Small Press Review - MONICA THE BARBARIAN by Lord Mitz

Time to review another comic, nothing to do with Kult Creations: MONICA: THE BARBARIAN @£2 via paypal from lordmitz@gmail.com 20 pages A5 full colour.

This title is a wonderful example about the power of comics at their best. When this arrived and it flopped out of it's little envelope… I just had to open up the cover and start reading it. I couldn't stop myself. It fact, that's not quite correct… Actually it was subconscious… I just found that I had started reading it, as if by accident. Before I knew it I just was reading… While I should have been working. And that is the clever thing about comic storytelling at it's best. It leaps into your brain without you realising that you were reading something. There's no effort involved, unlike when you're reading prose. It's no wonder that instructions about putting together flat-packed furniture or what to do in the event of a fire are written in comic form. It's helped here by Mitz's clear and minimalist style and the fact that his first story page is virtually wordless. I've seen many small press titles with simple-looking art, but here it's got that other important ingredient… clearness. Every picture puts across it's intent so well that the reader doesn't consciously have to work out how the story is progressing… the reader just KNOWS. For the most part his colouring is flat and… yes, simple (there's that word again) but it works wonderfully. The design work in general here is marvellous. The elegant spareness of the cover and the well-designed logo all add to the beauty of this package. All on gorgeous shiny-white paper in a card cover. 'But what is it about?' I hear you ask. Monica isn't in fact a barbarian… Just a modern girl who works in a shop. When on her way home one day she encounters a troll and a Djinn and finds herself transported… elsewhere. Soon she is on an adventure with a borrowed sword and a designer handbag, encountering mushroom men and real monster trucks. It's not serious, it's not deep… but it is pure joy from cover-to-cover. To tell you any more would be to spoil it for you. Do yourself a favour and pick-up a copy by sending him £2 via paypal to the email address above. You won't regret it. REVIEW BY – John A. Short 2016