A rounded up 3.5 stars.

I loved Gene Ha's work in DC whenever I saw it, so I picked Mae when I saw it in the library (apparently it actually began as a Kickstarter project). Our titular character rediscovers Abbie, her long-lost sister, a supposed runaway, after a seven year separation. With Abbie comes firestorm of weird happenings, a steampunk universe and lots of nerdy genre-savvy conversation. There's a quite a bit of fantasy-speak thrown at you as soon as Abbie and Mae move through the Gate - they land in the world of Cimrteren near the Free City of Krunỳřves, looking for the Zemetřasi responsible for kidnapping their father, meeting a talking ring-tailed cat who is not one of the Mňoukové. The context brings you along well enough, but I definitely fell into my usual trap of seeing any of these words and pronouncing them "aksjlajksdajsdalkj" in my head.

All the aside, the character design of the wild and varied inhabitants of the steampunk world is amazing. Robots, regular humans, many different kinds of animal humanoids; you name it, Ha has probably tried to incorporate it.

Favorite panel:



Favorite variant cover by Philip Tan: