Book Review: Will & Whit by Laura Lee Gulledge

Will & Whit

By Laura Lee Gulledge

Release Date: May 7, 2013

Source: Library

Summary: Wilhelmina “Will” Huxstep is a creative soul struggling to come to terms with a family tragedy. She crafts whimsical lamps, in part to deal with her fear of the dark. As she wraps up another summer in her mountain town, she longs for unplugged adventures with her fellow creative friends, Autumn, Noel, and Reese. Little does she know that she will get her wish in the form of an arts carnival and a blackout, courtesy of a hurricane named Whitney, which forces Will to face her fear of darkness.
Laura Lee Gulledge’s signature visual metaphors will be on full display in this all-new graphic novel, a moving look at shedding light on the dark corners of life.

Review: I never read graphic novels. The only time I ever do is for class, so when I had to pick a graphic novel to read for my YA lit class, I thought this one sounded cute. And look how adorable the cover is! In the end, though, I just couldn't get into the graphic novel genre and didn't enjoy the story as much as I wanted to. 

Will has always loved making lamps as a way to fight the shadows of darkness that have haunted her ever since her parents' death. Now, she's living with her eccentric Aunt and trying to lessen the burden she is on everyone around her. As the end of the summer is approaching, Will simply wants to hang out with her friends away from the drama of the world. When hurricane Whitney approaches, the entire town loses power and Will finds herself helping out with an arts carnival, along with her best friends. Through the hurricane and carnival, Will has to face her fears of darkness and finally confront the loss she's been hiding from. 

From the cover, I thought this one was going to be a super cute romance in graphic novel form. Ha, I was so wrong. There isn't really any romance until pretty much the very end, and even then we don't get to see the romance actually happen. The entire story is just Will dealing with her fear of darkness and helping out with the arts carnival. I'm not that familiar with graphic novels, but I kind of wanted to more to happen than what actually did. 

Reading this book, I wasn't all that impressed with the characters or the story. Sure, the characters were fun, but that's about it. The story went by super quickly, so I didn't really have time to become really invested in the characters. That being said, I feel like I only got a surface reading of the story and didn't really get anything out of it. I did think Will'd passion for building lamps was really unique and cool, and I liked how she transferred that passion into actual art in the end. The arts carnival was fun. Other than that, I wasn't all that impressed with this book. 

So I guess I can say graphic novels are definitely still not the genre for me. I need more words and emotions than this book gave me, not to mention more depth from the characters and story. The pictures and illustrations were very pretty and I liked the whimsical style to them, but I needed more from the story to enjoy this one.