In Search of Lost Dragons
Elian Black'Mor, Carine-M, and Jézéquel
Dynamite Entertainment
Fiction, YA Fantasy/Graphic Novel
Themes: Alternate Earths, Dragons, Steampunk Etc.
**+
Description
After an unusual encounter, intrepid investigator Elian Black'Mor sets out in search of the world's vanishing dragons. Following a trail halfway around the globe, he finds himself walking in the footsteps of a forgotten civilization, one that calls him ever onward...
Review
As a dragon-lover, I had high hopes for this graphic novel. Those hopes were quickly watered down, if not dashed altogether, by an excess of style and a dearth of coherent plot. The entire book is written in cramped cursive, often on less-than-pristine "paper" or other backgrounds, which made for very challenging reading - not helped by an unclear flow of sentences and paragraphs that often changed angles and sizes and only rarely connected to each other, visually or thematically, in any meaningful fashion. Maybe it would've been easier in physical print, but I was reading on my Nook tablet via Hoopla, and it took some serious contrast adjustment to begin to read some of the entries (and even then I'll admit I guessed at a few phrases, and gave up altogether on others.) Perhaps as a result, the plot seemed scarcely more substantial than that which flows through a dream, frequently interrupted by encounters that might or might not be all in the narrator's head. As for the dragons and other images, they are indeed imaginative, yet after a while there's a certain sameness to the style that detracted from the greater sense of wonder. Add that to my increasing disinterest in the alternate-history world and characters (such as they were) and frustration in trying to follow the journey, and I ended this one more disappointed than inspired, unable to even justify a flat Okay rating.