Comic Corner: Graphic novels kind of require graphics

‘Kellie’s Diary Volume 1’ review

By Brittney MacDonald, Senior Columnist

0/5

I have been writing these graphic novel reviews for almost a year, and never have I encountered a book that was so misleading. Kellie’s Diary does not fail due to a weak concept or bad anatomy. It fails because it breaks the only cardinal rule that can never be broken in any graphic novel of any genre: Kellie’s Diary has no graphics.

Kellie’s Diary is a completely textual diary of a nine-year-old girl as she lives through the first stages of a zombie apocalypse. Altogether it is not a bad concept, but the writing within the diary does not seem like that of a nine-year-old. The syntax and observations are that of an adult with the odd phrase or misspelling in an attempt to make the work seem like that of a child. With no actual art to redeem this book, the reader is left completely dependent on the weak narration, which eventually becomes extremely annoying because of how broken-up and unbelievable it is.

Kellie’s Diary is meant to be a graphic novel representation of Kellie’s Diary: Decay of Innocence by Thomas Jenner and Angeline Perkins. When I first picked it up, I thought it was odd that there was no illustrator or colourist listed, but now I understand why: the only “graphic” quality to this graphic novel is that each page is made to look as if it has been handwritten and kept in the same journal.

I would not recommend Kellie’s Diary to anyone. Not only is it not a graphic novel, it’s just plain boring to read.