Trollkungen (the King of Trolls)
By: Kolbeinn Karlsson
158 pages, color, soft covers
Language: Swedish
Publisher: Galago, 2009
ISBN: 978-91-7037-4425
Kolbeinn Karlsson is one of the most unique Swedish comics artists to emerge during the last couple of years. He has already made a name for himself publishing strange and evocative mini comics, and his first book Trollkungen (the King of Trolls) doesn’t disappoint. Karlsson’s stories follow their own, bizarre logic. The stories are seemingly set in our world, but are populated with creatures from another realm altogether. The book contains several, seemingly unconnected stories that in the end are shown to take place in a coherent universe. Here we meet two hairy men, living in a forest, practicing mystical rituals and finally giving birth to two equally odd children that they raise. Other stories involve a small troll, floating down a river and experiencing weird occurrences: a carrot-shaped character taking a bath and evolving into a huge tree, two green men planting a skull and growing a head out of it and so on. It all sounds very strange, and it is, but also beautiful, charming and almost enchanted. A vivid read, almost without words, showing an enchanted world with a logic of its own. This books is up for publication in English by Top Shelf, so if you do not read Swedish you will also get your chance to experience the magic of Kolbeinn Karlsson.
By: Kolbeinn Karlsson
158 pages, color, soft covers
Language: Swedish
Publisher: Galago, 2009
ISBN: 978-91-7037-4425
Kolbeinn Karlsson is one of the most unique Swedish comics artists to emerge during the last couple of years. He has already made a name for himself publishing strange and evocative mini comics, and his first book Trollkungen (the King of Trolls) doesn’t disappoint. Karlsson’s stories follow their own, bizarre logic. The stories are seemingly set in our world, but are populated with creatures from another realm altogether. The book contains several, seemingly unconnected stories that in the end are shown to take place in a coherent universe. Here we meet two hairy men, living in a forest, practicing mystical rituals and finally giving birth to two equally odd children that they raise. Other stories involve a small troll, floating down a river and experiencing weird occurrences: a carrot-shaped character taking a bath and evolving into a huge tree, two green men planting a skull and growing a head out of it and so on. It all sounds very strange, and it is, but also beautiful, charming and almost enchanted. A vivid read, almost without words, showing an enchanted world with a logic of its own. This books is up for publication in English by Top Shelf, so if you do not read Swedish you will also get your chance to experience the magic of Kolbeinn Karlsson.
