, and when Blue realizes Hamal’s strange ability may be putting him in danger, Blue has to find a way to protect him, even if it means… leaving him.

TL;DR: Taproot is a cute but slightly spooky paranormal story featuring a queer romance between a sweet gardener and a ghost. The queer romance was so soft and the artwork was beautifully complementary to the story. I think readers who enjoyed stories such as Mooncakes and The Tea Dragon Society would enjoy this one, although this one does have slightly darker moments!

Well, this went in a direction that I didn’t expect and although I was pretty confused about what was happening at the halfway point, I still really enjoyed this graphic novel. It’s a cute and funny story with a sweet queer romance! I liked the artwork and thought it fit the cute and magical vibe of the story. The colours were bright and captured all the flora and fauna that surrounded this town really well. The author did a great job in capturing the expressions of the characters as well—it wasn’t exaggerated but it was soft and sweet, much like the story itself.

I think this probably could’ve been done with some kind of chapter or section break to indicate changes in scenes and events. A lot of the events move very quickly and it left little time to process what happened before another big event occurred. Towards the middle, there were several events that happened which I thought altered the tone of the story considerably but the story moves on so fast that it was hard to take in. Obviously, we have a character who can see and speak with ghosts but the elements of death and magic that were thrown in as the plot were a little unexpected. It wasn’t ‘bad’ unexpected but I wish that it had been done better because as it is, it felt like it was just “plopped” into the story. I liked the slight comedic touch to our “friendly neighbourhood death” character though which was a pleasant surprise!

I’m not sure if this is will be part of an ongoing series because if it is then I think that’d be interesting (to see the different ghostly shenanigans that Hamal and Blue get up to)! It’s okay as a standalone too but it does feel a little underdone. I enjoyed the sweet softness of the story though so I’m glad that I checked it out 🙂