Deutsch’s uses the graphic novel format to tell a unique story that will appeal to fans of the genre, and make new ones, too. As it turns out, the ability to argue about knitting can literally save a person’s life. Footnotes define the Hebrew and Yiddish terms to make this charming book accessible to a wider audience. Spunky, strong-willed eleven-year-old Mirka Herschberg isnt interested in knitting lessons from her stepmother, or how-to-find-a-husband advice from her. Hereville: How Mirka Got Her Sword(words and images by Barry Deutsch, with colors by Jake Richmond) begins with Mirka arguing about knitting, and it ends with Mirka arguing about knitting. The illustrations are fun, ably enhancing the text. The troll declares her the winner of the contest, and she returns home with the sword in hand, ready to knit more while she awaits her next adventure. As Mirka has not paid much attention to her knitting lessons,she is pleased that she is able to knit the required sweater, though it requires some fast thinking on her part to justify the extra sleeve she knitted. She meets a troll in the woods, and he challenges her to a knitting contest. An encounter with an angry pig takes Mirka underwater, where she experiences a vision of her late mother and meets a witch who tells her how to find a hidden sword. In their town of Hereville, which sometimes feels like a old world shtetl and sometime feels quite modern, Mirka and her siblings go to school, help around the house, and occasionally bicker, activities with which most young readers will easily identify. Mirka, the star of this unusual graphic novel, is an 11-year-old Orthodox Jewish girl who wants to fight dragons, not take knitting lessons from her stepmother.
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