The Black Death (Graphic Medieval History) by Gary Jeffrey

The Black Death (Graphic Medieval History) Reviews

• 
  Laci Havlat

  The Black Death by by Gary Jeffery, explored the idea of Medieval history. The graphic novel went into great detail explaining the events of the plague that had overtaken the world little by little. The sickness had first begun on a ship and was eventually brought into a city. The disease was uncontrollable and spread quickly. Eventually the entire world was overtaken by the illness. Gary Jeffery did a fantastic job describing the setting and time period before each scene in the novel. By creating an image for the reader to develop an idea of what time and where the scene was placed, the story came into life for the reader.
  
  The Black Death would be a great graphic novel for people around the ages of sixteen to eighteen. The novel was made for an audience of higher maturity and education about Medieval history. The images that were illustrated in the novel by Alessandro Poluzzi are intended for people of higher age due to the vivid goriness. It is important for the audiences to have a well developed reading ability due to the strong vocab that Gary Jeffery implemented within the novel.
  
  I rated the graphic novel, The Black Death, with four stars. Gary Jeffery created a story in which came to life due to the strong vocab and setting and time period description. The illustrations were vivid. The illustrations contributed to giving the audience a greater understanding for the side effects of the plague in the story, along with the feelings that the characters were going through in the story based on the expressions draws on their faces. Jeffery could have implemented more background information about the specific plague, along with information about Medieval history. By doing so, the novel would have been in deeper understanding for what the characters had been experiencing before the illness struck.
• 
  Lacey Louwagie

  This is an appropriately dark bit of educational reading. The artwork is harrowing, and may be the best format to get through to kids first learning about the black plague how horrifying it really was. It is well written, clear, and competently illustrated. I did dock one star point because I felt it didn't adequately explain some things. It covered flagellates, for example, but it didn't make a clear connection between what they were doing and the plague -- that is, that they thought by self-mortification they could curry God's favor and perhaps relieve the suffering of the plague, etc. I was surprised to learn that the black plague still exists, but that we no longer catch it purely because of increased sanitation. Wow, do I love soap!
• 
  Kaethe

  Great idea, but I would have enjoyed more narrative.
  
  Library copy
• 
  James Traxler

  Gruesome but informative.
• 
  Becky

  I learned a lot from this. I actually wish it covered just a bit more....
• 
  Janelle

  The graphic novel format helps the reader visualize and retain the information. I'm glad the graphics are drawn and not real photos of the gruesome disease.
• 
  wildct2003

  Excellent book for the gross factor in words and in pictures.