Telling the folk horror tale of three witches in the seventeenth century. A strange and terrible ancient creature stalks the countryside outside the village of Gravesmoor in England... Can Becca Nox, Elsbeth Crowe and Isabella Goodacre discover a weakness in a monster that can't die - while avoiding the clutches of arch-witch-finder Abraham King? A tale not for the faint of heart.
I think that I have already stated that Hitchkock's style is very suited for horror -his art on the Nosferatu series in Shockwave for one. Well, this book arrived todayand I needed cheering up so... I read it (I CAN read I don't just look at pretty pictures. All the time).
Anyone visiting this blog regularly should know that I am a big horror fan and sci-fi-horror. One thing I love is the prelude of a dying or injured man and the "you...have to...stop it...millions will die!" and then the person dies. The TV series The New Avengers used that trope more than once. In this case we have a shocked Parliamentarian soldier (a "Roundhead" fighting against Royalists during the English Civil War) whose comrades have all been killed after being confronted by a mysterious force -even musket-shot did not stop it. His words say it all:
"I tell y',there's more horrors an' spirits an' secrets out there in this world than most folks would ever know..."
Oooh -gives yuh the shivers dunnit me dears?
From a witch's vengeance for the local squire not paying her for what she did for him to a young woman being hanged as a witch because she never drowned in the water -Yeah, real thing: if you were thrown in the water and drowned you were innocent -Yay! If you bobbed up and never drowned -boo! Hiss! Witch! And they killed you any way. Then the witch helping out at an "infestation" (old phrase for poltergeist activity). All three linked up by Mr Treacle a rather snazzy looking black cat.
Then we have my main man: The Man of the Forest, the Old Man of the Wood, Herne the Hnter or, here, Jack Greenherne.
The story goes on with gore and horror aplentyas well as some back story. All wonderfully drawn by Hitchcock.
The story and script is well written, it should be since it is John Short and he's been around a while. It's interesting how he can write the humorous almost Carry On movies comic strips or add a good old fashioned British tongue-in-cheek quips and jokes and then shift over to pure horror.
Seriously, you need to get a copy of this if you are into horror comics. The biggest compliment I can give the book is that it gave me a big chunk of nostalgia and memories of old Hammer/Tenser movies.
This is a horror comic in the only format a horror comic should be in -black and white. Kult Creations is rather like Hexagon Comics in that both produce excellent entertainment but both seem to be slept on by the comic readers.
10 out of 10
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