Content Warnings: Death, gore (graphic), war, rape (non-graphic)
An off-putting story about war and surviving, and a weird guy stalking you? The Horizon by JH focuses on our unnamed protagonists, referred to as the boy and the girl, and their struggle to survive after being orphaned by war.
After witnessing his mother's gorey death, the boy find refuge in an abandoned bus where he finds the girl. The two silently escape death before finally greeting eachother. After traveling together for a short while, they are startled by a strange man kaw-ing and kree-ing at them. He doesn't make many other noises, it's part of his strangeness.
As post apocalyptic stories go, The Horizon isn't too unique, but the art and rarity of actual text gives this graphic novel its charm. The white space (or often, black space) gives an feel of lonliness and awkwardness, and the double page spreads of the seemingly endless road with little to no words amplifies this feeling.
The characters are nothing to write home about, though I feel like the "strange man" feels a little ableist to me (I myself and multiply disabled). He seems to be a demonization of developmentally disabilities, and not a simple antagonist with a disability, but I digress.
The story itself was pretty light-weight and focused more on the art than anything, which isn't a negative, especially not in this case. The art adds to the atmosphere and, although the art style itself is nothing too exciting, the eeriness would be difficult to capture in written word, in my opinion.
I definitely wouldn't say the story gripped me, I was interested enough to keep reading, but I wasn't on the edge of my seat. Unlike with Goodbye, Eri, I felt I could put the book down without needing to pick it back up ASAP. The ending does a good job of making you want to pick up the next volume, though, but mostly feels like shock-value.
Final Verdict!
Art: ★★★★☆
Story: ★★★☆☆