Bibliography
Wang, J. (2019). Stargazing. First Second.
Plot Summary
Christine makes an unexpected friend in Moon who is her complete opposite. Moon is carefree and shares a lot of Christine’s interest. But Moon also has visions of celestial beings?
Critical Analysis
Christine was not expecting to find a friendship with Moon. Moon is loud and expressive and loves music which is almost the opposite of Christine. The two bond over music and decide to do a dance routine at the school talent show.
Both girls are Chinese, but Christine feels the pressure to be the “perfect” Chinese daughter. She plays the violin, takes Chinese class to learn the language, and takes an after school math class when she gets a 73 on a math test. Moon joins in on one Chinese class and leaves midway through, wears nail polish, and is a vegan Buddhist. She loves Moon for how she embraces herself. And it’s obvious that the friendship isn’t one-sided. Moon cherishes her friendship with Christine just as much, if not more, which is shown when she waits to watch a music video with Christine and looks towards Christine’s house on the morning of her surgery.
When Christine gets so busy with the after-school math tutoring and Chinese school, Moon seems to get close to another girl and Christine gets jealous. She lets her emotions get the better of her and leaves Moon’s sketchbook out for everyone to see at a birthday party. Ashamed of what she has done, Christine cannot face Moon when it’s revealed that Moon has a brain tumor. The brain tumor has caused seizures that Moon told no one about because she thought she was seeing celestial beings.
The two girls make up, and even though Moon cannot perform at the school talent show, Christine has a jacket made for her and performs the song with other friends in tribute to Moon. This is a cute story about how opposites attract in friendship and that you don’t have to be perfect.
The afterward is an interesting read because Jen Wang was diagnosed with a brain tumor when she was six. Instead of having the main character experience seizures and the surgery, Wang chose for Christine to be the main character in this graphic novel, the friend of the character who experiences the diagnosis. This book was a way for the author to express how lonely she felt - it seems that the character of Moon was based on the author more than the main character of Christine. This is a good author’s craft move to analyze.
Some Chinese, and possibly Korean, characters are inserted in areas where the music is being played. This helps reflect the girls background and their love of k-pop (Korean pop) music. At the beginning of the book, Christine seems to be performing at their Chinese church since all of the characters that appear seem to be Chinese. When they’re waiting for news of Moon’s surgery, her father takes her for desert, his favorite dessert when he lived in Taiwan, shaved ice with cream, fruit, and syrup.
Review Excerpt(s)
Asian/Pacific American Award for Children’s Literature 2020
“Relying on a muted palette and careful linework, Eisner Award winner Wang has crafted an understated, poignant tale of the joy and turmoil of budding friendship.” - School Library Journal
“It is so very rare and refreshing to see diversity within the Asian American community authentically portrayed; Wang allows each character complete ownership of their identity, freeing their truths, and in the process, allowing readers to do the same.” - Kirkus Reviews
Connections
-Activities
The first four pages have no text to them. Use the first four pages in a lesson on reading graphic novels. Cut up the panels on the page for students to arrange how they think it might be in the book.
Since the first four pages don’t have text, have the students make inferences about the main character based on what we see in those pages
Christine judges Moon before actually getting to know her. How does this end up backfiring on Christine?
Introduce students to K-pop! Popular K-pop bands students may know are BTS and Blackpink. Or have students that are familiar with that genre of music explain what it is and share their favorite k-pop artists.
Include this novel as an option in a realistic fiction book club study or graphic novel study.
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