GRAPHIC NOVEL REVIEW: Gronk: A Monster’s Story Vol. 1 TP

Gronk: A Monster’s Story, by Katie Cook, is about a monster who doesn’t like scaring people… does it sounds familiar… like Casper: The Friendly Ghost. Who moved out from her monsters’ community and along the way she met Dale, who lives in a little isolated place with her pet cat and dog. Dale treated Gronk as a new member of the family where she teaches her on how human lives.

But, I thought that this is a kid (less than 13-year-old readers) graphic novel but I was wrong, let me justify it. I made a small experiment with my two daughters.

First, I made my 7-year-old daughter read it. Honestly, she didn’t understand and did not find the comic book funny. Maybe because she didn’t like the graphics and she did not find Gronk as a cute monster. Then I asked my 12-year-old daughter, and I had the same result.

Which made me curious and wonder why, and so I personally read it and this is my view:

If Katie Cook is targeting readers from 13-year olds and below, you will have a children-parent problem that I experienced. I got to explain stuff that they may not have encountered or may not have taught in school. A good example, are some terminologies that a kid may not understand like “Stockholm Syndrome” and “Schrödinger’s Experiment.” And some movie flicks that a kid haven’t watched in the first place like Star Wars. I guess the author was inspired to write this comic strip based on her personal experience.

But just a minute, the book is dedicated to her husband? Not to her daughters. I wonder why? Maybe because, the comic strips are based on their actual experiences with their daughters. Personally, I can relate to that as a father, on how you want to expose your kids to some geeky stuff that you like, a good examples are “Lord of the Rings” and “the Muppet Movie.”

In terms of originality, I didn’t find anything new on the story, it reminds me of Disney’s Lilo & Stitch. But I want to give credit to Miss Katie of introducing Gronk as a friendly monster, maybe inspired by Sulley and Mike from Pixars’ Monsters, Inc. movie. And looking back at Miss Katie’s background working with Jim Henson’s Fraggle Rock and The Storyteller, you’ll understand that she is an expert on kid and monsters interactions.

Storywise, Miss Katie was able to establish the origin of Gronk’s past, it’s good thing that the author wrote on the introductory page that the friendly monster is a “she” and not a “he.” I thought that Gronk is a boy monster’s name because Gronk’s character design looks like Barney Rubble of Hanna-Barbera’s The Flintstones. There was no sign that Gronk was a girl-monster like we are used to seeing ribbons or flowers and all other cutie stuff, but I guess Gronk’s plush kitty is not enough.

For Dale Wilco, living in a “little” isolated environment, she got all the modern world can provide, maybe what Cook want’s to establish is that the character doesn’t have a neighbor nearby. And nobody will be alarmed seeing a monster in the community, maybe that is the difference between Lilo & Stitch, Disney was able to inject Stitch in the human community without any problem. As Dale explained to Gronk that “There just too many people who make uneducated judgments based on someone’s appearance,” I hope this will not leave a wrong impressions to her young readers.

In terms of artistic style, its simplicity makes it appealing to young readers, in the tradition of Jim Davis’ Garfield, which I think is also patterned with the same set up… a master and pet relationship.

Personally, I give this collection a rating of 3 stars out of five, for the parents can relate more than the children