Costume Party - by Jack Fallows

I recently read Costume Party, by the extremely talented Jack Fallows. I've had a copy for months now and keep glancing through individual pages and lookin' at the pitchas rather than actually reading the thing.

If you've done the same, I do recommend getting round to reading it. If you haven't bought it, do so. It's very strange and appears to tell several entirely different stories tied together by the title and tone. And the tone is downbeat and sad.

The first few stories are slice of life fragments of a child or teenage characters various failures to communicate, except via ink. He's haunted by an imaginary dull uncommunicative inky form, who turns up after the antagonist has left and says nothing despite it's only facial feature being a mouth: depression, barely personified. The design of this beastie is spot on.

Since the character is so Jack like, I hope that he's happier than this comic makes out - he does seem to be! But I don't want to put anyone off by saying that this is downbeat - this is beautiful stuff, drawn in Jack's typically poetic style.

Costume Party is a 210mm square book, black and white interiors with a very well designed colour on beige card cover. I normally see it for £3, and though it's fairly short, the craft here is lovely and well worth it.