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An American Library Association Best Graphic Novel of 2024
Winner of the grand prize at the Angoulême International Comics Festival
Texas Library Association's Little Maverick Reading List
Kathleen Karr's classic American story of grit, friendship, and turkeys—finally reimagined as a sensational graphic novel.
Missouri 1860: Simon Green is a bad student. His mother is dead and his father has disappeared. But he’s daring, and so when he hears that turkeys fetch a higher price in Denver, he borrows his teacher's life savings and buys a herd of a thousand birds. Then he sets off on the thousand-mile trek with his dog and a pair of mules. To survive the odyssey that follows, Simon will need grit, luck and smarts—and a colorful cast of friends.
Kathleen Karr’s beloved middle-grade novel of a resourceful boy and his herd of a thousand turkeys has enchanted readers everywhere since it was first published in 1998. Now it will reach a whole new audience in Léonie Bischoff's enchanting graphic novel, finally available in English. The adaptation has already garnered two of the world's most prestigious graphic novel awards: the grand prize at the Angoulême International Comics Festival as well as the ACBD (French Comic Book Critics Association’s Award).
"A good addition to any children’s graphic novel collection." ―School Library Journal
"A terrific adaptation of a terrific Old West yarn." ―Kirkus Reviews
Praise for the original The Great Turkey Walk by Kathleen Karr:
“Readers will gobble up Karr's hilarious novel of a boy who resolves to walk 1000 turkeys from the Show-Me state to Denver, Colorado. Simon, who's 15 and newly graduated from the thrid grade, may not be too bright, but he figures he can make his fortune by buying Mr. Buffey's brinze turkeys for a quarter apiece and selling them in Denver for $5 each...The gifted Karr has a cheerful, sassy down-home writing style and a perfect pitch for dialogue.” ―Starred, Publishers Weekly
“Full of good humor and page-turning quest-style events...This novel begs to be read aloud.” ―Starred, School Library Journal
“A wide-open western epic, inspired by actual drives and featuring a cast of capable young people.” ―Kirkus Reviews
Kathleen Karr was born in Allentown, Pennsylvania, and grew up on a chicken farm in Dorothy, New Jersey. After escaping to college, she worked in the film industry, and also taught in high school and college. She seriously began writing fiction on a dare from her husband. After honing her skills in women’s fiction, her children asked her to write a book for them (It Ain’t Always Easy), and she discovered she loved writing for young readers. She is the author of more than twenty novels for young readers. Her book The Boxer, won the Golden Kite award. She died in 2017.
After graduating in comics from the Institut Saint-Luc in Brussels, Léonie Bischoff became a bookseller and then an editor. She is the author of a graphic novel about the diarist Anaïs Nin. Her adaptation of Kathleen Karr's The Great Turkey Walk is her first book for children. Born in Geneva, Switzerland, Léonie currently lives in Belgium.
Michelle Bailat-Jones is a translator and novelist living in Switzerland. She has translated several short stories as well as two novels by C. F. Ramuz, Beauty on Earth and What if the Sun...? Her other translations include work by Clarisse Francillon, Claude Cahun, Julia Allard Daudet, Laure Mi-Hyun Croset, and Céline Cerny.