Family Comic Friday has a book for those young ones who are fans of Encanto! Most stories starring a prince have a damsel in distress. This time it's the young lady to the rescue! From Latin American folklore, I am pleased to present to you Blancaflor!
Blancaflor is the daughter of an ogre. This ogre has plans for having a prince for dinner. But not as a guest. As the meal!
The ogre's plan is to have the prince attempt 3 challenges. Challenges that are quite impossible to complete. For the past few months, the ogre blessed the prince with a good luck spell. Now that spell has worn off. The prince doesn't know this and still thinks he'll be lucky enough to beat the ogre in order to win a major prize! Looks like filet of prince will be on the menu!
Well it turns out that Blancflor is smitten with this prince. In order to not hurt his pride, she will secretly help the prince complete his three challenges. But the prince isn't gonna make this easy. He's a real dimwit!
This amazing graphic novel was written by Nadja Spiegelman. Nadja is the daughter of Art Spiegelman and Francoise Mouly, both characters in and creators of Maus II! It was just happenstance that I am reading works from the entire Spiegelman family this week!
I was also digging the artwork. It's by acclaimed Spanish experimental cartoonist Sergio Garcia Sanchez. It's a lovely mix native Mexican and European influences throughout. His double-page spreads are lively and fluid. There's so much movement despite not being part of an animated feature. Blancaflor is a family affair for Sergio Garcia Sanchez. His wife Lola Moral colored this book. And in a extra feature in the back of the book, Sergio and Lola's children, who are both professional artists, contributed stylized versions of the Blancaflor cast of characters.
This isn't my first experience with Nadja Spiegelman or Sergio Garcia Sanchez. They were the creative duo behind another Family Comic Friday classic, the labyrinthine Lost in NYC. This is also not my first experience with publisher Toon Graphics. They continue to kill it with their multicultural stories by some amazing and somewhat legendary talent. And from the list of other titles available from Toon Graphics, it looks like Family Comic Friday won't be out of an assortment of amazing titles for weeks to come.
Now if only my local library has these books.
I mentioned Encanto earlier. I know that this book has zero connection to that film. This is a Mexican fairy tale. Encanto is based on Colombian lore and history. But if the young reader in your life is a big fan of that film and you're looking for similar works that could piggyback on that interest, this is a great family fun read! It can help spread interest in Latino culture and it promotes reading from a female heroine perspective which is rare in American/European folk lore; but a mainstay in Latin American storytelling.
I can't recommend Blancaflor enough! It's a quick but satisfying whimsical read that doesn't follow the stand rules of prince and princess fairy tales! We might not be allowed to talk about Bruno. But Blancaflor is going to be forever on my lips as a suggestion for great family read!
Worth Consuming!
Rating: 10 out of 10 stars.
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