Pecos Bill, Colossal Cowboy: The Graphic Novel

Description

Tossed from a wagon and raised by coyotes, Pecos Bill had a strange childhood to say the least. As he grows up, this Texas-sized cowboy wrestles with wolves, grapples with a wild mare, and rides a mountain lion without even breaking a sweat! Pecos Bill is able to tame the Wild West with ease, but soon he faces an even bigger challenge, a rampaging cyclone the likes of which no one has ever seen! Pecos Bill must try to rein this wild storm in, or it will lay waste to the great American frontier.

Lisa K. Weber makes art for comics, kid's books, and cartoons. Her work has included graphic-novel adaptations of classic literature, illustrated books for young and middle-grade readers, and character and storyboard design for animations. She cofounded the comic book label HexComix in 2014, cocreating and illustrating its flagship title, Hex11, which earned a nomination for the Dwayne McDuffie Award for Diversity in Comics. Born in New Haven, Connecticut, raised in Wilmette, Illinois, and schooled in New York City, Lisa currently lives and works in Los Angeles, California, where she enjoys healthy doses of satire, science fiction, and classic-rock radio.

Classic American tales are retold with energetic, cartoon depictions meant to emphasize the outrageous entertainment elements. Both books are summary compilations of many stories, stripped to their essence, and they feel a little short because of it, with Pecos Bill feeling the most choppy and episodic. By replacing the traditional purple, shaggy-dog prose with over-the-top illustrations, each volume does successfully recapture the bombastic scope of the original stories, but the content remains slim. And while both books end with a glossary, discussion questions, and other educational filler, children might have simply wanted more or fuller tales. Of particular note is that in addition to the frenetic artwork in Paul Bunyan, the book is complemented by excellent design work that mixes advertising tropes with frontier photographic elements to help reinforce the legendary quality of the myth.?-- "School Library Journal"