A review by calistareads
Fish Girl by David Wiesner, Donna Jo Napoli
3.0
I’m not sure how I really feel about this book. I think I need to throw up a spoiler warning to speak about it so:
SPOILER Ahead
It’s an interesting tale. I believe this is David’s first graphic novel and he certainly pulled it off well.
We have the example of the little mermaid who was a mermaid that wants to be a human. There is precedent. The funny thing is that most children seem to want to be mermaids or something else. This Fish Girl is a mermaid and she doesn’t seem to desire to be human, she simply desires to be free. In the end, she is completely human and she can’t go back. Maybe this is saying as we step into ourselves and stand up, we have to give something up. There are sacrifices needed to take our shackles off. I feel like he is speaking of growing up and getting out of our parents house and into our lives.
Fish Girl lives in an aquarium with some man calling himself Neptune. He has the girl convinced he is THE Neptune. She does find out he uses machines to do the things she thought we his power of the seas. The man is simply trying to pay bills and he is providing for the Fish Girl while also limiting her experience of life.
The girl gets out of the tank at night. She becomes more bold and eventually she finds out she has legs. When she gets back in the water, her tail comes back. At least until the end, when she gets her legs for the last time. She tries to go back in the water and her tail doesn’t come back. She can not ever go back to her home in the ocean. She has a best friend of an Octopus who seems to be able to change sizes and I wonder if he is the real Neptune??? The octopus must go back to the ocean and the girl finds a human family. We assume she is not going to be put in the foster home system, because that would be cruel after what she did.
The artwork is lovely in the giant building of an aquarium. The building must have been reinforced somehow to how that much weight. There was wonder in the story and the story has something to say. I go back and forth between 3 and 4 stars. After discussing it, I still don’t know how I feel. I thought the setting and characters were good and a great seed of an idea for the story. I thought it was a good story, but I don’t have a fully positive feeling after the story either and maybe that’s ok. Not all stories are to lift us up. This story left me feeling sad and unsatisfied over the story I think. THat is why I’m at 3 stars. I somehow feel unsatisfied.
I love David Wiesner as a storyteller. I guess this has to do with where I’m at this moment. The story does ask questions and provokes thought, so it does its job. It’s a story on in the middle on.
SPOILER Ahead
It’s an interesting tale. I believe this is David’s first graphic novel and he certainly pulled it off well.
We have the example of the little mermaid who was a mermaid that wants to be a human. There is precedent. The funny thing is that most children seem to want to be mermaids or something else. This Fish Girl is a mermaid and she doesn’t seem to desire to be human, she simply desires to be free. In the end, she is completely human and she can’t go back. Maybe this is saying as we step into ourselves and stand up, we have to give something up. There are sacrifices needed to take our shackles off. I feel like he is speaking of growing up and getting out of our parents house and into our lives.
Fish Girl lives in an aquarium with some man calling himself Neptune. He has the girl convinced he is THE Neptune. She does find out he uses machines to do the things she thought we his power of the seas. The man is simply trying to pay bills and he is providing for the Fish Girl while also limiting her experience of life.
The girl gets out of the tank at night. She becomes more bold and eventually she finds out she has legs. When she gets back in the water, her tail comes back. At least until the end, when she gets her legs for the last time. She tries to go back in the water and her tail doesn’t come back. She can not ever go back to her home in the ocean. She has a best friend of an Octopus who seems to be able to change sizes and I wonder if he is the real Neptune??? The octopus must go back to the ocean and the girl finds a human family. We assume she is not going to be put in the foster home system, because that would be cruel after what she did.
The artwork is lovely in the giant building of an aquarium. The building must have been reinforced somehow to how that much weight. There was wonder in the story and the story has something to say. I go back and forth between 3 and 4 stars. After discussing it, I still don’t know how I feel. I thought the setting and characters were good and a great seed of an idea for the story. I thought it was a good story, but I don’t have a fully positive feeling after the story either and maybe that’s ok. Not all stories are to lift us up. This story left me feeling sad and unsatisfied over the story I think. THat is why I’m at 3 stars. I somehow feel unsatisfied.
I love David Wiesner as a storyteller. I guess this has to do with where I’m at this moment. The story does ask questions and provokes thought, so it does its job. It’s a story on in the middle on.