The Tower in The Sea

By B. Mure (Avery Hill)
ISBN: 978-1-910395-36-3 (PB)

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: A Mesmerising Mystical Magnum Opus in the Makingâ€¦ 9/10

Most forms of fiction, depend on strong – or at least memorable – characters and plenty of action to capture the attention. You need to be really good and quite brave to try anything outside those often-infantile parameters. B. Mure is that good.

They are a Nottingham based artist and storyteller whose other notable work is the remarkable webcomic Boy Comics. You should check that out too.

In 2018, B. Mure pulled together threads and ideas from years of planning, dreaming and doodling, to begin building an epic fantasy saga. It started with Original Graphic Novel Ismyre, introducing a strange ancient city of song and tired wonders, unsettled by magical eco-terrorists and weaponised flora, where a sculptor’s works inspired and moved the strangest of folk. This magical city was entering a period of â€œinteresting timesâ€â€¦

That was closely followed by sequel Terrible Means, which seemingly had very little to do with the protagonists of the first, but instead took readers back to a time when wizardly green rebels Niklas, Henriett and Emlyn were simply researchers whose studies divined a growing imbalance in the natural ecosystemâ€¦

Now the third instalment is here and The Tower in the Sea again slips to a different point in time and tale, providing a fresh approach to what is shaping up to be a vast and expansively multi-layered saga. Moreover, understanding and narrative connection depends as much on scene and place as actors involved: with sea, sky and terrain as expressive as the gloriously bizarre animalistic characters that have most of the speaking parts in the dramaâ€¦

Ismyre is currently more dictatorship than civil metropolis, and for years gifted children have been spirited away from it by a clique of outlaw magicians. The prizes are taken across ferocious seas to a hidden island and schooled in magical arts – especially divination. Our story begins and ends with little Miriam, brought to the citadel of knowledge by adventurous operative Emlyn…

Welcomed by imposing leader August Humble, Miriam slowly settles in for the long haul, often wondering if she’ll ever see her dashing saviour againâ€¦

Her dreams of the general future are far more specific and emphatic on other issues of importance. In fact, the coming years are plagued by increasingly terrifying visions of apocalyptic disaster, and neither scholarly tomes, skilled teachers or devoted classmates can ease the traumas or even clarify the too-vague portents in her head.

Miriam’s course becomes clearer only after she learns why divination is outlawed in Ismyre and how the school of the Tower in the Sea was first established. Sadly, now the tortured girl feels that her intuitions are presaging the imminent and actual End of the Worldâ€¦

Determined to be part of the action, Miriam – with the reluctant aid of classmates Efrim and Cassius – secretly breaks the school’s most inviolable rule: attempting to build a boat to take her back to the mainland where she can hopefully do some good. Typically, before that comes to pass, the totally unexpected happensâ€¦

The word â€œtapestryâ€ is one much overused but it really fits the gradual unpeeling of layers comprising the history of Ismyre: beautiful images coming together, small self-contained stories unfolding depending upon where you start from, yet all part of a greater whole, always promising more and clearer revelations further ahead. You must read all these books but (so far) it really doesn’t matter where you start from. So, it might as well be here, right?

Sadly, this glorious celebration is not available digitally yet, but that just means you can give physical copies to all your friends, suitably gift-wrapped and ready to be properly appreciated by all the tactile senses as well as cerebral onesâ€¦

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