Staff Pick
Beautiful Darkness is the fairy-tale twist you never knew you needed. Our hero, the gentle and kind Princess Aurora, ventures out into the big world with her little subjects, learning lessons about things like ruling, sharing, and the nature of the human condition. Replete with both adorable watercolor illustrations and some of the most macabre scenes you may ever come across, this story will make you feel emotions from joy to creeping dread. Read on if you want to learn if our princess will ever find her prince. Recommended By Cosima C., Powells.com
Synopses & Reviews
A dark fairy tale about surviving the human experience
Aurora's having a tea party with Hector, the prince she's been dreaming about, when a sudden deluge forces them to take shelter elsewhere. They emerge from the skull of a dead girl into the woods at night and find themselves among a crowd of tiny people, all of whom are milling about. Aurora quickly takes charge of the situation, and at first things seem to be going well for most of her friends. Despite a few injuries and deaths and a lot of hunger, they forage successfully and befriend a mouse that lives in the neighborhood. But as time goes by, more and more of the little people begin to lose hope, turning against one another in brutal ways.
Beautiful Darkness is a harrowing look at the human psyche and the darkness that hides behind the routine politeness and meaningless kindness of civilized society. The sweet faces and bright leaves of Kerascoët's joyful watercolors only serve to highlight the evil that dwells beneath, as characters allow their pettiness, greed, and jealousy to take over. Beautiful Darkness presents a bleak allegory on the human condition; Kerascoëts and Fabien Vehlmann's work is a searing condemnation of our vast capacity for evil writ tiny.
Review
“A twisted tale that draws from the likes of Alice in Wonderland and The Borrowers, only Beautiful Darkness presents a much bleaker allegory about brutality. As the tiny people lose hope, their underlying pettiness, greed and jealousy become evident despite their polite words and pretty faces.” Los Angeles Times Hero Complex
Review
"You've seen countless stories about cute little creatures living secretly in our world, but you've never read one like Beautiful Darkness. It's a world that's as adorable as it is cruel, where life is beautiful but also cheap, and where death is omnipresent.” io9
Review
“Set against the saccharine sweet storybook aesthetic of Kerascoët's rapturous watercolors, Vehlmann's narrative is a sinister saga that you wont be able to put down.” Nerdist
Review
"The watercolor artwork here is painfully beautiful, and the book is...best read on three separate sittings — one day for each season — to take in rise and wane and grudges of the miniature empires.” Buzzfeed
Review
"It's The Borrowers meets Lord of the Flies.” Comic Book Resources
Review
"A fairytale where the darkness is only natural: the real world of Beautiful Darkness not only includes but embraces decay, calm indifference, and animals who act like animals, just like life — and death. And neither its prince or princess are quite what we expect. Read it outdoors for maximum effect." Kathe Koja, author of The Cipher and Under the Poppy
Review
"A brilliant premise executed with panache — Vehlmann and Kerascoët's fairy world has the offhand cruelty of the Alice books and the offhand sweetness of Moominland — Donahey's Teeny Weenies and The Borrowers can be felt here too — and yet it really it seems without precedent, every page a surprise in style and form and content." John Crowley, author of Little, Big and Aegypt
Synopsis
BEST OF THE YEAR NODS FROM AMAZON.COM AND PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
"Kerascoet... render Aurora and her friends in the huge-eyed style of classic children's book illustrations, but cuteness is just another Darwinian survival strategy here. Even on her clover-high scale, as Aurora discovers, romance is decided by social pecking order and murderous deceit."--Douglas Wolk, New York Times
Kerascoet's and Fabien Vehlmann's unsettling and gorgeous anti-fairy tale is a searing condemnation of our vast capacity for evil writ tiny. Join princess Aurora and her friends as they journey to civilization's heart of darkness in a bleak allegory about surviving the human experience. The sweet faces and bright leaves of Kerascoet's delicate watercolors serve to highlight the evil that dwells beneath Vehlmann's story as pettiness, greed, and jealousy take over. Beautiful Darkness is a harrowing look behind the routine politeness and meaningless kindness of civilized society.
Synopsis
Kerascoëts and Fabien Vehlmann's unsettling and gorgeous anti-fairy tale is a searing condemnation of our vast capacity for evil writ tiny. Join princess Aurora and her friends as they journey to civilization's heart of darkness in a bleak allegory about surviving the human experience. The sweet faces and bright leaves of Kerascoët's delicate watercolors serve to highlight the evil that dwells beneath Vehlmann's story as pettiness, greed, and jealousy take over. Beautiful Darkness is a harrowing look behind the routine politeness and meaningless kindness of civilized society.
About the Author
Fabien Vehlmann is a French comics writer who has been nominated for the Angoulême International Comics Festival Award a number of times. He is best known to North American audiences for his collaboration with the Norwegian cartoonist Jason on
Isle of 100,000 Graves.
Kerascoët is a husband-and-wife cartooning team best known for illustrating the book Miss Don't Touch Me written by Hubert, as well as a couple of the Lewis Trondheim Dungeon books.