Alabaster: Wolves

Dancy Flammarion shows up in what looks like an abandoned looking town in South Carolina with nothing but a duffel bag on her back. While she waits at the bus stop, trying to leave, a black bird catches her attention. The bird recognizes her, apparently she is well known as the “murdering, albino kid.” After the bird tells her to leave he fly’s away, but Dancy isn’t alone for long when this girl comes by to check her out. She has heard of Dancy too and actually has something of hers that Dancy thought she lost a while back. When she tries to get it back through a game of riddles, the girl gets angry and transforms into this werewolf type creature. You begin to see that this Dancy girl has what she refers to as a “Seraph,” or an angel, following her and she is to do its bidding. She tries to get the Angel’s help during this battle but it doesn’t seem to do anything when she asks. Only when she calls out its name (which you find out what the name is later on) does it make any type of response. Eventually the fight ends and the werewolf girl is dead. Dancy is left with a bad wound to her shoulder area and a very angry angel. The Seraph became so enraged that she said its name that it burned a mark on her forehead and abandoned her.

When Dancy returns to the bus stop after the brawl, the bird returns to talk to her. After some time, a bus does finally show up but doesn’t even bother stopping and rushes right through. Dancy has no choice but to sleep in this abandoned diner and tend to her wounds.

That was the first chapter. At this point I’m thinking “Ok, nothing was really explained and I don’t know too much about anything yet but I’m sure it will open up and I will understand a bit better.”

The story goes on in the next chapter where Dancy, who ventures out into the town she is stuck in, finds herself at an old church. Inside is anything but what she considers "holy." She walks into this meeting, or so it seems, of these evil looking creatures. They all seemed to have heard of her and her killing reputation. After another bit of a brawl, Dancy seems done, passing out in the church as it’s burning down. In her mind it's over, she is finally going to die. She wakes up to find she was dragged out by the werewolf girl she defeated earlier, only now she is a ghost, and you find out her name is Maisie.

From there, the bird, the werewolf girl named Maisie, and Dancy set out through the area and you begin to learn a bit more about them all. There is really no explanation why the bird can talk though, or what the norms are in this world of theirs.

The work is written by Caitlin R. Kiernan, drawn and lettered by Steve Lieber, colored by Rachelle Rosenberg, and the covers for the chapters were done by Greg Ruth. This is Caitlin R. Kiernan’s most recent work and it was published in 2012 by Dark Horse Books. Kiernan has written many works prior to this and has even been approached by Neil Gaiman and some editors at DC/Vertigo Comics to work on the comic, “The Dreaming.” She also worked on and wrote the novelization for the film, “Beowulf.” (1)

While looking up information about the author, I find out that the main character in Alabaster Wolves, Dancy Flammarion, is a character of Kiernan’s that was introduced in one of her novels in 1998 called “Threshold.” These novels, according to the author, didn’t do well and in 2006 she returned to it and wrote short stories based on Dancy that were later collected and published in a book called “Alabaster.” (2)

This can be why I was a bit lost throughout the whole graphic novel. But this is the graphic story about her character, Dancy, and there shouldn’t have to be a requirement to read those other novels before reading the comic. The comic also doesn’t mention anywhere inside its pages that Dancy, the character, was based upon a previous novel.

I think the panels for the comic work pretty well though, apart from the story. I didn’t find myself confused and they varied in size, shape, and orientation a lot which made the pages and scenes more interesting. The writing though was something I felt I had trouble with. I found myself rereading word bubbles and word boxes a lot. I think it’s partially due to the way in which the characters speak; I think they are meant to have more of a southern accent and the way the sentence is formed seems like it's missing a word sometimes. I felt the action scenes were also handled pretty well. I wasn’t left confused on what was happening and the timing was spaced out just enough to get the play by play of the action while also keeping you interested. 

The art was my favorite thing about this comic. It was what drew me in in the first place. The cover caught my eye first, of course. I know they say to never judge a book based off its cover but the cover tells a story of its own to get you to open to the rest of the book.  Each chapter also had these wonderful covers that were drawn just beautifully and the dull, gray, color schemes helped to create and enhance the mood.

 

I felt the overall story was very rushed. Everything happened so fast. Even if you had read her previous novels where Dancy was first introduced, there is a lot of information thrown at you all at once and it leaves you lost or confused a lot. The parts I felt most satisfied with were the flashbacks. There was just enough information there to get you to understand what had happened and you felt satisfied with the information given. Even still, there wasn’t enough back story for me to really prepare for the ending when the villain is introduced and faced in battle.

During the last fight of the book with the main villain, who we only really found out about 20 or so pages before, I had no desire for either character to win or lose. I wasn’t entirely sure what they were fighting for to begin with either. 

When I first picked this up and began to skim through the pages, the overall feel I got from this comic related back to E.C. Comics. This graphic novel is grouped in with the fantasy and horror genre. E.C would have done something in this genre as well, more graphic most of the time though.

 

Alabaster Wolves

 E.C. really set the stage for all the horror comics and graphic novels out there today, Alabaster wolves is no exception. Comics like these, or the "Walking Dead" wouldn't be where they were now if not for E.C. Comics. The use of these sci-fi fantasy type creatures in Alabaster Wolves, such as werewolves in this case, and the dark colors and values sets the mood right away for each page. 

I do have a feeling there will be other publications of this series, or I'm hoping there are other ones for the near future because I feel this series has great potential. It would make sense to have other chapters or other publications related to this story line to get more of a backstory for the main character and a better sense of the plot overall. 

I find myself really wanting to like this graphic novel, like I said, I truely think this has a lot of potential to be something big. I don’t want to say I disliked it, but I also can’t say I enjoyed the story either. I loved the art, but you do need both the story and the art to make something such as this truely successful. 

I would recommend this to people if they want something visually captivating. I would also recommend reading Caitlin R. Kiernan's novel "Threshold," and/or "Alabaster," to get a better sense of Dancy Flammarion's character before starting this graphic novel.  

-Alexa Schwab