It’s been an uncommonly good year for graphic novel Greek myths, don’t you think? From George O’Connor’s amazing new series (starting with Zeus: King of the Gods) to two different takes on the Odyssey by Gareth Hinds and Tim Mucci, I suppose we have Percy Jackson to thank for this bountiful harvest of Greek God magnificence. Of course, all the books I’ve just mentioned are best suited for older readers. Let us not forget that there are nine-year-olds out there who’d like some mythmaking as well. Preferably in color. Preferably with a bit of humor stuck in for spice. If you were to plan the perfect kid-friendly version of these myths, I’ll be frank with you, you wouldn’t dream up Michael Townsend’s Amazing Greek Myths of Wonders and Blunders. Not because it isn’t good, of course, but because unless your brain has warped in all the right places NOBODY would be able to dream up a book like this one. Townsend taps into his love of pure animal extravaganza, producing a book so madcap, wild, uninhibited, and inspired that it’ll either burst the blood vessels in both your eyes upon contact with its content or you’ll find yourself so sucked in that only a steady diet of Pixie Stix and Yo Gabba Gabba will produce the same thrill. The back of the book reads, “WARNING: These aren’t your parents’ Greek Myths!” Actually they are. But when it comes to the presentation they are 100% kid.
There are several different ways to go about presenting a book of myths. You could be chronological or choose stories that have something in common. Townsend selects nine tales of his own and if there’s any connection between them, maybe it’s how much comic gold each one can potentially yield. So it is that we read about Pandora and her descent into box-related madness, Arachne and her big head, and a Pyramus and Thisbe that rivals A Midsummer Night’s Dream in hilarity. Side characters like a smelly donkey, doomed bunnies, and some stupid sheep add a little spice on the side. Townsend always remains essentially true to the original tales, but that doesn’t mean he can’t have a little fun along the way.
You don’t tend to expect to learn something new from a graphic novel, and I certainly expected to already know all the myths included in this book. ESPECIALLY the story of King Midas. What’s not to know? Midas is greedy, a god grants him the gift of turning stuff into gold, he can’t eat, his daughter gets transformed, end of story. I guess I somehow missed the entire Silenus element. Silenus, in
My son LOVES this book. He’s a reader, but prefers non-fiction and comics to novels. I’ve been thinking about handing him Percy Jackson, but after devouring the series myself, realized it is still a little dense for his tastes. So I’ve been handing mythology books as a lead-up, which he loves. I’m glad that he likes the classic D’Aulaires, but the Townsend is definitely his favorite.
Going in my Amazon cart in 3…2…
I think I reviewed this for SLJ. Anyway I’ve had a copy for a long time. And I’m such an art junkie/snob, my initial reaction to the brutal colors and blocky, 2-D characters was kind of comically extreme. I seriously could barely look at it.
But it’s had the same popularity in my house as in your library Betsy – in all this time, it has NEVER made it onto the shelf. One or the other of my boys has always had it out on a stack somewhere, and now I kind of love it, even the colors.
It wins you over, doesn’t it? I have a theory that just as our taste buds change as we grow older, so too do our perceptions of different colors. So what looks garish to an adult (i.e. this book) strikes a child as flamboyant and fun. I think it works because it’s willing to become that extreme. I mean, look at Townsend’s other books. I get the feeling this is the first time he was told to let go and get wild. A sugar rush for the eyeballs. Glad you’ve come around to it.
My daughter dove into Greek mythology about four years ago when she was still quite small. Way back in 2006 there was nothing like the wealth of graphic novels available today. But we got lucky — a publisher in Singapore, Youngjin, produced a series of 3 lengthy sets of manga stories under their Y.Kids brand. (It was the lonely result of a search of the phrase “Greek Mythology Graphic Novel.”) Here’s the listing for the first:
http://www.amazon.com/Greek-Roman-Mythology-Graphic-Novels/dp/9810522401
These books go far in depth, while staying lighthearted. They also sidetrack into some text explainers that are easy to blow past if they feel too wordy.
The minutia my kids have picked up from these books is tremendous. Yet it’s all still silly comic books, too.