I call these "boy" books because they're the kind of books that people think of as being boyish; adventure stories, mostly, not aimed at girls specifically. On the other hand, Opal is fonder of this genre than many of the boys of her acquaintance, some of whom find them too scary, and others of whom strongly prefer non-fiction.

The Bone series These graphic novels include violence, but not usually particularly graphic violence. It's a swords-and-dragons tale, with a war between good and evil, and a lot of humor on the side. The main character is male, but the chief heroes and villains are female.

Corby FloodThis is the second in a series, and we've read it and the one before. The first one had a boy as its viewpoint character, and this one has a girl. Adventure, pirates, derring-do, lots of pictures, jokes for the grownups. Opal was noticeably fonder of this one than of the first.

The Fog Mound series These are semi-graphic novels; they alternate between chapters that are mostly pictures and chapters that are mostly words. They involve anthropomorphized animals (literally; people have made the animals people-like) in a post-apocalyptic world. The main viewpoint character is male, but there are a lot of supporting female characters, including the primary drivers for adventuring and engineering.

The Oz books Classic? Yes. Great literature? Well, probably not. But they include lots of adventure, and most of them involve mixed gender casts, with either Dorothy or Ozma in central positions.

Madeline L'Engle's Time Series Science fiction with strong female characters; in fact most of the important characters in A Wrinkle In Time are female, rescuing men.

Akiko, by Mark Crilley There are two Akiko series, one of comic books and one of regular old illustrated books. The names and plots overlap, which may drive you insane. I recommend picking one and sticking to it, and personally, I prefer the comic books. Which are, of course, out of print. Sorry. They're not expensive if you're not picky about edition or condition. Anyway, these are classic space opera. Robots! Dinosaurs! Aliens! Robotic alien dinosaurs! The title character is a girl, and every so often you run into another female character.

Sardine in Outer Space These are "graphic novels". What I mean is, these are comics, but they're filed under "graphic novels" because they're European. Sardine and Little Louie are orphans, rescued from the evil Super Muscleman by Yellow Shoulders, the pirate. They subversively defeat the government in every episode, often with mention of snot. Sardine is a girl, and the brains of the outfit. It's all comic violence, nobody ever dies or is permanently hurt. Again, these come in two kinds, little volumes and big volumes, and I have never been able to tell them apart by title.

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