A graphic novel by Denis Lapière, Philippe Graton – Art by Marc Bourgne, Benjamin Benéteau

NOTE: I received a free preliminary, and likely unedited copy of this book from Netgalley for the purposes of providing an honest, unbiased review of the material. Thank you to all involved.

Time to jump out of my comfort zone, and read something different than my normal diet of Manga, dark comics, and occasional superhero comics. I can’t say I’ve ever read a comic based on racing in any way, so this is a bit of a new one for me. A new comic from Europe Comics, Michel Vaillant is coming soon to an eBook reader of your choice.

“Michel Vaillant is the star of all the biggest international auto racing circuits, and he’s revving up for a whole lot more than just a spin around the block. The Vaillant team finds itself up against new technological innovations, as well as some disconcerting changes in the world of auto racing. The fate of the Vaillant dynasty is in the hands of three generations of men and women. The first challenge is to fight their way to the top on the race track, with their sights set on Formula 1. The second is to try to keep the family together, despite increasingly differing points of views. And it will be up to Michel to ensure their success on both fronts.”

I was on a bit of a Tintin kick a few months ago and read a whole bunch of Belgian and French comics like Blake and Mortimer and Freddy Lombard, so the style of this comic immediately reminded me of those. I went back and did a bit of research and discovered that this was, in fact, an older comic that did indeed feature in the very same magazine. It’s funny when you can spot the tonal differences between some of these publications and their comics.

Despite not really being too much into racing, though I did watch Top Gear religiously in the past, I actually enjoyed this. Its probably because it wasn’t bogged down with laborious car racing descriptions and relied on the human drama to tell the story, the technical aspects were just there to spice it up.

The linework in this comic’s art is incredible, especially in backgrounds and technical aspects of the cars and other machines. Half of the time I spent reading this, was be looking around the pages taking in the gorgeous old-school art-style. Comics have sometimes veered towards a more cartoonish look as of late, and art styles like this, with highly detailed pen lines, make me feel nostalgic and give me hope that everything borrowing from the same style-sheet is soon coming to an end.

I was sad to see that this ended on a colossal cliffhanger, so I will try to keep an eye out for the next installment if I can. It’s crazy to think that there are so many diverse types of comics in Europe, it often makes me sad that The US market is over-saturated with superhero books in most of the main houses. That isn’t a dig on superheroes, but I’d love the diversity they have – I would have never likely read this otherwise. Great book, can’t wait to continue it!