Children of the Night Tide

By Jan Strnad, Dennis Fujitake & Tim Solliday (Fantagraphics Books)
ISBN: 0-930193-24-5

In terms of variety and creativity the 1980s were a fabulous time for comics, with an expansion in every aspect of the market, except general sales, where, in fact, the decline of all printed reading matter continued. Comics died as a mass-market medium, becoming too expensive to sell on corners and in general stores, but developed their own methods of direct distribution, allowing different formats and most especially a broader spread of genre and cross-genre storytelling. Artists too, for good or ill, were no longer tied to house-styles or chimerical fashion.

This lovely slim volume of classic fantasy comes courtesy of then-fledgling publisher Fantagraphics who have since gone on to become the leading proponent and champion of both the American industry’s most radical, experimentalists and the World art-form’s fascinating and endangered history and antecedents.

Best known for his television and film work today Jan Strnad worked sporadically with a number of leading comics figures such as Richard Corben. He garnered well-deserved praise and attention for the satirical science-fiction series Dalgoda, which he co-created with the wonderfully stylistic Dennis Fujitake, and wrote a number of short serials for the fantasy anthologies that sprang up with the rise of the direct market. Here in ‘Sea Dragon’ they combine to tell the salutary tale of Winston, a young Wyrmling who dared to aspire, and of his consequent fate in a glorious fairytale for modern kids of all ages.

This brief saga (18 pages) is accompanied by the far more traditional story ‘Goblin Child’ which expands on the theme of children stolen by the Night Folk to tell a truly moving and compelling tale of mother’s love, power, pride and sacrifice. It’s drawn by Tim Solliday, better known today as a painter and illustrator, in a loose, linear manner that evokes memories of Everett Raymond Kinstler and Roy G. Krenkel (people you need to look up NOW if the names are unfamiliar – this internet stuff’s great, innit?) and one of his early paintings adorns the back cover. His eerie black and white line-work is a perfect fit for the script and it’s a pure shame that he’s produced so few strips.

This delightful book is happily still available from the publisher – and, I’m sure, elsewhere – and will impress any story fan or aficionado of traditional fairytales as well as the usual comics suspects.

Sea Dragon © 1986 Jan Strnad and Dennis Fujitake.
Goblin Child © 1986 Jan Strnad and Tim Solliday. All Rights Reserved.