An odd little graphic novel with some interesting world building, good art, and not the greatest execution. 2.5 rounded up to 3 stars.

It's 2068. Post-apocalypse, Pan is a small community that survives on foraging the dead world around them, farming rice, and trading. When a militaristic force from the land of Fortuna show up to take over, the people of Pan are forced into a trial to save themselves from being swallowed up by the more powerful Fortuna. Aster, the main character, wasn't born in Pan and thus is ostracized by the people of Pan, but she's still tapped to join the small group fighting for Pan. Because she's super talented at what they end up having to do. (And what they do?

Spoiler

Is play epic dodgeball. I'm not joking. It's literally dodgeball.

)

The world building is fun, if a little confusing and hard to believe; 2068 is not so far off into the future that people who survived a world-ending event wouldn't know about drones and different types of machines. It's hard to swallow the idea that the people of Pan find everything about Fortuna's "futuristic" technology completely alien. I assume that the world ended pretty close to our current time, since there are tanks and cities to scavenge and radiation is a huge problem. I just can't believe, then, that survivors would completely forget everything about our modern world in the way that it's presented in this story.

Suspension of disbelief aside, I found the actual world building great. (If the graphic novel didn't tell me it was 2068 when it started, I could fully believe this world existing in, say, 2168.) Following Aster and her friend Wallis throughout a typical day was a great way to see this post-apocalyptic world and to understand what their lives are like. They forage, they trade, they try to survive on what little they have. The art direction is fantastic; there are great panels and transitions that really show off what the world is like.

Pacing is the largest problem I had as we move on, however. We barely have time to settle in to the world before Fortuna shows up to demand subservience (and crops) and Pan is forced into fighting against them to survive. The change from slow world building to rapid fire plot movement gave me whiplash, and after that it moved at a breakneck pace until the end. Aster is great at what she does, they lose, they win, the final battle happens, some characterization takes place in there somewhere, and then the book ends and everything is wrapped up.

Setting the story and pacing problems aside, the art is great. Using watercolor gives it all a hazy tone that makes it easier to step into the world. The character work is SO good; almost everyone is their own person, with their own distinct look and feel. I think the dynamics of the action scenes could have been done better; they felt more like snapshots of moments than fluid movement, but I enjoyed it overall.

Ultimately I think this is a very fun idea that needed better execution. Given more time to breathe, it could have been a very good fleshed out story with more characterization to make us love the characters and the world.

I received this as an ARC via NetGalley.