Journey Into Mohawk Country original text by Van de Bogaert and art by George O'Connor
Summary: With text taken directly from the translations of Van de Bogaert's journals, an Dutch explorer early in America's colonial history, O'Connor adds to the story with images
The Good: At this library the young adult and middle grade comics are all put in the same place and I feel like this work was aimed at middle grade readers and that I would've liked reading this back in the fifth grade when we were just starting to learn American history. Actually, all of the American History classes (and World History sadly) I've had since have always focused on the same pieces of history so it was nice to read something a little different, the Dutch colonization of America was never discussed much. It was very interesting to see a happy relationship between the colonists/traders and the Native Americans, one where both sides seemed to respect each other and be interested in each other, I only wish that's how things had continued during the rest of history.
The Bad: I'm sad that there aren't more historical comic books (either educational in nature or merely using a historical setting) for both MG and YA audiences, this book reminded me of how much I enjoy them. As for the story itself, as much as I liked O'Connor's additions to the story (I would have missed a few innuendos otherwise) there were times when he started adding in bits and I couldn't see where he had gotten the inspiration for them. At times it made me feel like I was reading two versions of the same story at the same time which isn't a good thing, basically I wish he was a little less creative in some of his interpretations.
The Visuals: The art is on the "cartoony" side but I think it would appeal to middle school kids which makes it a good thing. The art is consistent, colorful without feeling unrealistic and everything flows well. There are times when the font is hard to read so I wish they had either used a font that looks less like old fashioned handwriting or had simply made it bigger (each page was crammed full of panels so larger text could have presented a problem) but by and large it was readable and interesting to look at.
And okay book but I think that people much younger than me would enjoy it more and I think it would be a great thing for them to read so I'm happy with it. Been getting a lot of comics out of this library recently actually so I should be set for reviews for a while now, well, if I can find time to read them all that is.....
