Luna: The Graphic Novel
As a part of our Forests Unit, we're currently working on Luna, our first graphic novel.
A spread from Luna of Julia’s first climb up the redwood tree and her first time seeing clearcuts.
A True Story
Luna combines history and biography into an action-packed coming-of-age narrative that brings to life humans’ consequential impact on the environment. Follow Julia Butterfly Hill and her team as they struggle to save an ancient redwood during their famous 738-day tree sit.
What would you do if you survived a horrible car accident,
but found yourself feeling like a stranger in your old life?
What would you do with your second chance?
These are the questions 23-year-old Julia asks herself in 1998 just weeks before she climbs a redwood tree called Luna--a tree she ultimately lives in for 738 days without once touching ground.
Our visually stunning depiction of this famous tree sit combines Julia's narrative with Luna's thousand-year-old voice. Through Julia, we learn about the devastating effects of clear cutting and deforestation as she learns of them herself. This provides a rich, engaging, and cohesive platform to investigate the history, science, and social issues behind the redwood forest's history, and its parallels to forests around the world. Through Luna's perspective, readers discover the history of the redwood species and the Northern California region, and see how indigenous people have learned to cultivate relationships with the forest ecosystem, exposing readers to lifeways informed by a worldview very different from our dominant culture's.
By illustrating the role human beings have played throughout our environmental history, we can understand more clearly where we are now and how things might progress. Luna and Julia's stories also shed light on the profound impact of the Gold Rush on the Northern Californian landscape, and the power of noviolent civil action to create change. Readers will marvel at the importance of forests, our interconnectedness with them, and their capacity to regenerate and heal. They'll understand why we ought to fight for forests and for the people that call them home.
Character study of Luna, the redwood tree.
Character study of Julia Butterfly Hill.
“This inspiring tale made me personally attach myself to wildlife both inside and out of the book. Breathtaking illustrations and powerful story made Luna impossible to put down.”
“Graphic novels engage multiple learning types, but also it’s a medium so many kids LOVE.
And at Rising Earth, we want fun, exploration, and connection at the heart of how we educate.”
“Julia shows us that any ‘normal’ person can have an enormous effect on people. Regardless of who you are, you are able to change people’s viewpoints and make a difference in this world.”
Sample pages from Luna:
Curious about our creative process?
Collaborating With Youth
Here are just a few examples of how the Teen Production Council and Alumni Council’s have made our graphic novels more relevant and exciting for teens:
Pointed out where pages were too congested or boring and suggested ways to improve.
Rewrote dialogue the way a young person might phrase something.
Provided insight into scenes where characters deal with mental, emotional, and social challenges.
Suggested art direction for coloring.
Proposed character studies, costume designs, and story arcs for our next book.
Practice the art of manuscript writing and storyboarding a new or revised scene, giving their valued options.
Interns from our youth programs mark in the storyboards their feedback for layout, art, and text —a crucial step before line art and lettering.
We guide our interns through the manuscript writing and storyboarding process. They have opportunities to use their voice and express their opinions by reworking particular scenes.
Examples of storyboard revisions by a Teen Production Council member’s after reading Luna, the graphic novel:
Examples of a visual expression by a Teen Production Council member after reading Luna, the graphic novel:
“Reading Luna, I felt like I was more and more immersed in nature which explains the plants and leaves in the subject’s hair.”
Stay tuned for the complete graphic novel!
Story by Lauren Wigo, Joseph Biaz-Elm, and Maggie P. Chang.
Storyboards by our artist Nguyen Tran.
Final line art by our artist Julia Yellow.
Coloring by Karla Castaneda.