Important Note: We have already provided a detailed review of the novel version of this book. That book expands the content, but follows this graphic novel very closely. Please read that book review as this one will focus on differences/additions to the concerning content. That review is needed to get the full picture.

https://christianparentreviews.com/book-reviews/White-Bird-A-Novel-a-Wonder-Story-R-J-Palacio-with-Erica-S-Perl

The biggest thing many parents will want to know about comes in the Epilogue. Read that previous review to hear more about the surprising way the author uses this content to end the book, but here we see a newspaper headlining that 100s or 1000s (number is partially obscured) of “children separated from their parents as a part of Trump’s “Zero Tolerance” policy” and another saying “Refugees turned away with few options”. Whatever we feel about this complicated topic, making at least a partial nod relating it to the Holocaust (after a lot of very emotional content) is a really unfortunate addition. The protest march that follows this scene expands on this with several signs, including “No Walls” and “Love is Love”.

One interesting note here is about the choice of a graphic novel for this content. As we mention in the main review, this is a heavy and sad story, with some intense parts to it. This makes it an unfortunate choice for a graphic novel. As we have shared many times, we believe strongly that graphic novel format books will inevitably end up in the hands of very young children. Many libraries put these books all together in a single “graphic novel” section. A book on the Holocaust being next to “Investigators” in a section with bright, colorful illustrations is not ideal. In our opinion, this type of story (and many others we see in this format) should not be released as graphic novels.

Another thing to point out specific to the graphic novel is that there are (obviously) more illustrations. This means that some of the things left to imagination in the novel are shown in a graphic drawing in this version. At one point early on a soldier who is trying to help hide Jewish children is shot in cold blood, which is obviously disturbing (especially considering the previous paragraph). Here the young reader is shown the soldier lying on the ground with blood at the gunshot wound and also seeping on to the white snow. Similarly, in this version we see in drawing the scene where Vincent, who is partially disabled, being punched multiple times, here showing the blood. There is also a drawing of her imagining a wolf coming into her bedroom while she sleeps (a disturbing concept). Later the scene where this wolf kills the wicked young man is again shown.

We see a few different pseudo-spiritual elements we don’t remember from the first one. At one point when Sara is being chased, she cries out “help me Maman” (who she believes to be dead). She writes out a list of blessings, almost in a prayerful way, we see the credit/thanks addressed to “Life”.

A few other additions to the concerning content in this version that we will share:

The “very long kiss” is illustrated and shown.