Monsters - A Frighteningly adorable anthology

Monsters is an anthology of short comics about monsters and the fears children have about them. All of the stories are written by creator Karen Beilharz with the illustrations done by 10 Australian artists (Well, 9 Australians and 1 American living down under). It features 11 short stories and is self published with the help of crowd funding website Pozible and if you hurry there is still time to pledge for your own copy to read for yourself or with your own little monsters.

As a child I was plagued by fears of the monster under the bed and in the closet (and just between you and me I was also 100% sure there was a monster living in the toilet) and I really could have used a book like Monsters to address these irrational yet incredibly common fear that so many children have. Most of the stories deal with the reasons why children might be afraid of monsters and does so in a child friendly yet sophisticated way. Many of the stories run with the idea that children are afraid of things they don't understand, with my personal favourite being the story Scared by Karen Beilharz with art by Nathan Seabolt. Scared involves a little boy finding a monster trapped in his attic during a thunderstorm. As the boy chastises the monster for constantly scaring him, the monster becomes upset and tells the boy he thought it was a game and the little boy enjoyed it. Both the boy and monster realise that they misunderstood the other and become friends.

Scared

One of the best things about any anthology is that you get a diverse sample of art from many different artist usually covering a wide range of styles. One of the art styles I find particularly interesting in Monsters comes from the story Hungry written and illustrated by Karen Beilharz which is drawn the way a child would draw with crayons. The people are stick figures and the monster, which I find especially cute, is just a purple swirl with pointy teeth in the middle. I've never seen a comic use such a minimalist style so effectively and I can really see children loving the art style of Hungry. Not all of the art styles are as unique as they appear in Hungry. Some of the stories lean towards a more traditional style. Those include The Dark, illustrated by Peter Fairfax, which has a similar feel to a classic fairy tale with solid dark colours set in a creepy twisted forest or Monstrous Part 2, illustrated by Jemima Trappel, which reminds me of the kind of illustrated children's book I remember reading as a child.

Hungry

Throughout the book are pictures of monsters drawn by the children of the writer and artists, along with short descriptions which can be used as a great way to encourage children to draw their own monsters. In my mind anything that encourages children's creativity is a fantastic idea.

I think the idea behind Monsters is brilliant in encouraging children to talk about their fears and to help them understand that things may not always be quite the way they seem. Teaching children that they may be frightened of some things simply because they don't understand them is incredibly important and is a lesson they can use all through life, and not just in regards to the monster under the bed.

Monstrous Part 2

Monsters is written specifically for children so there won't be a lot of reread value for adults but I can see children loving Monsters and being perfect for the nightly bedtime story.
I give Monsters 4 out of 5 squiggle monsters.

Find out more about Monsters here.

A Dream - Art within art

A Dream is written and self published by David Goei, which incorporates the works of two famous poets, illustrated and coloured by Serene Lau, song performed by (yes that's right, song) Jonathan Ong. I was originally drawn to A Dream because of the glorious cover, as I've mentioned many times before I just love anything colourful, especially watercolour, I honestly knew nothing else about it so I wasn't quite prepared to read A Dream.

A Dream begins with a young girl, Victoria, drifting off into a beautiful dream world. As she enjoys the colourful world around her she comes across a lost and exhausted mother ant who has become separated from her family. After hearing the ant's tale of woe they set off on an adventure across the dream world to find her family. On my first read through I didn't think that there was going to be much of a story behind in A Dream and that the entire thing was more of an excuse to create an art book with beautiful and fantastical imagery. I love anything whimsical so I didn't mind the lack of story but then, in a matter of a few pages I quickly changed my tune.

A Dream's first few panels are done in entirely blue and white but then the comic suddenly explodes with enough colour to make a rainbow look dull by comparison. Every page is a mixture of all the colour of a Disney movie with the design of a more traditional fairy tale and are an absolute delight to look at. With every read through of A Dream I notice something new, as small as a frog wearing a hat or kangaroos in the background. The little girl in the story is cute but still has the realistic look of a child which is nice to see rather than an angelic looking cherub with perfect hair and clothes. The artist perfectly captures the child's expressions ranging from joy, sadness and wonder and despite the complete lack of dialogue from the child allows the reader to easily interpret her mood.

A Dream is the first comic I've ever even heard of with an accompanying song; now don't get me wrong I know probably less than nothing about music but the beautifully haunting melody of A Dream's theme song perfectly compliments the story allowing the highs and lows to echo just a little bit deeper. A Dream is a beautiful comic with a surprising amount of depth. I'd recommend A Dream to long term comic readers and fans of poetry. 

I give A Dream 4 out of 5 ice-cream lizards.

Find out more about A Dream here and more about the author here.