TITLE: Twistwood Tales
AUTHOR: A.C. MacDonald
PUBLISHER: Andrews McMeel Publishing
ISBN: 978-1524877415
PODCAST EPISODE: None
REVIEWER: Hilary Wilson
There’s a man dressed in black wearing a Plague mask. He looks up, his expression inscrutable as a troll is brought before him with a broken leg. He sighs, and picks up a saw proclaiming that it’s time to amputate. Or is the mask not a mask at all, but simply the head of Dr. Crowley? It’s difficult to tell, and he might do more harm than good, but he claims he’s doing his best. It’s hard to argue with the man filling the full body cast full of leeches… and there don’t seem to be other options for doctors when one is living in Twistwood.
This is just one of many scenes in Twistwood Tales, the new comic collection from the mind of AC MacDonald and published by Andrews McMeel Publishing. MacDonald claims the tales are culled from his own imagination as he wanders around the great forests of his home in Scotland, and it is easy to see its inspiration. The forests of Twistwood are dense, and the tales are rife with both pathos and dark humor. Where the story could end up edging into cruelty, though, MacDonald pulls back - instead favoring the optimistic notion that everyone has their own intrinsic worth and we are best when we all rely on one another.
The stand-out of the collection is undoubtedly Bucket Boy, a young, overly-eager boy with the head of a bucket who can’t hold water due to the eyeholes. Early on in the collection he gains the ingenious addition of goggles, which allow him to carry water, only to lose them in an accident. He tries to make himself useful in other ways and to remain optimistic in spite of the loss of what he feels is his purpose in life. Between this overarching narrative are individual strips. Some contain characters you might expect - Mr. Wolf and Red Riding Hood, the witch in the forest, trolls, and ghosts. Others are more unexpected, such as the Fairy Gourd-Mother, or the ever-present threat of the Snolems - a creature with a snowman head and long spindly branches like the legs of a spider.
All of these characters come together in an array of fun and twisted fairytales. The knights are relieved when they get the eggman up the wall, certain he’ll fall, only to witness Robber Ducks arriving in a balloon to whisk him away to safety. The subverting of expectation is part of the joy of these comic strips. The Wolf, when asked about Little Red, gets a wistful expression on his face. We’re told later only she could break his curse, and indeed promised to… yet he is still a wolf. There’s plenty of space to pause on that melancholy moment between the laughs and smiles.
MacDonald taps into the charm of fairy tales, which resonate with readers in spite of the absurdity of many of their premises, and utilizes it to great effect in Twistwood Tales. Bucket Boy is, at his heart, a very silly character. A little bucket who can’t hold water – what good might he be? Yet we care about him and want him to succeed. There’s something very human about these characters, and that leaves the reader aspiring for more. AC MacDonald is a creator to watch, and I eagerly await his next offering.
AUTHOR: A.C. MacDonald
PUBLISHER: Andrews McMeel Publishing
ISBN: 978-1524877415
PODCAST EPISODE: None
REVIEWER: Hilary Wilson
There’s a man dressed in black wearing a Plague mask. He looks up, his expression inscrutable as a troll is brought before him with a broken leg. He sighs, and picks up a saw proclaiming that it’s time to amputate. Or is the mask not a mask at all, but simply the head of Dr. Crowley? It’s difficult to tell, and he might do more harm than good, but he claims he’s doing his best. It’s hard to argue with the man filling the full body cast full of leeches… and there don’t seem to be other options for doctors when one is living in Twistwood.
This is just one of many scenes in Twistwood Tales, the new comic collection from the mind of AC MacDonald and published by Andrews McMeel Publishing. MacDonald claims the tales are culled from his own imagination as he wanders around the great forests of his home in Scotland, and it is easy to see its inspiration. The forests of Twistwood are dense, and the tales are rife with both pathos and dark humor. Where the story could end up edging into cruelty, though, MacDonald pulls back - instead favoring the optimistic notion that everyone has their own intrinsic worth and we are best when we all rely on one another.
The stand-out of the collection is undoubtedly Bucket Boy, a young, overly-eager boy with the head of a bucket who can’t hold water due to the eyeholes. Early on in the collection he gains the ingenious addition of goggles, which allow him to carry water, only to lose them in an accident. He tries to make himself useful in other ways and to remain optimistic in spite of the loss of what he feels is his purpose in life. Between this overarching narrative are individual strips. Some contain characters you might expect - Mr. Wolf and Red Riding Hood, the witch in the forest, trolls, and ghosts. Others are more unexpected, such as the Fairy Gourd-Mother, or the ever-present threat of the Snolems - a creature with a snowman head and long spindly branches like the legs of a spider.
All of these characters come together in an array of fun and twisted fairytales. The knights are relieved when they get the eggman up the wall, certain he’ll fall, only to witness Robber Ducks arriving in a balloon to whisk him away to safety. The subverting of expectation is part of the joy of these comic strips. The Wolf, when asked about Little Red, gets a wistful expression on his face. We’re told later only she could break his curse, and indeed promised to… yet he is still a wolf. There’s plenty of space to pause on that melancholy moment between the laughs and smiles.
MacDonald taps into the charm of fairy tales, which resonate with readers in spite of the absurdity of many of their premises, and utilizes it to great effect in Twistwood Tales. Bucket Boy is, at his heart, a very silly character. A little bucket who can’t hold water – what good might he be? Yet we care about him and want him to succeed. There’s something very human about these characters, and that leaves the reader aspiring for more. AC MacDonald is a creator to watch, and I eagerly await his next offering.