The Envious Siblings

August 1, 2019

Cartoonist Blair (The Hunting Accident) presents this collection of eight twisted vignettes that range from the totally absurd to the gleefully macabre. In one, children with devious smiles plastered across their faces happily mangle one another with playground equipment before growing bored and turning on their father. Another features a little girl who is beginning to grow suspicious that her parents might not be telling her the truth about how her older sister became a skeleton. Other stories follow feuding siblings who hack one another limb by limb, a pack of stylishly dressed wild animals determined to lure a little girl out through her bedroom window to join them for dinner, and a group of insects throwing a raucous party atop a human cadaver. All but one story--that of a child who wanders into the subway and watches as hideous monsters gradually replace her fellow passengers--are told in light rhyming verse. VERDICT The influence of Quentin Blake, Tim Burton, and especially Edward Gorey is clear, but the combination of surreal comedy and imagery far more horrific than any ever created by the artists by whom he was obviously inspired set Blair apart and result in an audacious and entertaining compilation.

Copyright 2019 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

August 12, 2019
Blair (The Hunting Accident) unveils a gruesome collection of eight repellent Gothic faux–nursery rhymes. Each tale follows anachronistic youths along their sinister, often violent paths. “The Malicious Playground” stars a gaggle of children who gleefully torture one another at recess, while “Honourable Beasts” features a young girl enticed by gentlemanly wild animals to join them for dinner—where her mother is to be eaten. Blair wears his adoration for Edward Gorey and Tim Burton on his sleeve, but it never moves past homage; some segments are difficult to evaluate beyond their riffs on Gorey originals (his monster-infested “Awful Underground,” for instance, closely recalls elements of “The Wuggly Ump”) with the gross-out factor dialed up. Blair’s skill is evident, but there’s an overall flatness to his cross-hatched preening figures. Though some of his poetry elicits a chuckle or a startled gasp, Blair’s debut solo collection mostly mirrors his inspirations, drenched in shock value.