Graphic Novel Review: Knots by Colleen Frakes

Knots by Colleen Frakes. Harper Alley, 2023. 9780063247161. 240pp.

I’m a huge fan of Frakes’s comics, including Prison Island, Tragic Relief, and her other minicomics, and I can’t believe it missed this graphic novel when it came out last year.

At the beginning of the book, Norah and her little sister Lark live in Cheney, Washington, with their parents, who both work for the Washington State Department of Corrections. Nora starts middle school and, after talking her mom into it, begins bleaching and dyeing her own hair at home. It doesn’t go well, then it does, then it doesn’t. Nora’s hair’s ups and downs nearly mirror changes at home, as her mother takes a new job and moves across the state with her sister, leaving Nora in Cheney with her father, who is busier than ever because of a promotion. After her hair gets tangled up, Nora worries about her teacher reporting her to the authorities, and that she’ll be in trouble because she’s alone at home so much.

This is a great read — Nora is full of new-to-middle-school worries but not the same ones I’ve read about in other books — and her family’s problems don’t involve divorce despite her parents having markedly different personalities. (Minor spoiler) Everyone is in a rough place and instead of driving them apart everyone comes together in a believable, hopeful way by the end.

Worth noting: Nora spends lots of time at the library!

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