Will wakes one morning with a mission. His brother Shawn is dead. Will takes Shawn’s gun and gets into the lift that will take him to the ground floor of his apartment block and outside to get revenge. What will doesn’t expect is for his friend Buck to get into the apartment on the next floor, because Buck is supposed to be dead. Buck was shot in a separate incident.
Who else is haunting Will? As the lift sinks downwards, Will is forced to confront his past.
This text is already popular with educators and librarians for the empathic insight it offers into the cycles of violence, hurt and revenge that perpetuate gun crimes in young people. The graphic novel edition is staggering in its emotional intensity and it is worth reading even for people who are familiar with the original text. There is no hiding from the emotions drawn into the character’s faces.
The characters who get into the lift force Will to challenge his decision. There are people who have been shot, people who have shot others, and people who have both shot and been shot. As the layers of this story build it becomes clear that Will’s choice isn’t as simple as he might like to believe. Danica Novgorodoff’s art picks up on both the humanity of this story and the fact that it is haunting by setting real-looking people against ghostly backgrounds.
Throughout the story Will reminds himself of ‘the rules’ – No crying, No Snitching and Revenge. Get revenge if your brother or father or uncle or loved one is killed. The story revolves around two issues – is Will going to turn around or go forward with his plan, and can Will, who has suppressed his emotions over the violence he has witnessed, allow himself to feel the pain that this violence has caused? These two questions are interlinked. By supressing their emotions, the narrative suggests, boys like Will become more likely to repeat the cycle.
For children who are affected by gang violence this narrative offers the reassurance that they are not alone and that there is a solution. It is also important for others because reading outside of our own experiences helps us to build empathy. We build an understanding of one character’s feelings and experiences and then we are able to think more compassionately when we hear about similar experiences and people in the real world.
A graphic novel that challenges the reader and remains in the mind long after it is closed.
Long Way Down – The Graphic Novel by Jason Reynolds and Danica Novgorodoff is available now from Faber & Faber Limited. RRP. £9.99. (Provided for review)
