This article first appeared in the February 22, 2011 edition of the Syracuse Islander Newspaper.
Once upon a time there was a girl named Rapunzel who lived in the Wild West and used her grit and spunk to fight injustice. What? That’s not how the story goes, you say? Then you haven’t read the graphic novel, Rapunzel’s Revenge by Shannon and Dean Hale.
Like all graphic novels, Rapunzel’s Revenge uses sequential art that involves illustrations, panels and images. This evolving form of literacy is longer than traditional comic books and has a compete plotline as opposed to a cliffhanger ending. In a graphic novel the reader “reads between the panels”; they make connections between the pictures and text and the page as a whole. Graphic novels can be a tool to help children and adults succeed in the multimedia world we live in.
Young Rapunzel lives a sheltered life with Mother Gothel. When she dares climb the walls surrounding her home she learns that Mother Gothel is not her real mother, but a tyrant who controls the only water source in the land. After confronting Mother Gothel, Rapunzel is locked inside a tree in a magical garden where everything grows at an alarming rate, including her hair.
Read the full review and find links to paper dolls and more info about graphic novels here.
