Sleeping Beauty pricks her finger on a spindle and sleeps for 100 years. Then she's awakened by her Prince's kiss and falls madly in love with him at first sight, and is carried off to his palace to be his bride.
So what happens to the castle? The kingdom remnants have slipped away... there's nothing much left to rule, but here is this castle and the servants who were asleep with the princess for 100 years. What are they to do?
Linda Medley explores the question in her beautiful graphic novel, Castle Waiting. This collection brings together the first 12 issues of the Eisner Award-winning series. This is one of those books that you can just immerse yourself into, the drawings as compelling as the writing, the story spun slowly out so that even as the action moves on, the character's past is revealed in tantalizing tidbits. With engaging nested stories (for those who like that style), this book ends up including multiple tales, all with fairy-tale flavor, feminine empowerment in a range of forms, and some wonderful offhand references to other stories.
The artwork is gorgeous and creative, a far cry from the "cartoony" feel of some comic books, so if you haven't read any graphic novels before, this might be a good one to try. Altogether, Medley portrays her story well, both in words and images, for a delightful exploration of Sleepy Beauty's castle. I'm looking forward to Volume 2.
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