Thursday Comic

Polly and the Pirates - Ted Naifeh

Polly Pringle is a prim and proper girl who aspires to be just like the prim and proper mother she never knew. Living in a maritime city where there's no clear distinction between the ships and the buildings, she's the one girl in her boarding school who never gets into trouble and always does as she's told. That is, until she's suddenly abducted by pirates who believe that she's actually the daughter of the courageous and honourable Pirate Queen - and their best bet at recovering a lost treasure map.

These Thursday posts are supposed to be part of my impetus to read through the stack of books and comics on my bedside table, but I haven't had any time at all for reading over this past week, and looking for something that I could re-read in one sitting and write a post about, this adorable little book immediately leapt out at me. Polly and the Pirates is funny and adventurous, it's full of memorable characters and it eventually manages to be quite touching as Polly grows to give a damn about a group of scurvy buccaneers who probably need her a lot more than she needs them.

I've sung Naifeh's praises as an artist before, and I think that his diverse cast of caricatures - from an impossibly petite schoolmistress to a razor-toothed, goblin-like pirate - manages to cultivate the perfect tone and feel for the story. His writing's on top form here as well, with plenty of swashbuckling action and piratical repartee. Pretty much the only the complaint I have with this book is that three years later there's still not been a sequel.