Poison Ivy: Thorns

A creative reimagining of DC villain Poison Ivy’s past, this graphic novel explores themes of love, identity, and sustainability. Pamela Isley is a teen girl who loves plants and has a shadow of secrets hanging around her. When she meets Alice and their relationship begins to evolve, she must navigate her feelings towards her while also trying to conceal her complex family secrets. A story that also broaches notions of human experimentation and environmentalism, this novel uses compelling visual elements and lends itself well to exploring the interplay of art and text when telling a tale. This book may be suitable as a class novel study in a secondary classroom as it is relatively short, yet it invites deeper and higher-level discussion around its themes.