By Julia Beauregard
Hometown Weekly Editor
Recently, the Westwood Public Library (WPL) invited children ages seven and up to partake in a graphic novel writing workshop with graphic novelist Johnathan Todd.
Todd shared his approach to creating comics, expressing that he had been creating them since he was in elementary school. He asked children to reflect upon meaningful moments in their lives to create a story based on them. "I want you to take a story that really happened to you and make it into a comic," he said. He felt this would provide the students with an easy basis to mold their story around, as his book is a fictionalized account of his life. He wanted the stories they shared to involve a "big emotion" and teach them a lesson, instructing the children to have a beginning, middle, and end to their stories.
After the kids decided upon their stories, Todd called them to the front to show how he would draw his comic panels. The children then returned to their seats to begin working on their story graphics.
Once the children finished creating their stories, they shared them with each other, receiving praise from Todd. Todd then shared snippets from his graphic novel, explaining his own story and how the novel came into creation. He explained how he transitioned from a cartoonist to a graphic novelist.
Graphic novels are a unique medium that combines visual arts with narrative storytelling and are very popular among middle-grade readers. These books can encompass a wide range of genres, from fantasy and science fiction to memoirs and historical fiction, allowing for diverse and complex stories to be told. Todd discussed his graphic novel, "Timid," published earlier this year. According to Todd, "'Timid' was inspired by my struggle to overcome shyness as a tween following my family’s move from South Florida to a Boston suburb in the 1980s."
After Todd's presentation, children were invited to pick up a copy of Todd’s graphic novel and have it signed by the author.
For more information on events such as these, please visit www.westwoodlibrary.org.
