In Trumpets of Death, we follow Antoine, a young boy who is left to live with his grandparents in rural France. His mother is missing, and his father has too much on his plate to take care of Antoine. His grandmother is sweet if strict, and his grandfather for some reason aggressively dislikes him. Left to forage with his grandfather one afternoon, Antoine eats a strange mushroom and goes on a strange odyssey. 

Now, the synopsis for the book says "mysterious forces of nature culminate in a fearsome hunt through the forest that will resolve their differences once and for all." I have to ask, what fearsome hunt? What resolution? After this journey for Antoine begins, he's pretty much alone. There is NO resolution with his grandfather. We have no idea why his grandfather even dislikes him so much - and that's the main issue I have with this graphic novel. While it's great at showing Antoine's situation, it doesn't really delve deep into character work. I have no idea why his grandfather is the way he is. I have no idea what the journey Antoine went on meant beyond him having some sort of growing up moment - which was not even that clear in the book until we're told he felt that he grew up in the forest. Character growth doesn't seem to be something the author is interested in showing on page.

Writing aside, I do have to give the author credit for doing some really interesting work with the art and color direction. Every section of story has its own color scheme, working in an almost monochromatic way but with different color choices. The art works well to show Antoine's boredom and loneliness, and the passage of time. 

I wish this did more with the character work, or that it gave us more focus on Antoine's grandparents vs all the time spent showing various pages of panels showing time passing. I just came away from the end of this asking what was even the point?

Many thanks to NetGalley and Lerner Publishing Group for the ARC. Trumpets of Death will be available  August 5th, 2025.