You Can’t Kill Snow White

In this unsparing variation on the Brothers Grimm story, Alemagna (Never, Not Ever!) embraces all the intensity and violence of the original. Narrating in the oft-villainized queen’s voice, the text contextualizes the woman’s position. “This girl is tearing out my heart,” she howls of Snow White, born to the king’s first wife; “I hate all that is better than me./ I drape myself with diamonds, and anger.” Blank verse lines appear sans illustrations, followed by multiple wordless full-bleed spreads in which beauty and horror intermingle. The loose, liquid images employ earth tones and electric pink to spotlight blood and hair, thorny undergrowth, angular rooms, and exaggerated features among the cast, portrayed with varying skin tones. The titular princess is nearly silent throughout, distinguished by flowing dark hair, while the queen is shown taking action: in one scene, the exquisitely coiffed woman devours raw the bloody boar’s heart that she believes is Snow White’s. As Snow White approaches marriage, death offers the queen release: “becoming everything, again..../ Becoming nothing” via blazing hot iron shoes. It’s an artfully produced volume that, per a preface, hints at “what is brutal, dark, and feral, as a way of telling the full story of childhood.” Ages 14–up. (Oct.)