Customer Reviews

Isaac the Pirate: Vol. 1 - To Exotic Lands

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This French graphic novel is an excellent example of the genre, strong storytelling, evocative art, and a very distinct sensibility of its own. This book revolves around a young Jewish painter named Isaac, who lives in pre-Revolutionary 18th-century Paris. He's kind of the prototypical starving young artist who has a beautiful fiancee and a weakness for nice paintings. While he wants to provide her with food, shelter, etc., he also can't help hoarding pennies to buy pictures he likes. In a funk one day, he is accosted by a dapper little surgeon who flatters and charms him into coming along to paint a sea captain (the painter is particularly fond of maritime subjects). The gullible young man agrees, and before he realizes what's what, he's en route to the Caribbean to serve as artist-in-residence to a pirate captain!

But not just any captain, for this one is intent on sailing to South Pole to discover new lands and thus win immortality as a great explorer. Provided with ample supplies and the patronage of the pirate captain, Isaac spends the long voyage sketching shipboard life, in all its gritty detail. Treasure caves, aristocratic ladies, the terror of battle, and brawling crewman are all faithfully recorded. But meanwhile, back in Paris, Isaac's fiancee Alice is hired as charwoman and then clerk to a handsome, wealthy young buck. At first, this seems like a wonderful solution to her increasing poverty, but then she must cope with his over friendly attention. Isaac and Alice's stories alternate as the pirate drives Isaac closer to Antarctica, and Alice's faithfulness is tested. Blain does an excellent job of conveying the fantastical nature of the wonders of the arctic for the seamen, including ice floes, sea lions, and penguins. At the same time, he's well attuned to the pressures faced by Alice.

The comes in a nice compact format, with very traditional paneling (as befits the old-fashioned story). The art is an interesting mix of realistic backgrounds and props, and very stylized people -- not unlike Herge's classic Tintin books. Blain's Paris is crowded, drab, and decrepit, the interiors dark and creaky. His Caribbean is bright and lush, his Arctic gray and foreboding, and the ship is claustrophobic. On the other hand, his people are rather bizarre looking: from Isaac's rectangular head with pinprick eyes and spike nose jutting out, to the surgeon's squashed head with huge mouth and grotesque sausage nose. It's a peculiarly European style that I can't say I care for, but the storytelling is so strong that it's hard to complain. Good stuff, especially if you like old-fashioned adventure stories -- I look forward to the continuation of Isaac's adventures

Isaac The Pirate: 1. To Exotic Lands is a graphic novel by Christophe Blaine of an especially high literary quality. Isaac Sofer is a talented young artist searching for money to make himself a worthy suitor to his beloved signs on to paint the portrait of a ship captain - yet once they are on the seas, Isaac learns that he is working aboard a pirate ship! Furthermore, the captain dreams of discovering new lands around the South Pole - but at what cost? The simplistic color illustrations set the stage for a powerful and enduring tale of the failings of human nature. The first of an anticipated series, Isaac The Pirate is a very enthusiastically recommended addition to graphic novel enthusiasts.

...no kidding! This is quite possibly THE most talented artist/author working in graphic novels. Brilliant writing, with astonishing characters -- and then the artwork, which just takes my breath away. This is far from mutants and superheroes... This is first rate literature, which I read and re-read all the time.
Treat yourself to this one!

NBM's english translation of Christophe Blain's engaging tale of a young Frenchman, Isaac Soper, who stumbles into a life of piracy while pursuing his dreams of becoming a famous painter, is several steps above the improbable adventures of Captain Jack Sparrow on the literary ladder, but still manages to capture the energy and unpredictability of a life at sea.

Isaac is a prideful dreamer, the proverbial starving artist, as passionate about his painting as he is about the love of his life, Alice, whose long-suffering support he pushes to the limit when he secretly purchases an expensive preparatory study by a deceased master painter, from which he plans to paint his own naval series that will bring him fame and fortune. "They'll create a sensation, I'll earn three or four times as much! I want to paint sailors, boats. We'll live in a wealthy port city, full of merchants, I'll become an official painter." Unmoved, Alice insists he copy the study and resell it, which sets off a series of events that finds Isaac in the employ of the egomaniacal pirate Captain, John "the Pillager", headed for the South Pole in search of an undiscovered New World, of which he is charged with documenting its existence. This New World, will of course, bear John's name.

Joe Johnson's translation of Blain's prose is seamless, exhibiting a depth of storytelling that, while the norm for European comics, is still an exhilarating breath of fresh air in Western comics. Blain does an excellent job of pacing his character-driven story, deftly switching between Isaac's many adventures at sea and Alice's efforts to sustain a life for them in Paris, while avoiding easy stereotypes by offering up a three-dimensional character in the enigmatic pirate Captain, John, whose ambitious desires and conflicting emotions make him as compelling character as the two leads. The trio's evolving relationships, with each other and those around them, develop nicely, organically, as they variously struggle with issues of loyalty and temptation, pragmatism and destiny.

As impressive as Isaac's story and character development is, it is Blain's artwork that lifts the whole to a higher level. His characters are distinctive thanks to cartoonish exaggerations like Isaac's sharply pointed nose that becomes even more distinctive once it is broken in a fight, a milepost on his journey from Isaac the Painter to Isaac the Pirate. A variety of settings demonstrate Blain's range as the streets of Paris, the claustrophobic confines of a pirate ship, and the frigid Antarctic all come to vivid life on the page, and he's equally adept at depicting a genteel garden setting on a lush [Caribbean?] island as he is violent hand-to-hand combat.

Isaac the Pirate perfectly embodies NBM's ComicsLit mission of offering "the most intelligent comics the world has to offer," and fans of pirate tales, action adventure and romance, as well as those of straight-out excellent storytelling married to distinctive artwork, will be well-served by it. Also, anyone who's been hooked by First Second's many excellent translations of European comics should definitely check out Isaac out.

This book has great drawing and the story is very deep. I liked all the characters. The story is generic, but the storytelling is well done.
The style reminds me of Kevin Oneil from Extrordinary league of gentlemen.

I bought this book based on a recommendation in an Amazon list of children's books.
Big mistake. Amazon should check those lists for that kind of mistake.
This book series is probably quite good for adults but it's absolutely not for children. I'm quite liberal but there is kinky sex, violence and foul language in these books that I think kids don't need to be exposed until they are well into their teens.