Rating: WORTHY!
Raven Girl is described as a graphic novel and was in the graphic novel section of my local library, but it doesn't fit any reasonable definition of a graphic novel. It isn't presented in comic strip form in a preponderantly graphic format with supplemental text. This is a short story with some illustrative full page pictures interleaved, just so you know! These are beautiful line drawings in sepia and green overtones executed by the author herself.
The story is about a mail carrier who falls in love with a raven - except that it's set in Britain, so he's really a postman. The two of them marry and have a raven girl child (how this is consummated is wisely left unaddressed by the author!) who grows up unable to speak anything but raven, although she can communicate in English by means of written notes. She looks just like a human, but has bird bones and so is extraordinarily light for her size.
Throughout her life, she feels out of place, but when she's in college, she meets a scientist who is doing physical augmentation on humans - giving them horns or a tail, or whatever they want. This is like an answered prayer for Raven Girl because she wants wings, so he kits her out with a functioning pair, and she learns to fly and eventually marries the Raven Prince. It's a weird story, but it was a real delight to read. Apparently Niffeneggar wrote it as a modern fairy tale for a dance company to perform.
The hardback version I got from my local library (in the graphic novel section!) was gorgeous, with grey silvery edging to the pages and a dark grey cover which in a way tells the whole story, but it seems to me that the cover tells the inverse version: the child is shown within the raven on the cover, whereas in the story, it is the raven which lurks within the child. I recommend this as a worthy read.
