Robert Louis Stevenson's Treasure Island The graphic novel, adapted

Gr 5-9-Jim Hawkins, Billy Bones, Ben Gunn, and Long John Silver come alive again in this faithful adaptation of the classic novel, which retains much of the original language. Billy Bones is still âÇ£struck dead by apoplexyâÇ  and the parrot still cries âÇ£pieces of eight,âÇ  for example. The stark visuals are often gripping, most notably in the scene in which Billy Bones first appears and later when Jim Hawkins fights for his life against Israel Hands aboard the Hispaniola. The section entitled âÇ£The Making of Robert Louis Stevenson's Treasure IslandâÇ  includes concept sketches, photos of Hamilton's friends that he used as models for his characters, and information on his artistic techniques. Readers will also learn that the author approaches storytelling âÇ£in a cinematic way,âÇ  which may explain why there are so many images of characters' faces hidden dramatically in shadows. Older children and teens will find this to be a compelling read, and it can help to bridge the gap in your library between graphic novels and the classics.-Andrea Lipinski, New York Public Library (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted. All rights reserved.

"Woohoo. Treasure Island, here we come!" So crows young Jim Hawkins in this notably lame and jumbled graphic adaptation of Stevenson's classic. Crowding variously sized panels and sometimes-misplaced dialogue balloons atop one another, Kohlrus illustrates the tale with jumbles of generally static figures in ragged (but apparently freshly laundered) clothing and scenes of hard-to-follow action. The sound-bite dialogue is largely incidental to Jim's severely truncated narrative, which is broken up into multiple captions on every page, includes unnecessary footnotes ("The Dry Tortugas are a small group of islands in the Gulf of Mexico") and gives the whole outing a feeling of being told rather than shown. No competition for the robust adaptations of Tim Hamilton (2005) or Roy Thomas (2008), nor does it measure up to the standards set by the same publisher's adaptation of Moby Dick, adapted by Lance Stahlberg and illustrated by Lalit Kumar Singh (ISBN: 978-93-80028-22-4). (Graphic fiction. 11-13)]] Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.