Blankets by Craig Thompson
Published 2003 · 592 pages · 15,000 words · about 3 hours at an average pace · Coming-of-Age, Graphic Novel, Memoir & Autobiography, Nonfiction
How hard is Blankets to read?
Blankets scores 20 out of 100 for difficulty on ReadingRate, making it relatively accessible. The score is a weighted composite of nine measures: four of how hard the prose is to parse, five of how hard the meaning is to extract.
- Vocabulary: 18 out of 100
- Simple, direct language. Biblical references from a child's perspective.
- Sentence structure: 15 out of 100
- Abstraction: 22 out of 100
- Concrete sensory detail. Theological questions experienced rather than argued.
- Information density: 30 out of 100
- Visual density is high. Text density is low. Wordless sequences carry emotional weight.
- Narrative indirection: 18 out of 100
- Chronological memoir with some flashback to childhood abuse.
- Symbolic density: 35 out of 100
- Blankets as warmth, intimacy, and protection. Snow as purity and isolation. Drawing as salvation.
- Ironic distance: 100 out of 100
- Deeply earnest. Craig's naivety is presented without mockery.
- Resolution withholding: 15 out of 100
- The romance ends. The faith is lost. Resolution is bittersweet but clear.
- Structural complexity: 22 out of 100
- 582 pages with visual-narrative techniques. Mostly chronological with flashbacks.
How Blankets is regarded
Blankets holds a literary regard score of 50 out of 100, weighing its place in the canon, its critical reception, its influence on other writers, and the standing of its author. Regard is measured separately from difficulty: a demanding book is not necessarily an admired one.