I vastly overestimated the number of books I still had to read for the 2026 Hugo for Best Graphic Story, so this is the last and, dare I say, my favorite of the slate! Full ranking at the bottom, once I’m done discussing this utterly charming graphic novel that reimagines the life of Nnedi Okorafor’s beloved cat Peri.
Peri, despite the elegant and admittedly exotic appearance of his Oriental Shorthair breed, is not your ordinary Earth cat. His father came from Neptune, so he has the ability to engineer marvels, including a liminal space in which to craft items such as the spaceship he uses to race other cats amidst the stars. One of these cats is his nemesis — one of several, tbh, including hot sauce and a particularly annoying cat toy — but all thoughts of such are temporarily shelved when his family moves to Nigeria to research a book Nnedi is writing.
As with many cats in tropical countries, Peri soon becomes an indoor-outdoor pet, and quickly learns about local superstitions via the stray cats at the nearby market (I, for one, had no idea that Nigerians view cats with such suspicion!) When a threat arrives from outer space, however, Peri will have to unite more allies than just his new friends in order to protect humanity and the world from alien invasion.
Golly, this book was so cute from start to finish, from Ms Okorafor’s playful writing to Tana Ford’s note-perfect illustrations. To be perfectly honest, as soon as I saw that this was published by First Second Books, I knew that this would be class through and through. Peri is a conceited but warm-hearted delight, and his adventures both on earth and beyond are a hoot. I was both charmed and moved by the narrative, which did a perfect job of conveying the message it meant to. For that reason primarily, I’ve put this at the top of my list for this year’s Hugo for Best Graphic Story.
I’ve had to think about the rest of the slate, and have decided that the order I’ll put them in is
2. The Power Fantasy Vol 1
3. Absolute Wonder Woman Vol 1
4. The Invisible Parade
5. A Wizard Of Earthsea
6. A Girl And Her Fed
I’ve linked to my (sometimes unknowing of the nomination) reviews of each, which will hopefully explain how I’ve ranked the books. There is no review for A Girl And Her Fed, as the parts of the web comic that were eligible for this year’s award made zero sense to me as someone entirely unfamiliar with the story. I’m sure it’s great within the context of the larger storyline but I do lean heavily towards works that still convey meaning as a standalone, as prior graphic story nominees have done despite being installments of a larger whole.
The Space Cat by Nnedi Okorafor & Tana Ford was published August 12 2025 by First Second Books and is available from all good booksellers, including
Al Singh
Doug Merrill
Doreen Sheridan
Emily Lauer
John Pitzel
Lars N. Goldschlager
Laura Eilers
Professor X
Robert Maedgen
Sylvere Ap Leanan
The Shire
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I’m a little surprised that “five chapters of prologue,” as you called The Power Fantasy back in April, got your second-place vote! Was The Invisible Parade just too slight to rank any higher?
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Yes. I actually had a very different take than you did on Etienne’s massacre, and I found the amalgamation of world cultures in here more convincing than the appearance of the more overtly Biblical themes in TIP. Also, my comparisons in my original review were against the author’s own high standards (and other giants of the field.) TPF isn’t as good as Once And Future, but I feel like it’s better than the rest of this year’s Hugo slate, barring The Space Cat. AWW is an unnecessary reboot that doesn’t say anything new about an established character, tho would be AMAZING about a brand new one. AWoE is beautifully done but I still hate the source material. Tbc, these are all great books! This is, however, my order of preference in terms of enjoyment and in how likely I would go back to reread them.
“my comparisons in my original review were against the author’s own high standards” Ah, ok, that helps me understand!
I was trying to remember when I first read Earthsea, and I couldn’t really. Almost certainly elementary school. Nor could I remember when I last read it before this graphic version, which explains a lot in both directions.
I loved the artwork of Earthsea but found there was a bit of gap between what I thought the author was communicating vs this graphic novel.
I totally did not get “Power Fantasy” at all. I’ll probably be attending the LACon session that is roughly titled “are we over the superhero genre”