Some book are just nice to read. They wrap their characters and story around you like a blanket and allow you to relax into them. “Mooncakes,” originally a webcomic, now collected as a graphic novel, is exactly that kind of book. Written by Suzanne Walker with art by Wendy Xu, it is a cozy, inclusive and fun book that follows a young witch and werewolf as they fall in love, fight monsters, and spend time with one another.
Written by Suzanne Walker
Illustrated by Wendy Xu
Lettered by Joamette Gil
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.
The two words that best describe “Mooncakes” are safe and comfortable. And I don’t mean either of those in a negative way. The book, over the course of its two-hundred-and-fifty pages, is a great exercise in creating a space that feels warm, welcome, and inviting. By the end, it feels nice to just be in the same world as these characters, to see them interact, to happy and comfortable in their presence.
“Mooncakes” main character is Nova, a young witch who lives with her lesbian grandmothers. The story follow her reuniting with an old crush of hers, Tam, the a genderqueer werewolf that is fighting a demon in the forest. When I say that “Mooncakes” feels safe, part of that is because of how inclusive a book this is. Both the main characters, Nova and Tam, are queer Chinese Americans. The identities of the characters in this book are important, but they’re identities that these characters are also comfortable with. Who these characters are, how they fit into society, is never a source of conflict.
This is a big reason why the book is so comfortable. The characters are who they are, and while they do face challenges through the story, it’s never due to their identities. It’s not really due to their relationship either. The main cast of characters are all extremely supportive of one another. Nova supports Tam and is in turn supported by her grandmothers and her friends. “Mooncakes” is a book that you walk away from feeling happy. The warmth the characters feel for one another radiates off each page.
This warmth is just as present in the art as it is in the plot and character relationships. The base color of each page is a mellow beige. It’s a small thing, but it’s surprising how much it changes the reading experience from having the boarders of each page be a stark white, as is the case in most books. As I said before, it’s a little thing, but has a huge effect on the reading experience, and perfectly supports the actual art that is on each page.
Mostly, the beige pages just help draw you in to how warm the art of “Mooncakes” already is. The way the characters are represented on the page, the way Tam and Nova smile at one another, the boy language between them. “Mooncakes” is a book that spends most of its time allowing its characters to just be with one another, and as a reader, you end up wanting to see these characters be happy.
The actual plot of “Mooncakes” ends up being a bit secondary to everything else. It’s so effective at making the moment where its characters are just hanging out, falling in love, and being kind to one another so comfortable, that when it moves to the more action-oriented part of the story, it does fall a bit flat. “Mooncakes” is a book that does have big action moments, huge magic battles, and story that involves a demon terrorizing local woods. But, with the aesthetic that the rest of “Mooncakes” creates, those moments don’t feel especially dangerous. And, action without danger is just kind of events happening.
But that isn’t what you should be looking for in “Mooncakes.” If it is, there are plenty of other stories that you could read. There are far fewer that are as charming as this one. Reading “Mooncakes” is like being wrapped in a warm, happy blanket. If the conflict did feel like it was a bit more dangerous, it might actually break the spell that “Mooncakes” creates. I honestly wish that I could have spent more time with the characters. I wish that the story was longer, that it committed even more to creating a story that revolved around entirely around characters being together. But, as it is now, the somewhat limp conflict doesn’t take away from the parts that work. It just exists and doesn’t feel like it needs to.
If you’re looking for something safe, something comfortable, “Mooncakes” is the perfect book for it. There is so much in the world right now that is an absolute disaster. “Mooncakes” imagines a place where things are okay. A place that is inclusive, a place where teens can be themselves and fall in love and the problems that they face pale in comparison to the happiness that exists when they’re together. If that sounds like something you need, and it was for me, “Mooncakes” is definitely worth checking out.
