Mooncakes

Cover for Mooncakes
A talented hard-of-hearing witch reconnects with her non-binary childhood crush; together, they must decipher the mystery of a newly appeared demon in the woods.

Mooncakes

A story of love and demons, family and witchcraft. Nova Huang knows more about magic than your average teen witch. She works at her grandmothers’ bookshop, where she helps them loan out spell books and investigate any supernatural occurrences in their New England town. One fateful night, she follows reports of a white wolf into the woods, and she comes across the unexpected: her childhood crush, Tam Lang, battling a horse demon in the woods. As a werewolf, Tam has been wandering from place to place for years, unable to call any town home. Pursued by dark forces eager to claim the magic of wolves and out of options, Tam turns to Nova for help. Their latent feelings are rekindled against the backdrop of witchcraft, untested magic, occult rituals, and family ties both new and old in this enchanting tale of self-discovery.

    • grief over deceased parents
    • being held captive

Practical information

Authors: Wendy Xu and Suzanne Walker
Publisher: Oni Press
Publication year: 2019
ISBN: 9781549303043
Age category: young adult
Disability portrayed: hard of hearing
Genres: fantasy, graphic novel

Authors

Wendy Xu

Wendy Xu is a Brooklyn-based illustrator and comics artist with three upcoming graphic novels from HarperCollins. She is the co-creator of "Mooncakes", a young adult fantasy graphic novel published in 2019 from Lion Forge Comics, and part of it can be read on mooncakescomic.tumblr.com. Her work has been featured on Catapult, Barnes & Noble Sci-fi/Fantasy Blog, and Tor.com, among other places. You can find more art on her instagram: @artofwendyxu or on twitter: @angrygirLcomics

To me, a witch story has always been a diaspora story — you’re the kid who stands out, eats weird food, has a weird, eccentric mom/aunt/grandma nobody else understands, and weird family customs — how is that not the way society sees immigrants? I wanted Tam and Nova and her family to be Chinese-American because I never got to see that.
(Comics Beat, August 2019)
Suzanne Walker

Suzanne Walker is a Chicago-based writer and editor. She is co-creator of the Hugo-nominated graphic novel Mooncakes (Lion Forge/Oni Press) with artist Wendy Xu. Her short fiction has been published in Clarkesworld, and she has published nonfiction articles with Uncanny Magazine, StarTrek.com, Women Write About Comics, and the anthology Barriers and Belonging: Personal Narratives of Disability. She has spoken at numerous conventions on a variety of topics ranging from disability representation in sci-fi/fantasy to comics collaboration. You can find her posting pictures of her cat and chronicling her longsword adventures on Twitter: @suzusaur.

A lot of Nova’s story comes from my own life. Her hearing loss, obviously, is based on my own disability and reflects my own experiences, but also her relative innocence and fear of change. I was terrified to leave home when I was 18, there were so many ways in which I wasn’t ready. I think there’s something powerful in how she moves forward with the gentle support of her loved ones.
(Comics Beat, August 2019)