Angelica and the Bear Prince - Trung Le Nguyen - ★★.¾

AUTHOR: Trung Le Nguyen

GENRE: YA Graphic Novel

PUBLICATION DATE: October 7, 2025

RATING: 2.75 stars.

In a Nutshell: A YA graphic novel focussing on stress, grief, burnout, and “love”. The themes, the cover and inside art, and a couple of the characters were praiseworthy. But the rest of the execution didn’t work for me. This is a slightly outlier opinion.

Plot Preview:

A year ago, over-active Angelica, aka Jelly, faced a mighty burnout and withdrew from all extracurricular activities. Now seventeen, she is ready to get back on track, and decides to begin one step at a time. When the reputed local theatre selects her as one of the interns for an upcoming production of a fairytale retelling, Jelly is thrilled. Not because she has a job to focus on, but because she can finally meet Per the Bear, the mascot of the theatre whom Jelly has been secretly DMing since a year and finding comfort in their supportive responses. Who is the stranger behind the bear costume? Was their connection just one-sided, or did Per the Bear genuinely care?

The story comes to us from the third-person perspectives of various characters.

‘The Magic Fish’, the debut graphic novel by this author, is supposed to be amazing. Though it is still lying unread in my TBR, its reputation (and that of the author), and the adorable cover of this sophomore work, made me try this book. The result is somewhat mixed. The book has so many right ingredients but as a dish, it was under-spiced.

The introductory letter by the author, explaining how he meant for the tone in this book to be “fun and frothy” as against his debut long comic, but it didn’t work and the book ended up with serious themes. Appreciate the honesty and the warning.

Bookish Yays:

🤴🏻 Angelica, aka Jelly. A realistic teen, with strengths and flaws. With a fix-it attitude towards problems and setting overly high goals for herself, Angelica represents many clever teens who stretch themselves too thin these days.

(On an aside, totally a fan of “Jelly” being used as a nickname for “Angelica”. So cute!)

🤴🏻 The theme of burnout. I haven’t seen this tackled in a graphic novel before, which is surprising because it is an increasingly relevant theme these days for youngsters. I love that the book also highlights how people use busyness as a distraction from some sorrow.

🤴🏻 Jelly's best friend Christine. Such a sweet girl! Their closeness and connection comes out wonderfully. I love how Christine sorts out issues through open communication.

🤴🏻 Christine is not sketched like a thin supermodel, and no one in the book even once comments on her weight, nor is sceptical about her selection as the lead in the play. If only society would reach such judgement-free acceptance of plus-sized humans!

🤴🏻 Unlike most teen novels, this story also includes some scenes from Jelly’s parents’ perspective. Moreover, the adult characters aren’t depicted as jerks (most of the time.)

🤴🏻 A special Yay for Jelly’s Dad, who isn't shy about PDA! 😄 He seems to know both the women in his life well, and performs his role as a supportive peacekeeper with diligence.

Bookish Mixed Bags:

🎭 Most of the artwork was a huge Yay. The characters are a bit too cute for a YA book, but I like cute so I was fine with it. However, some scenes involve characters losing their temper, and in these panels, their depiction got really ugly. Also, I was a bit confused between characters in a few panels as the illustrations drew them too similarly.

🎭 Per (or rather, the person inside the Per costume) has a major role in the narrative, but their character development felt somewhat shallow. We know bits and pieces about their past, but the transition from then to now is unexplained.

🎭 The narrative POV jumps across several characters. While this helps us see all of their emotions in greater detail, it also results in a jumpy storyline. Every main character is dealing with their own distinct grief, which further adds a cluttered feel.

🎭 The storyline has inclusivity, but it is too subtle in one case, so much so that I almost missed it. I wish there had been greater detailing in that regard. The old gay couple was super-cute though.

Bookish Nays:

🐻 The plot normalises the scenes of a young girl messaging a stranger about her psychological troubles and revealing all her vulnerability. Keep in mind that she had no idea who the person was; she was messaging an anonymous account that was the official SM handle of Per the Bear. This set my mommy radar beeping in alarm. Luckily, things go well for Jelly, but this could easily have been some pervert taking advantage of a young girl. There should have been some kind of a warning against this in the story or in the author’s notes. This issue was a major red flag for me.

🐻 Not a fan of profanity or vulgarities being included in a book aimed at teens. YMMV.

🐻 This is initially supposed to be a modern retelling of ‘East of the Sun, West of the Moon’. While the resulting story changed direction, the original Norwegian fairytale is also included in this book as a story-within-a-story coming in special gold-framed panels. However, this serves as a weak framing device as the parallels between the play and the main plot are minimal. Moreover, the book doesn’t do justice to the fairytale, covering the initial relationship and the final HEA scene, but totally skipping out the quest and the resolution of the curse. I reread the original just before reading this, so I knew the missing bits. But to those who don’t know the fairytale, the storyline won't make any sense as they simply won't understand how the curse was broken.

🐻 The ending is both rushed and abrupt.

Overall, while I did like the themes and the characters, I didn’t appreciate the ignoring of stranger-danger and the inadequate portrayal of the fairy tale.

My younger daughter (who belongs to the target readership) also read the book (not as a buddy read, though) and had this to say: “It is just mid. Maybe three stars. That is the highest I can go if I have to be generous.” Well… the boss has spoken.

Recommended to those who are okay with the above Nays. The book is officially aimed at readers aged twelve and above. It might still work with adult discussion, but how many teens discuss graphic novels with the adults in their life? 🤔

My thanks to Random House Children's Books and Random House Graphic for providing the DRC of “Angelica and the Bear Prince” via NetGalley. This review is voluntary and contains my honest opinion about the book.