Oasis

by Guojing

JieJie and her little brother, DiDi, are living on their own in a barren desert while their mother works tirelessly to earn their admission into Oasis City. Their days are filled with weathering sandstorms and scavenging for water, but everything changes when they come across an AI-powered robot lying dormant in an abandoned junkyard.

Filled with equal parts hope and suspense, Oasis tells the story of a potentially not-so-distant future that you won’t ever forget.

Genres: Graphic Novels, Middle Grade, Science Fiction, Comics, Dystopia, Family, Fiction

160 pages, Paperback

First published February 18, 2025

About the author

Guojing (Jing Guo) is an illustrator and concept artist. Previously she worked in the game and animation industry. She is now a professional illustrator. Her wordless picture book, ‘The Only Child’, a New York Times Best Illustrated Children’s Book of 2015, and a Publishers Weekly Book of 2015, is published by Schwartz and Wade (Random House, Dec, 2015). The story is based on her own experiences as a child. Guojing is also planning her next picture book. She also likes to paint in oils in her spare time. She loves to share her ideas and feelings through her art work.

Offical website: www.guojingart.com

(from http://www.creativeauthors.co.uk/illu...)

Reviews

[s.penkevich [hiatus-will return-miss you all] · Rating 4 out of 5]

As our lives are increasingly swallowed up by the demands of labor, families find themselves spending more time with their technology than each other. Oasis, a bittersweet and gorgeously illustrated graphic novel from Guojing, finds siblings JieJie and DiDi spending their days in a barren wasteland of a desert braving sandstorms to find water and travel to a payphone booth for a daily chat with their mother. Their mother works in the nearby city and cannot yet afford admission to the city for her children, but when the siblings stumble upon a discarded AI robot they may have found a replacement mother to care for them. With breathtaking art that further crafts a heavy atmosphere of loneliness and frustration punctuated by tenderness, Guojing harnesses a whole slew of modern anxieties around labor, technology, family, financial stability and meeting basic needs into a succinctly haunting sci-fi fable. A beautifully heart wrenching tale that can be equally enjoyable and poignant for readers of any age, Oasis is a quiet little gem.

Oasis managed to really move me in a short space of time. The art is breathtaking and Guojing is able to instill so much life into the two siblings that you can immediately empathize with them. They are so cute and care for each other while having to survive alone in a desert.

While the recent adaptation of The Wild Robot retaining it freshly in cultural memory may garner a few passing comparisons, Oasis feels rather original in its simplicity. The children find a destroyed AI, fix it, and program it to be their mother. While the older sibling is apprehensive, the AI Mom quickly wins them over and truly does take care of them.

Yet when the mother returns, she is initially horrified to find herself replaced by an AI that isn’t actually a mother with real emotions. It nudges our increasing social reliance on technology and the aide of AI, with AIs being able to mimic human interactions and people even turning to AI for companionship (the internet is full of articles about people dating an AI), and how the absence of the mother has pushed the children closer to the AI. The AI Mom fills a need and instill hope in the children, real authentic hope and real feelings of closeness. The story, for how short it is, does a good job of addressing this nuance.

‘May we all be blessed with long life. Though we are far apart…
…we are still able to share the moonlight together.’

Something Oasis does best, however, is capture the plight of parenting and the struggles to find financial footing even with a full time job. The percentage of stay-at-home parents has declined significantly over the past two generations while the percentage of parents feeling financially secure despite having a full-time job has plummeted. And the cost of daycare almost negates having a part time job in order to pay for daycare. Oasis looks at the anxieties over how, despite greater technology to assist us, people are finding they are working more, longer, or struggling to find jobs they enjoy. In Oasis, the mother works around the clock ‘like a robot’ in a blue-collar job that looks like something out of the film Metropolis to uphold the city now mostly run by AI robots yet still cannot afford to bring her kids to come stay in the city with her.

There is a moment near the end where she crumbles under the duress of having to always miss her children in order to work while still never having enough money. ‘I wish we could survive without money’, she says. While Oasis is a beautiful yet heartbreaking slice of life story, it does end on a note of hope and optimism that really ties the whole thing together gorgeously. A lovely little story with great artwork, I really enjoyed Oasis.

4.5/5

[Bookishrealm · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm not sure I knew what to expect before diving into Oasis, but this was a delightful read.

What Did I Like: I've heard so much about Guojing's beautiful artwork, but nothing could compare to actually experiencing it. A key part of my enjoyment of graphic novels is the way that the art, without text, can evoke so many emotions and push the reader to make inferences about the story. Though it is filled with text, Oasis shines in its art and use of color to illustrate a post apocalyptic world that relies heavily on the extensive labor to keep it functioning. Though filled with dark moments and themes, hope is woven through the course of the entire story.

It's a quick read, but meaningful and impactful and definitely recommend checking it out.

[Drew Canole · Rating 3 out of 5]

Guojing is really great at art. This story was pleasant, simple, heartfelt like her other work I've read. I don't know though, AI characters always give me the ick no matter how nice they are.

[Steph · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is so flipping beautiful and since as an adult I’ve fallen in love with robots due to the work of Jasmine Warga, Jarrett Lerner, and Peter Brown, I had to pick it up. This STUNNING graphic novel is set in a hopefully very distant future and it follows siblings who live alone in a desert while their mother works in “the city” to keep them all alive. When the kids find a robot in pieces, they bring it to life and find themselves with hope and comfort they’d once thought was lost.

[DaNae · Rating 4 out of 5]

Set in a dystopian future, two young children are left alone in the wastelands while their mother works in a nearby ‘utopian’ city to make their lives better. Feeling abandoned and isolated, the children find an unexpected source of succor.

Like with her first book, THE ONLY ONE, Canadian author/illustrator, Guojing, references her Chinese roots. With this book she showcases the children that are left at home in rural places, while their parents work in cities to carve out a sustainable economic life. Even without the subtext this story soars in its kindness and hope.

[Mary · Rating 4 out of 5]

In a dystopian future ruled by robots, humans are the workforce required to keep society moving forward. Unfortunately for one family, two children are left behind in the desert while their mother desperately works to provide for them. One day, the children discover a discarded robot in a scrap heap and they manage to return the machine to functionality, activating a program that turns the AI into a surrogate mother. When the human mother returns to care for her children, two previously disparate paths must unite for their blended family to survive. This thought-provoking graphic novel incorporates limited text and few colors to illustrate the world of Oasis and the land and people the elevated community abandoned. Emotional imagery connects readers to the complexity of the children’s existence, especially as they manage each day without an adult caregiver. The existential conflict between the human and the AI mothers is palpable in the story, and while the ultimate connection between the mothers is predictable, it is also endearing. Accessible to an elementary school-aged audience, this book investigates substantial subject matter primarily through illustrations, which offers a wide range of readers the ability to connect with the narrative. Fans of sci-fi and dystopian fiction will appreciate the approach of this story, and the plot will inspire young people to consider a potential future wherein artificial intelligence has the upper hand. Thoughtful and visually stunning, this is an enjoyable addition to graphic novel collections for upper elementary school-aged readers.

[Zaidee · Rating 5 out of 5]

JieJie and DiDi live in a harsh desert, navigating sandstorms and making due with limited resources. In order to pay for their passage to Oasis City, JieJie and Didi’s mother is constantly working, leaving the siblings to fend for themselves. When a fox steals some of the children’s water reserves, they end up chasing it into a junkyard of Oasis City trash. Lying among the garbage is a humanoid robot, powered by AI. After some tinkering, JieJie manages to restore the robot, and the added company brings a great change to the children’s lives.

Guojing’s illustrations are beautiful, stark in black and white but soft with texture and round-faced characters. JieJie is a sweet and thoughtful older sibling, shouldering the responsibilities of caring for DiDi and reassuring him of their mother’s return. As the AI replicates the role of a mother, the burden the young girl carries is made even more apparent once she is able to let go and be taken care of. By contrast, once we glimpse the life of the mother working in Oasis City, a new layer is added to the role of AI robots and the humans that create them. This story is sad and bleak at times, but the hopeful solution at the end was satisfying and took me by surprise. An interesting tale at a time when AI is becoming ever more present in our own lives, I appreciated the nuance of the relationships between this little family and the robot that became a part of it.

Many thanks to NetGalley and Macmillan Children's Publishing Group for the digital ARC!

[Jesse · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read this while walking around my local library. The colors and story are bleak to begin, though small changes bring positivity to the children’s existence. I loved that the ending bucked typical expectations. I feel like there’s a message in here for blended families, as well.

[ash · Rating 3 out of 5]

“i wish we could survive without money”
the struggles of a low income single mother who ends up *checks notes* coparenting with an AI robot??

[Brianna · Rating 3 out of 5]

Cute, kinda weird, but the art is cool

[Alison · Rating 4 out of 5]

In Oasis two kids live in the middle of the desert while their Mom works in the city of Oasis, hoping to earn enough to buy the kids passes into the city. They exist on packaged food, water they must trek through the sand dunes to find, and weekly phone calls from Mom. One day they find an AI robot in the junkyard and when they turn it on their lives change.

Wow, this was an emotional read. The imagery is dark, and sad, and beautiful. The author and artist do such a good job of pulling the feelings out of you and your heart just aches for the kids. The introduction of the AI robot, who becomes a surrogate mother for the kids, also starts the introduction of color and hope into the story. Just well done overall.

Thank you Net Galley for the ARC

[Darian Reed · Rating 4 out of 5]

This story is super sweet and has beautiful artwork. Jiejie and DiDi created a good example of how it can be difficult when there is a single parent household and the parent must work frequently. I also love that their mother's hesitation to trusting the robot. It made for a sweet heartwarming read about family.

[Erica · Rating 3 out of 5]

In an imagined desolate, sand-stormed post-apocalyptic future, two siblings try to survive in a barren wilderness while their mother works in the subterranean factory that serves the lucky (unseen) people who inhabit a dome-covered paradise of clean air and fresh water.

Their existence is lonely, bleak, and frustrating, but they have hope and they manage to occasionally speak by phone to their mother - when they make the trek to an old phone booth that still has "service" and the timing is right.

When a wild fox steals some of their meager supplies, they chase it through a prohibited area to a trash dump. Undiscovered, they make off with an abandoned partial-robot. The older sister repairs it, they find the robot's missing pieces, and it starts to care for them.

The assistance of a capable AI-enabled robot changes their lives completely, and they begin to thrive. When their mother is unable to phone them and makes a desperate escape to reach them in person, her initial jealousy and fear quickly turns to collaboration with the robot, and the small family creates their own tiny pod of clean air and safety.

It is a beautiful, haunting, ephemeral book, with images entirely in black, white, and grey tones, with hints of warmer tones (rose, sienna, pale blue) and the exception of the robot's eyes, which are green in a few images. Oddly, the robot's cheeks are just slightly more vivid pink than the people's cheeks.

The text is sparse and relies heavily on the images, so it's accessible to a wide age-range of readers; maybe 4th to 10th graders?

If this story was meant to demonstrate that a robot is nearly as good as a parent at showing affection, that a parent could only come to clarity about their own children's priorities after a robot prompts them, that the only hope for humankind after an apocalypse and a cruelly, inhumanely inequitable distribution of resources is the intervention of a personal robot, that human beings may be clever, but they can't think through their own problems to sustainable solutions, then I believe it succeeded.

But why would anyone want to spread that message? I find it hard to believe that an artist who draws people with such a range of emotions, and who is willing to grapple with difficult topics would actually believe that we are doomed without AI-assisted humanoid robots. Does Guojing believe this? If not, then why not introduce even a tiny bit of outside perspective to get readers to THINK about what the story is presenting?

I mean, most post-apocalypse children's stories are missing something - for example; how do they get power, building materials, food, water, human connection, etc.? But to be missing all of that AND to convey the idea that you just have to be lucky and find a helpful robot...this seems irresponsible at our present moment.

Maybe I am in such a desperate state of mind, I can't handle a light-hearted sci-fi exploration of an unlikely future...

What I really think is that our current wealth disparities, ecological precarity, and reliance on AI is just a few steps away from this story - and if I try to imagine the Way Out, it is certainly the exact OPPOSITE of what happens here. In other words, community, unity, and disruption of the status quo to achieve healing for everyone in the underground factory and for the surface of the planet.

[Paul Spence · Rating 4 out of 5]

In Guojing’s Oasis, two children wait for their mother in a desert wasteland.

Guojing is the author of several picture books and graphic novels. She was born in Shanxi and notes life under China’s One-Child Policy as inspiration for her first novel The Only Child, which was named one of The New York Times’ Best Illustrated Children’s Books of 2015. Guojing now resides in Vancouver.

Oasis is set in a grim future. JieJie and her little brother, DiDi, wait for their mother to return from work. Unlike many parents who may leave for a few hours a day, JieJie and DiDi’s mother has been away for weeks. JieJie and DiDi live in a menacing desert. They have no neighbours, the dunes seemingly barren of all other life.

Guojing’s art style makes the setting seem both claustrophobic—one can almost feel the sand rubbing uncomfortably against their skin—and infinite. In spite of this, the siblings venture daily into the dunes to find water and call their mother in Oasis City.

JieJie is a diligent older sister. She takes care of DiDi’s basic needs, maintains the household, and keeps her little brother’s panic at bay. Though she faces this role valiantly, JieJie is just a child herself, and the work weighs on her. DiDi is barely more than a toddler and feels his mother’s absence deeply, making JieJie’s role even more difficult.

When their mother misses their scheduled phone call on DiDi’s birthday, the little boy is distraught. Upset, DiDi flees from his sister’s side and stumbles across a decommissioned AI robot in the nearby landfill. Though JieJie is nervous (rightly so, as robots rule Oasis City, where their mother is forced to work underground night and day), she allows DiDi to bring the robot home as a means to mend his sour mood. Through wisdom beyond their years, JieJie and DiDi repair the robot. A charming, if atypical, ‘found family’ is born.

Oasis is inspired by “the left-behind children,” those who stay in rural communities while their parents go to urban centres in search of work. This, paired with the bleak, futuristic setting, has all the makings of a sad or disturbing story. Guojing leans into this presumption, using a largely monochromatic art style that plays with shadows and light to create a landscape that is both beautiful and unsettling.

Yet, Oasis is anything but dire. JieJie and DiDi demand to be adored. Though the landscape is harsh, the siblings are not. They love each other with a fierceness that cuts through the sandstorm blackouts. Though marketed as a middle-grade novel, Oasis will resonate with many adult audiences, too. Not only is the art style captivating, but the story has a level of simple sophistication that lingers like an affecting dream.

Unlike other dystopian novels, where children become violent and solemn due to unforgiving circumstances, JieJie and DiDi remain soft and kind. As our once-distant dystopian future seems to draw nearer every day, many books and films eagerly portray the inevitability of disaster. Oasis is set apart by the bravery to hope for the best. In Oasis, Guojing dares us to push back on the seeming certainty of that dark future, showing how love and kindness bring us together and propel us forward, even in the worst of times.

[YSBR · Rating 5 out of 5]

What did you like about the book? Stuck in the middle of an inhospitable desert outside Oasis City, JieJie and her little brother DiDi eke out a kind of life, communicating with their mom on daily treks to a old phone booth while dreaming of being reunited for the Moon Festival. Their ingenious adaptations to their harsh surroundings fill the first third of the novel as we watch them devote every ounce of their energy to retrieving water and preparing their meager meals. On Didi’s birthday, they can’t reach Mom, but then find a lithe, broken android in a slag pile of Oasis trash. Astonishingly, they manage to repair and activate the unit. Now in Mom mode, the droid tenderly assumes the children’s care, offering comfort, warmth, and bedtime stories. Frantic at being unable to reach her children, JieJie and Didi’s human mom returns, setting off a short-lived conflict before the little family can finally reach a new and loving equilibrium. It’s only in the second half of this astonishing novel that we see inside Oasis City (“a paradise with the purest air and water”), in which the human mom “works hard. She works like a robot.” The final pages offer a sliver of hope as the mom and her android counterpart create a modest but independent life, complete with emerging bits of greenery, which may eventually compete with the arid sand. 

Throughout the story, the characters communicate economically through simple speech using talk bubbles. Much is left to conjecture (what’s happened to the Earth, why the children are separated from their mother, who controls the planet) but Giojing’s astonishing artwork will help even young readers make sense of her dystopian setting. The grey and black color palette (possibly created with charcoal and graphite) and smudgy monochromatic style beautifully conveys the encroaching sandstorms and barren landscapes of the children’s world. Occasional pale accents of color immediately demand our attention: the faint orange “on” light for Mother, the dark blue sky she is able to evoke, or the pale green shoots that she manages to coax from the ground. In a brief author’s note, Guojing lets us know that the book also pays tribute to “left-behind children” in our own world, whose parents must leave to find work in cities or even other countries. Link to complete review: https://ysbookreviews.wordpress.com/2...

[Becky B · Rating 3 out of 5]

Two children live in the desert wasteland of a future Earth while their mother works at a factory in the domed city overseen by robots. The children miss their mother and have to work hard to survive on their own. When they find a robot in the rubbage heap, they get it working again and put it on the Mother setting. It would be nice to have someone care for them when their actual Mom can’t be there, right? But what will happen when their real mom returns? One who lives under the harsh rule of robot overseers?

The artwork is really the star of the show in this, as anyone who has read any of Guojing’s other books will no doubt expect. This dystopia setting could have been very heavy, but it was kept more muted for middle grade readers. The plot is kept pretty basic and simple, whereas a full length novel based on this premise could have been quite complex. It is an interesting premise and highlights the desire most people have to be cared for and have someone else shoulder the heavier burdens.

Notes on content:
Language: None
Sexual content: None
Violence: Only a robot is injured. It is hinted the robots took over by force.
Ethnic diversity: The characters appear to be of Asian heritage.
LGBTQ+ content: The kids end up with a human mom and a robot mom, but the two aren’t a couple or anything.
Other: The kids have to travel a long way for water and other basic supplies. Kids and parent separated for a job/survival. Less than ideal working conditions.

[Jessica · Rating 4 out of 5]

Oasis is set in a dystopian world where a young Chinese brother and sister (they go by Jie Jie and Di Di) are largely living on their own in a desert setting where sandstorms are common, there is no water, and most adults live in the city, Oasis, where Jie Jie and Di Di's mother works in a factory producing robots and AI. Every day they trudge to a pay phone to attempt to call their mother, but she is unable to visit or speak for long (sometimes missing calls) because she has to work long shifts in the factory. One day, the siblings find an outdated AI robot in a landfill, which they fix and re-program to be their AI mom. In AI Mom, they find the affection and care that they so desperately needed, but when mom returns, they're faced with a new challenge.

I haven't read this type of dystopian fiction for middle grade in a while, and it made me really melancholy and reflect on technology, our planet/environment, and children/motherhood. It was a super quick read (maybe 20 minutes) and would be a great discussion tool for a middle grade book club.

Gr. 4-6 for content but since it has very little dialogue and a lot of wordless spreads, it could easily be read by a younger age group (my 1st grader picked it up and was engrossed, as she often does with her older sister's graphic novels)

[Dylan Teut · Rating 2 out of 5]

The illustrations of this book are stunning- I love everything Guojing does.
But- I just couldn't love this book. Maybe it's because I don't understand what the brother and sister were going through. Maybe it's because I just watched Cassandra on Netflix and was spooked by it. Maybe it's because I see so many artists rallying against the dangers of AI.
Try as it might, AI will never ever replace or come close to the companionship and love of a real human being. As AI develops and grows smarter and more capable of predicting things and solving problems, it begins to leave relationships cold and limits human interactions.
I know that this brother and sister were craving a motherly love.
I know it was conveyed that they felt that sort of love from the robot.
The book seemed to imply that if your mother (or any loved one) is unavailable to care and love you, an AI replacement or substitute will get you by.
I have been in the thick of relationship bliss and shattered relationships- relationship shattered by disagreement or distance or even death. As much as I crave those relationships to be restored, there is no robot or machine that could ever replace the love I felt from these individuals.
I'm sorry, but the implication of AI being able to replicate or replace human love ruined the book for me. I hoped for a different ending.

[Amanda (spooky.octopus.reads) Turner · Rating 5 out of 5]

🤖 𝙊𝙖𝙨𝙞𝙨 //𝘎𝘶𝘰𝘫𝘪𝘯𝘨⁣
⁣
If this isn’t one of the sweetest books I’ve read in a long time. It was reminiscent of 𝘞𝘪𝘭𝘥 𝘙𝘰𝘣𝘰𝘵 for me…robots as sentient beings who have the capacity for care, love, and connection. This story has heart…metallic AI heart, but heart all the same. ⁣
⁣
As the story goes…⬇️⁣
“JieJie and her little brother, DiDi, are living on their own in a barren desert while their mother works tirelessly to earn their admission into Oasis City. Their days are filled with weathering sandstorms and scavenging for water, but everything changes when they come across an AI-powered robot lying dormant in an abandoned junkyard.”⁣
⁣
I was blown away by how such simple artwork and minimal, but meaningful, dialogue shaped such a powerful story exploring our inevitable addiction to working to survive and also maintain our family connections. There’s a certain underlying sadness to the story, but also so much hope and love. The topic of AI reliance is also touched upon…how much can (and should) AI do? Can AI take the place of a human being? And in what ways should AI integrate into our communities and family lives? ⁣
⁣
I really, really enjoyed this graphic novel (which is usually not my thing). The deeper messages and thought provoking aspects made it a win for me! If you’re looking for a short, powerful read, THIS is it! ⁣
⁣
🖤🖤🖤🖤🖤/5⁣

[Dave Schaafsma · Rating 4 out of 5]

A children's graphic novel where Cormac McCarthy's The Road meets Peter Brown's The Wild Robo!t?

Oasis (2025) by Guojing is maybe my fifth book by the author. She has done wordless books, a range of work, but is known primarily for her illustration work, I think. Gorgeous art. Here she takes a kind of risk in a couple ways. Oasis is a children's dystopian/sci-fi graphic novel. JieJie and DiDi live in a desert, within a world dominated by AI/robots, pencil drawings, with only the occasional wash. Will kids be scared of it? Like it? It does have a pretty happy ending.

JieJie and DiDi's Mom is gone, having to work, not clear when if at all she will return, as they navigate sandstorms and limited resources. At one point the kids find a pretty much destroyed robot, which they fix--oh,just go with that-- and who they reprogram to be an AI-Mom in their mom's absence. Weird? Make you uncomfortable? When actual biological Mom returns she wants the AI-Mom gone, but over time they work together as a kind of JieJie and DiDi Has Two Moms fashion!?

AI/Robots, labor, family, love? Raises more questions than answers, as literature should do. Guojing worries us with the AI takeover scenarion, then backs off the fear with a collaborative scenario. I like the invention and philosophical probing in it.

[Glenna Coleman · Rating 5 out of 5]

A sister and her younger brother are living on their own in a place destroyed by desertification while their mother works in Oasis, the dome city built and maintained by AI robots, but staffed by human labor in slave-like conditions. Jiejie and Didi live for the moments they can speak to their mother from the old-fashioned phone booth. On Didi's birthday, though, Mom doesn't call. When a fox steals their water, Jiejie and Didi discover an enormous dumping ground from Oasis. In it, they find a partial AI robot. To cheer Didi, they bring it home and fix it. The robot becomes their AI mom. The struggle of their human mom to accept AI mom, and the ways AI mom enhances life for the children and ultimately for the entire family and perhaps even the world shine a spotlight on the ways that AI can perhaps help improve lives for families and improve the rapidly-deteriorating environments of Earth, but only with human-AI cooperation. Guojing's wonderful art captures both the hopelessness and the joy of the children and mother and paints the positive aspects of AI in a rosy light, while tangentially showing the cost of human greed coupled with AI. This is an important book which presents young readers with a simplified choice of how to navigate the crossroad of AI vs. human-only existence.

[Roben · Rating 4 out of 5]

Welcome to a grim future. The world is bleak and barren - filled with dust and sandstorms. JieJie and her little brother, DiDi, are eking out an existence alone. Their mother is working in Oasis City - a domed refuge. Hopefully she will eventually raise enough money for them to all live their together. Once a week, they talk to her from a lone phone booth, almost buried in the sand dunes. One day, they are out gathering water when a fox steals some of their water bags. They chase her into the junkyard and there they find part of a robot. They haul it back home and manage to repair it enough to turn on. Asked what they need, they reply, "A mother." And so the robot's AI loads the information for it to become a mom. She immediately takes over - after they return to the junkyard to find her other arm and her legs. And then their human mom comes home because she is worried about them.

This is a really great graphic novel - the illustrations are superb and help set the tone for the desolate wasteland where the children live. It's not all doom and gloom. Even before the kids find the robot, they play and love each other - but it's hard work. Finding the mom robot makes a huge difference in their lives. The book ends on a hopeful and inspiring note.

[Jame_EReader · Rating 5 out of 5]

👦🏻reviews: Have you watched the movie “The Wild Robot”? A bit similar to this book. This is such an astonishing graphic novel about Ai and two siblings living in the desert while their mother works outside in the city of Oasis. I know that things like this do happen in other countries where young kids fend to themselves while their parents temporarily move to outskirts to work. This graphic novel has so many emotional moments and coming of age. Jie-jie and Didi are amazing characters while the author made them human-like packed with beautiful emotions. We all have different opinions when it comes to Ai-powered robot and I think in this book it has served as an important and interesting piece to the story. The illustrations and the black-white colors have brought mystery and drama to the reader. I think this is one amazing graphic novel.

[Alicia · Rating 5 out of 5]

Reminiscent of Shaun Tan's illustrated series, the pencil sketch of this futuristic world is engrossing. From the start you're pulled in to understand how this girl and her sibling are handling life, essentially alone, trekking in this sandstorm to a phone booth to await a call from their mother, get water from a handpump, and return home to a meager existence. They both want the return of their mother who is working hard but a reader doesn't really understand what this world is like or if the mother really is around.

Enter a robot they stumble upon and awaken, asking it to be their mother as a substitute because their real mother isn't around. This sentimental journey sees the return of the real mother and the emotions that come with it when she sees this AI mother robot. Then reality sets in.

Minimalistic with an omnipresent setting and mood makes it phenomenal.

[Lori · Rating 4 out of 5]

In OASIS, JieJie and Didi are living a bleak existence in a dystopian future. They often wait at an isolated phone booth for a call from their mother, who has left them behind for work at a factory in the city of Oasis in hopes of earning enough to bring the children to the city with her. While poking around in a junkyard after a disappointing day, the children find a broken robot and take it home. This find will change their lives in ways they never could have expected.

The graphic novel’s beautiful illustrations inform and contribute to the mood of the story, bringing warmth to the desolate landscape that serves as the background for events. A timely tale about AI, the story is a statement about survival in the face of challenge and the enduring power of families and love with a satisfying conclusion.

[Anne · Rating 4 out of 5]

Siblings JieJie and Didi live in the desert far outside Oasis city where there mom works long hours in a factory, trying to earn enough money for their admission to the city, too. The two struggle to find food and water and talk occasionally to mom on a pay phone. Then they find an abandoned AI robot, fix it, and put it in mother mode. It becomes a surrogate mother to them. When mom is able to get away and discovers this, she is horrified.

Illustrations are in somber grays and browns, absolutely suited to the tone of the story. Pencil strokes give beautiful detail to the faces and the setting and fade out at the edges. This would be perfect for a book club discussion about AI and its role in modern life.

[Teresa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dystopian--robots eventually took over and the humans now do the scut work in factories, making new and better robots!
Two kids living alone, fetching water etc while mom (we eventually learn) is in the city working in the factory. The kids rescue a robot, who helps them find all her parts, and they choose "Mother" mode. The robot starts taking care of them. When the mom comes home for a visit, she is threatened and damages, but then repairs, the robot. The two moms end up working together; the mom almost goes back to the city for $, but last minute she gets off the bus and comes home to help the robot with a plan to grow food in a greenhouse.
Sketchy, smudgy black and white illustrations add mystery and suspense.

Suggest for people who loved the Wild Robot?

[Holly Wagner · Rating 3 out of 5]

Dystopian graphic novel about two children living in a waste world alone. Their mother works in the utopian Oasis. They climb a hill, suffer sandstorms all to get to a broken down phone booth where their mom magically calls them to check in. They meet a partial AI Robot that they fix and turn on. They ask her to become a mom robot. She does. They help her rebuild herself and she fulfills their mom dreams. Meanwhile Mom leaves work to find the kids. Mom thinks the robot is a threat and pushes her over causing her to breakdown. The kids freak out. Jie Jie runs away. The mom fixes the robot and they try to figure out how to live together building their own oasis so mom doesn’t have to go back.

The story was beautifully illustrated. It just isn’t enough of a story.

[Michelle Tuite · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reading 2025
Book 284: Oasis by Guojing

A middle grade dystopian graphic novel I bought after it being recommended to me in a few places, also on Time's List of best children's books of 2025.

Synopsis: Filled with equal parts hope and suspense, Oasis tells the story of a potentially not-so-distant future that you won’t ever forget.

Review: I had no idea what to expect from this book, as I went in blind. I am going to have to get some middle grade readers’ opinions on this one. In a dystopian setting, two kids must fend for themselves while their mom is off trying to provide for them. When a robot enters their lives everything changes. In the end, a sweet story of the choices we make in life and the role AI and robots may play in the future. 4⭐️

[Rachel · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I feel totally justified in calling Guojing a genius. I have been a fan of hers since I read her wordless picture book Stormy. Her ability to display emotion on her characters' faces without using words, is truly remarkable and this book is no different. Even though there are a few words in Oasis, the story is primarily told through the details of the illustrations, and it is amazing how much the reader begins to feel for AI Mom. I felt the book came to a satisfying conclusion and I would readily read anything else Guojing publishes.