After admiring Carlos Pacheco's work on Superman, I decided to look for more of his work, and came across Arrowsmith, which comes in two volumes: So Smart In Their Fine Uniforms, and Behind Enemy Lines. Since Pacheco is now dead and the second book ends in a bit of a cliffhanger, you have to be OK with the story probably never getting finished.
The world is a fantasy version of the state of the planet during World War 1, complete with trolls, dragons, and wizards and magic spells substituting for the technology. In this world, history is quite a bit different (there's an appendix in volume one where a writer friend of Kurt Busiek fills in the background behind the world).
The art is the highlight of both volumes. Pacheco's art is gorgeous, and makes you really believe the world exists. The story is a bit of a cliche --- it's the loss of innocence that happened in World War 1 but transplanted into this fantasy milieu. Sure, maybe that's some plot about the trolls being the bridge to the sunlit lands or to the seelie court, but to be honest Busiek breaks no new ground here in the story. As a vehicle for beautiful art though I cannot fault the setting or the way the story takes you through a mythic version of a Europe that might have been, seen from the point of view of an starry eyed American would-be-hero.
The story is short and obviously unfinished, so we never see how the world of Arrowsmith lives up to its potential. But it was very much worth my time checking it out from the library.
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