Notes from the Shadowed City Hardcover – 27 Oct. 2016

Lovely illustrations, but ultimately thinly veiled dark souls fan fiction - from the knight of thorns to the minotaur of the sun and a high city suspended above a lower one, it borrows too often and too deeply (on almost every page). I'm sure some people will enjoy it on that basis alone, but it doesn't feel like a genuine article.

Great book full of beautiful illustrations

I ordered Notes From The Shadowed City expecting standard graphic novel panels, with text bubbles, a plot, perhaps a subplot, characterisation and all the usual elements of an illustrated tale.What I got was more like a dream diary: a narrative that was suggestive but not exhaustive; illustrations that led my imagination way beyond the simple story.That story is as follows: an unnamed narrator finds himself in a city, having lost any memory of himself, and with only a journal that suggests he is researching magical swords.His quest is to be the discovery of his own identity. The ensuing story a gathering of magical and weird elements that are recorded by the narrator, often without further comment, and often without any apparent intersection with the character’s destiny.The narrative, such as it is, is delivered by the combination of a simple, often flat, declaration (‘A small number here prefer the axe’) with an accompanying pen and ink illustration in black and white.It comes to an end after a series of strange meetings and hinted at adventures, when the narrator sleeps, falls into dream, and in that dream is promised a magical sword of his own. There the book ends: while the suggestion of a further volume hangs heavily in the air.It has to be said, the book can be read through in minutes; for sure, not a recommendation to many fantasy fans. But there is thick spoonful of the weird stirred in with the high-fantasy elements of swords and questing. You will find, among many peculiarities: an unreliable narrator, tentacled floating cities, a black sun, and migrating mountain ranges of ossified dragons.It would be a rare reader that isn’t held back by these images. And this is why, despite its brevity, I could heartily recommend the book to anyone who loves the weirder end of fantasy.This seems to me a book, or jumping off-point, for the active imagination; there are enough world-building elements here for a dozen books. It reminds me, in that way, of China Mieville’s Perdido Street Station, with the strange creatures and rituals sprouting almost ceaselessly from out of a simple plot line.Indeed, with such a spare narrative, the quality of the sense of place that is still achieved is a testament to the power of the images and the sure hand with which they are distributed throughout. The very occasional dashes of colour, in an otherwise black and white world, are superbly done.I would certainly look forward to a further volume, the images certainly merit it, but I would love to see further depth in the story-telling and greater exploration of the world and characters so far only hinted at - and this criticism only arises because of the quality of the work done so far.