The First YA Graphic Novel Romance From Nakama Press Arrives This Summer
A sweeping YA time-slip romance where love bridges a century, but history threatens to tear it apart.
Nakama Press, an imprint of Mad Cave Studios, announces APERTURE, a standalone young adult OGN from Pacific Northwest-based writer Kirsten Thompson (I Am Hexed) and acclaimed Brazilian illustrator Huenito (Teeth of God). Blending romance, history, and quiet wonder, Aperture explores the fragile space where connection forms, and the forces that threaten to break it…
When Sage, a first-year university student, discovers a forgotten camera in the library archives, she’s thrust into a world beyond her own time. The camera links her to August, a student who walked the same halls more than a century earlier. What begins as a miraculous connection soon deepens into something neither of them expected. But history has a way of pulling people apart—and as WWI looms for August, the closer they grow, the more impossible it seems to hold on.
Writer Kirsten Thompson said, “Aperture is a story about taking unusual routes to figuring out where and who you want to be, and letting that take you to unexpected places and the people that can be found and loved along the way. It’s also a love letter to libraries and all their infinite possibilities (shout out to UW’s Suzzallo Library’s staircases and cozy reading nooks) with pining, some theater, and a mystery extending from the 1900s to present day.”
“To me, what makes Aperture special is seeing myself in these deeply relatable characters,” artist Huenito added. “Their love and support for one another alter their destinies, much like the people in my life who have done the same for me. In the end, I believe this is what the book is all about—how we all hold that same transformative power, even in our smallest acts—and I hope that readers will close this book encouraged to be this positive force that changes someone else’s story.”
Rooted in emotional intimacy and longing, Aperture is a story about finding connection in unexpected places and choosing it even when time itself stands in the way.
The 224-page OGN arrives August 25, 2026, and is now available for preorder at your favorite retailer and directly from Nakama Press.
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