Listen up! Bea Wolf is a brilliant retelling of a classic Old English saga—for kids

Enlarge / Kids and grown-ups alike will enjoy answering "candy's clarion call" in Bea Wolf. (credit: Boulet/Macmillan)

A rowdy group of young "mallow-munchers," "bully-crushers," and "bedtime breakers" must battle a fun-hating foe intent on putting an end to their untamed revels in Bea Wolf, a new graphic novel by cartoonist and writer Zach Weinersmith, with illustrations by the French cartoonist Boulet. It's a 21st-century re-imagining of the Old English epic poem Beowulf, but unlike most prior translations aimed at adults, this one targets kids (although adults should love it, too).

Ars readers are likely already familiar with Weinersmith's work, most notably the webcomic Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal, still going strong after 20 years, as well as The New York Times bestseller Soonish, a popular science book co-authored with his wife, Kelly Weinersmith. While he's known for his science-nerd credentials, Weinersmith (like me) earned his undergraduate degree in English literature. That's where he started drawing what's now known as "Classic SMBC." The comic soon morphed into the single-panel version we know and love today, while Weinersmith went back to college to study physics.

It was while he was studying literature that Weinersmith fell in love with Beowulf, as well as the medieval chivalric romance Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. When he became a father, he told some of those timeless tales to his daughter, Ada. In 2015, he crowdfunded a children's retelling of Sir Gawain called Augie and the Green Knight, and said it was because he wanted to give his daughter a book "about little girls who are smart, and scientific, and risk-taking." Boulet created the illustrations for that book, so it was only natural for Weinersmith to ask him to also illustrate Bea Wolf.