(courtesy Macmillan Publishers)
It’s a sad fact of life that far too many people only seem comfortable in themselves when they’re adhering to a rigid set of social values in which there are two possibilities – you satisfy the often cruel requirements laid down by god-knows-who and are accepted, or you don’t and find yourself on the outer, an Other to those within the stultifying confines of the majority clique.
Cosy it may be, in a twisted way, but let’s face it, no one ever fully wins but if the visual and narrative delights of Snapdragon teach us anything, it’s that it’s often those people on the outer who discover and own a more authentic sense of self and the richer and more fulfilling sense of community that comes with it.
The titular character of this wholly delightful and emotionally thoughtful graphic novel doesn’t have it easy.
She lives with her loving single mum in a trailer park, and while she experiences unconditional love and acceptance there, school is a whole other matter; there she is treated like a plaything for the bullies and those who will do anything to get inside the clique and stay there.
Snapdragon could conform but you get the very real feeling she would never be able to accomplish that, just like those of us who have never really found a way to be one of the crowd; for better or worse, we are who we are and no amount of anything is going to change that.
This bright and impulsive girl is fiercely intelligent, endlessly brave and has a thirst for knowledge and new experiences, all things that those in the inner circle see as some kind of weakness and embarrassment when in fact they are a source of towering strength and a gateway to a life so rich that anything is possible as Snapdragon quickly discovers to her delight.
(courtesy and (c) First Second New York)
Snapdragon is a grphic novel that buoyantly and wondrously celebrates all kinds of difference.
Rather than view, as so many do, as some kind of libality, Snapdragon instead asks what if all that difference actually makes the world a more expansive, alive and endlessly possible place?
As the story evolves, Snapdragon discovers that the so-called witch that everyone mocks and pillories has a name – Jacks – a fascinating past with amazing connections to Snapdragon’s own family, and a business selling posed roadkill skeletons that awakens even further in the young girl a thirst for knowledge, and yes, magic.
Yes, actual real magic which upturns Snapdragon’s world in the very best of ways, forging a closer relationship with her best friend Lu aka Lulu who, like so many characters, is not who people think he is, healing some traumatic old wounds for a slew of people and emphasising how magical being different can be.
Possessing a gloriously healing and liberating queer bent, Snapdragon is a love letter to the amazingly full and rich possibilities of life when you discard the idea that it has to be lived only in one set, definitive way.
Neither Snapdragon, Lu or Jacks, or even Snapdragon’s beautifully strong and inclusive mum, who becomes a strong advocate for so many people in the story fit the usual mold and one of the lovely aspects of Snapdragon, quite apart from its luminously colourful and highly expressive art which pops off the page and burnishes the narrative to a superlative degree, is how it champions how weird, strange and different are likely the best things human has going for it.
It’s a joy and a delight to dive into Snapdragon, and Leyh brings all the masterful storytelling and artistic presence she brought to the Lumberjanes series to this graphic novel which celebrates the different and the odd with a loving vibrancy, charm and emotional honesty that will win your heart and heal it, all at the same time.
(courtesy and (c) First Second New York)