Explore TeachingBooks’ collection of activities and resources for Snapdragon.Īs part of our Virtual Book Tour, TeachingBooks asks authors and illustrators to complete short sentence prompts.Listen to Kat Leyh talk about her name.You can click the player below or experience the recording on TeachingBooks, where you can read along as you listen, and also translate the text to another language. Listen to Kat Leyh talking with TeachingBooks about creating Snapdragon.

Leyh brings humor and magical realism to this graphic novel about self-discovery, friendship, and honoring individuality. Soon, though, Snap discovers that Jacks may, in fact, know some real magic after all, as well as some secrets about Snap’s past. Sure, it’s creepy, but Snap thinks it’s kind of cool, too, and she begins to help Jacks with her work. But in reality, Jacks is just a crocks-wearing older woman who sells roadkill skeletons online-after doing a ritual to put their spirits to rest. Published by First Second Books, an imprint of Macmillan PublishersĪccording to the rumors, Snap’s town has a witch.This endearingly offbeat story emphasizes found community, the importance of love and friendship, and a fierce commitment to individuality-all powerful themes for middle-grade readers. Beyond the magic, creepy undertones, and captivating artwork, themes of acceptance, particularly regarding gender and sexuality, permeate the story and are handled in a refreshing, matter-of-fact manner. Leyh’s dynamic artwork, full of active motion, shifting perspectives, and varying panel shapes and sizes, matches the complexity of the plot, and her figure designs, which show a wide variety of gender presentations, body shapes, skin tones, and hair types, nicely complement her characters’ personalities. The slow reveal of those connections makes up the dense but heartening plot of Leyh’s graphic novel, which is bolstered by some affirming, character-revealing side-plots, such as Snap’s growing friendship with transgender, dark-skinned Lulu her fantastic relationship with her tough yet deeply compassionate Black mother and her impatience to become more powerful herself. Beyond their shared obsession with animals, though, Snap and Jacks have a much deeper connection based on family secrets, ghosts, and a touch of magic. There’s something creepy about Jacks, the odd, gangly, one-eyed old white woman living in Snapdragon’s town, but Snap’s not afraid, especially after Jacks shows her how to take care of a litter of orphaned possums and what she’s up to early in the morning with a wheelbarrow full of roadkill (it involves a very lucrative internet business for skeleton enthusiasts).

Kat leyh snapdragon