#haphaven

Haphaven by Norm Harper and Louie Joyce

Haphaven is a fun and exciting graphic novel about an adventure in a world connected to Earth's superstitions! I thought of this book when I saw the prompt was "Weapon" because of the plot, but I'm not going to reveal spoilers in this post.

Creators: Norm Harper, Louie Joyce / Letterer: Ocean Ransford / Lion Forge Comics

Step on a crack / Break your mother’s back

How superstitious are you? Super superstitious? Maybe just stitious? But have you thought about all the familial traditions, the stories we share generation from generation, the odd habits we pick up because it has become engrained in your being, your very core? Have you thought what it would be like to confront both history and fantasy? Well thankfully Harper and Joyce have you covered with their latest graphic novel, Haphaven.

Haphaven tells the story of Alex Mills, who (among other things) is the exceedingly superstitious daughter of a baseball player and descendent of a famed gambler Zane who never lost a card game as long he had fishhooks (a colloquial for holding two jacks). All the exposition is told brilliant in the opening prologue of the book before we pivot to the story. Alex lost her father due to a terrible accident due to a terrible storm, and she and her mother are still adjusting to the new status quo years after the fact. Before long though, a childhood rhyme proves a little more dangerous than anyone could believe and Alex’s mother breaks her back. When a little leprechaun shows up and offers a chance to save her mother Alex all but leaps at the call to go to a fantastical world of Haphaven armed with nothing but a baseball bat and her wits.

And thus sets the stage for the graphic novel. Told in five chapters, Haphaven follows your conventional structure for your coming-of-age novel where a young teen has to embark on a great quest with vast implication on both a personal and world encompassing level. While overexcited teen excitedly accepts the call to action isn’t the biggest variation on the formula, Harper and Joyce do manage to make their story has its own unique charm. Haphaven is sort of a mid-fantasy world, it lacks the dragon and antics of sorcerers and wizards but being the source of all power for all of Earth’s superstitions also means that we’re not dealing with a world that is scarce in magics and magical creatures.

You have airships piloted by leprechaun crews, talking animals, and some monsters unique to the world. Plus, Alex Mills is a biracial (half white, half black) protagonist and since representation matters literally every day, it’s always nice when these stories don’t default to your typical white male teen. It also helps that Harper helps flesh out the world both through anecdotes about Alex’s ancestor Zane that help create a sense of grandness of the story and including a textual history of the land with each chapter.

Oof, Alex steps on a crack and breaks her mother’s back. That starts her on a journey to Haphaven, where all the Earth’s superstitions draw their power. She needs a rabbit’s foot from Haphaven to save her Mom, but, of course, it won’t be quite that easy. Especially considering who and what she has to go through to even get to the Jinx, who guards the lucky rabbit foot.

Okay, this was wicked cool. I mean, c’mon now, someone named Penny who doesn’t like to be picked up, a heckuva Black Cat who you do Not want to cross at all, the whole comic just had me going between laughing and rolling my eyes. It was soo good. So soo good.

Short version: When Alexia’s father is killed, she turns to an obsession with superstitions. Then her mother falls into a coma, and she is visited by a leprechaun who tells her that her family is cursed, and the only cure is to get involved in the politics of an alternate world where superstition is not only fact, but law.

What I thought: Got a mixed feel here. On the one hand it feels very tight and intentional like a movie, and on the other, that’s not really what you look for in a graphic novel. At least, not what I look for. I like complicated characters, political intrigue that’s got more than a couple of players, and world-building that hints at a vast expanse that’s way bigger than just the people we see. Haphaven doesn’t do those things, but it was not intended as an adult graphic, so a lot of it’s forgivable.

What I do like is that because it’s not meant as an adult graphic, the thinking of the prepubescent mind shows up fast and strong, and it works. Alexia doesn’t even question it when a leprechaun shows up in her bedroom, doesn’t think it’s weird that her mother falls into a coma directly after she stepped on a crack (”break your mother’s back”), and doesn’t waste any time diving straight into the fairy world and learning its rules at running speed. You don’t have to waste any time with the whole ”this can’t be real” schpiel you hear so often in these types of situations because Alixia is already so used to believing in weird stuff without question.

It raises a lot of points about free will and how much influence your family history actually does have, not to mention a wonderfully human approach to an annoyingly random element (a certain pistol will fire something with unlimited ammo, but never the same thing twice. It could be a bullet, it could be cotton candy, it could be the person next to you). Unfortunately, the graphic does this by being a bit repetitive, and I felt like it could have just made each point once if it had been more powerfully written. Overall a good, light story that had the potential to be much more impactful but got shy at the last second.

Quick review Haphaven - Norm Harper & Louie Joyce #Haphaven #NormHarper #LouieJoyce #NetGalley