"THE DIRE DAYS OF WILLOWEEP MANOR": GRAPHIC NOVEL REVIEW
Written by Shaenon K. Garrity and illustrated by Christopher J. Baldwin, who both only previously have worked on webcomics, comes this whimsical tale of gothic romance tropes, colourful characters, and a relentlessly hungry amorphous horror.
The story is about Haley, a high-school student who is obsessed with classic gothic romances, being swept away (somewhat literally) to Willoweep Manor. When she wakes in a bedroom of the manor and finds it populated by the archetypes of her favourite genre, she fells everything is strangely convenient, but also somewhat easy to navigate. However as she discovers she cannot leave the grounds, and strange tremors plague the manor, it becomes unavoidably apparent that the gothic romance motif is merely a facade for something much stranger. Unfortunately the mysteries of the place become far more desperate when all-consuming monster arrives and quickly turns the atmosphere to a gothic horror.
Both Shaenon and Christopher definitely show their history with webcomics for the art, narrative, framing and pacing, and they do a good job of extrapolating the format into something that works for a full graphic novel. However similarly this webcomics-like style does create the problem that there is a lot of negative space in the art and the narrative. The creators seemed to be aware of this being a problem and ensured that their storyline accommodated it (without trying spoil) and there is an internal reasoning for largely vacant castle and grounds. When the story does take a darker turn, it does manage to increase the pace and tension without sacrificing too much of the comedy.
All in all, it is a fun, easy and light comedy-horror. There may be a couple of anti-climactic moments, and the weird science and internal logic isn’t as clever as it seems to think it is, but overall I did really enjoy reading it a few times. They both show promise and talent and I’ll be keeping an eye on both of them to see what other large-form publications they get involved in.
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