Continuing with my fairy tale theme, this week we meet Rapunzel- who is a spunky red headed cowgirl who can lasso her hair like no one’s business!
We first meet Rapunzel as a preteen who lives in a lush villa with her mother and servants. She is adequately cared for but not coddled by her stern mother, but is plagued by a dream of being loved by another couple. As she starts to question why the walls are so high around her home, she uses the lassoing skills to climb up and explore what is beyond the boundaries of her home. Discovering a wasteland, she sneaks out and by chance meets her enslaved biological mother who explains how she came to live with the magical Mother Gothel. After confronting Gothel, Rapunzel is banished to another part of the kingdom and imprisoned in a tall tree.
Rapunzel is left to her own devices for several years, and while the mystical forest provides her with food, the spell also seems to affect the growth of her hair. Mother Gothel only visits her once a year to see if she repents, and in the mean time Rapunzel hones her skills of utilizing her long hair as a weapon. She escapes without any one’s assistance, and ends up meeting Jack, a young con man on the run. Their wild-west escapades together were fun and relatable, for not everything goes their way, despite them doing their best to help others they encounter. Rapunzel and Jack (of beanstalk fame) join in a traveling vaudeville show to camouflage their way back into the villa, and there they create chaos and challenge Mother Gothel and her evil ways.
The illustrations are fun and vibrant, and give Rapunzel a Pippi Longstocking vibe- which I love. The characters in the story are a diverse group, which was appreciated, and drawn well. This appealing fairy tale hews closely to the classic story, but adds enough extras to make it fun and different. Definitely recommended to younger readers!
-Nancy
Graphic Novelty² 
February 3, 2017 at 4:38 pm
Well this is kind of hilarious and sounds really fun , I think my niece will really enjoy this , she always had weird questions when I read her fairy tales anyways .
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February 3, 2017 at 5:21 pm
This would be perfect for her, and you can score points for being a cool uncle!
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February 3, 2017 at 5:42 pm
first she must start reading properly , right now I am just reading stuff to her … so this will be a good gift like a year from now and yes the cool uncle , i hadn’t thought of that 😀
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February 3, 2017 at 7:27 pm
That cover is a cool pic! Seems like a fun story.
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February 3, 2017 at 8:35 pm
I loved Pippi Longstocking as a child, so the cover art made me think of her due to the braids.
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February 4, 2017 at 9:12 pm
Of all the fairy tales, Rapunzel always gets me. I remember watching (and loving!) Disney’s ‘Tangled’ but I just kept thinking, “Wow…her hair would take so long to wash, condition, and dry! How could you even enjoy life with that much hair to care for?? It’s crazy!!” As someone who’s had long hair for much of his life, I got anxious thinking of how impossible it would be to care for that much hair :). Everyone tells me “it’s magic hair” but that doesn’t cut it. I’m still left wondering how she can have time for anything other than hair care in her life. Anyway, my weird suspension of disbelief issue aside, this volume seems like a lot of fun too! Like I said before, i really dig the whole genre of postmodern re-imagining of fairy tales. Yay for fairy tales!!
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February 5, 2017 at 10:54 pm
I too have a problem with “suspension of disbelief” in books and movies. My husband tells me I need to let some plot points go, but my practicality often gets in the way of looking at the big picture. But what I did like about this book, was that it showed her trying to deal with her hair, and that mistakes are made along the way to the happily ever after.
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February 12, 2017 at 8:56 pm
I’m afraid I didn’t enjoy this one as much as I wanted to. Hale seemed to be trying to play with gender stereotypes, but she ended up merely flipping them by making Jack the “useless” character and Rapunzel the fighting character. I really wanted to see more of an equal relationship and some teamwork.
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