Nil: A Land Beyond Belief [Paperback]

James Turner (Author, Artist)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 1, 2005

Join fellow sufferer Proun Nul on his quest to find meaning in a desolate world saturated with angst and ennui. Foreman on a deconstruction ship that specializes in demolishing belief outbreaks, Nul is prodded out of his complacency by a false murder charge, and sets off on a journey that takes him to the very brink of hope. A 240-page concoction of fiction and intrigue that delves into the bleak and bitter philosophical brew of Nihilist chic.

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

*Starred Review* Impersonal regularity perversely predominates in the visually repetitive black-and-white land of Nil, as it does in the weirdly attractive milieus of classic dystopian novels (Zamiatin's We, Huxley's Brave New World) and films (Lang's Metropolis). As becomes, or comes easier to, a graphic novel, Nil is, however, very much a comedy, reminiscent in tone and, eventually, incident of Richard Lester's antiwar movie (featuring John Lennon) How I Won the War. It's the adventures in revolution of Proun Nul, engineer on the floating deconstruction ship Derrida, which sallies forth to squelch any ideological meme that dares erupt in Nil, a land that enforces lack of belief with police-state rigidity. When an accident kills the nephew of Hypocripope Nada Dionysius, Nul falls under suspicion of murder. He decides to defect to Optima, with which Nil is at war, and has to pretend to lead a revolutionary cadre to do it. Then he gets hung up at the border, conscripted into the Nilean army, and sent to the front. On that basic plotline Turner hangs a plethora of incidents full of daft, downbeat dialogue and grim, even painful comic action. If, on six-by-seven-inch pages, the copious text of Nil, especially the lines printed in gray, causes eyestrain, in context, that seems appropriate. After all, the citizens of Nil greet each other as "fellow sufferers." Ray Olson
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Product Details

• Paperback: 240 pages
• Publisher: SLG Publishing (April 1, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1593620209
• ISBN-13: 978-1593620202
• Product Dimensions: 7.6 x 5.6 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #353,728 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars cool is just cutting edge conformity!, July 29, 2005

By 

Matt - See all my reviews

This review is from: Nil: A Land Beyond Belief (Paperback)

Don't get the impression that this is a serious allegory of conflicting ideologies. This is a dark comedy that plays with the silliness of taking almost anything seriously, against a backdrop of rickety victorian dystopia. The artwork alone is worth the price, but the story is quietly very funny.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Astounding, September 14, 2007

By 

Carl Brutananadilewski - See all my reviews

This review is from: Nil: A Land Beyond Belief (Paperback)

I don't have a single negative thing to say about this book. Everything is excellent. The artwork is fantastic and it really grew on me. The test itself is very well written, and if looked at closely, could raise quite a few eyebrows. I can (and have) read this book over and over again, it's that good.

4.0 out of 5 stars Most Original-Looking Comic Book I've Read in a While, March 2, 2009

By 

Jason A. Martin "Professional Artist" (Sarasota, FL) - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Nil: A Land Beyond Belief (Paperback)

As an artist myself, I couldn't help but be completely stunned at the amazing depth that the creator, James Turner, gave to such a unique version of Hell.
Inhabited by Nihilists, this circle of hell is appropriately goth and black, but the graphic design style continues to tickle your eyeballs with geometric buildings, unicycled tanks, and stylistic columns with sharp-angled skulls on the bases, and skull pattern motifs upon the walls.
This is not only a comic that I want to read, but I want to ANIMATE it, as well. Filled with tons of additional little speeches and Memes floating about perpetually, it always has additional Easter Eggs for you to discover or go back and find.