This graphic novel was a lot darker than I was expecting and way more emotional, but the story was so well done and all of it came together so beautifully. I loved that there was Lion Dancing, which I had little knowledge of, so it was so fun to learn a bit about this incredible tradition and the different iterations depending on Asian descent. The dancers wear giant Lion Costumes and must work together to dance, in which they mimic the movements of a lion. The dance is intricate and is usually performed at special occasions to bring good luck and fortune. It is something that Val yearns for, both a community and luck in love. This novel had incredible depth with Val's friendships, her family, and the love she was seeking. Specifically, as Val grows she realizes there are many kinds of love and that giving her heart can be scary, but it can also be worth the possible future heartache. If her father had never met and fallen in love with her mother, than Val would not exist. Val's relationship with her father is full of light and love, until she finds out about her mother and then it becomes strained due to lies. Together they must work through the pain, Val in terms of loss of trust in her father, realizing her mother left them, and realizing after all that she loves her father and recognizes that his heart was broken and he made bad decisions because of that. Meanwhile, her father must finally accept his part in what happened and apologize to Val. It was interesting to see the likeness between Leslie and Val's best friend, Bernice. They are both very much the make friends and love connections easily, but do not become too serious about any one person type. Bernice is like this because of how her parents are together and her fear of turning out like her mother (tolerating a relationship she appears to hate). Leslie is so obliviously cruel to Val, as she continuously asks him to define who they are to each other. I do not understand why Jae continued to help and support Leslie when Jae had real feelings for Val. I personally was so angry at Val for allowing Leslie to treat her the way he did for so long, but I realized she had so little experience with love that she could not understand why Leslie acted the way he did. Val and Jae's story was cute. The way they work through their shared past and their similar pains. Both have lost parents, Val to her mother leaving and Jae's father dying of cancer. Jae is the only one who understands Val's imaginary friend Saint Valentine and the fear she has of him and that he wants to keep her heart. He realizes her apprehensions about love and he too has issues to work out about his own loss and his own regrets. They are perfect for each other. The art in this graphic novel is stunning. The colouring is vibrant and highlight the moments of joy and the moments of pain, fear, loss. There are darker moments when the statue of Saint Valentine is interacting with Val. Those are moments of horror, with him slowly crumbling each time she sees him, and his eyes often being the only part of him visible. Quite the change from the cherubic angel of her childhood. The lion dancing is drawn so incredibly that it seems as though the page is moving with them. There are also several moments where visuals take whole pages to display an important theme or moment for Val in her journey to self love, familial love, friend love, and true love. The colours, the contents, the writing, made this graphic novel stand out and the story very memorable.
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