LITERARY ADAPTATION

Robert Louis Stevenson’s celebrated historical adventure doesn’t need pictures to enhance its power. But this graphic novel adaptation, produced as part of the One Book ?" One Edinburgh reading campaign, successfully captures the essence of the original ripping yarn and isn’t just a truncation for those who can’t manage too many words on the page.

Inevitably, certain key elements of the original novel, such as the realistic detail of David and Alan’s eventful flight through the heather into Glencoe, have been strained to their bare essentials. While this version may well serve as a way into Stevenson’s original tale, Grant’s sympathetic adaptation does rocket along at an appropriately breathless pace, illustrator Cam Kennedy bringing to chunky, full colour life such iconic characters as the odious Ebeneezer Balfour, fussy lawyer Rankeillor and, of course, the heroic ‘bonny fighter’ Alan Breck Stewart.