All the fairy tale creatures of old have created a secret community in New York City to hide from an enemy known only as the Adversary. When one of the fable apartments is found trashed and covered in blood, its occupant missing, the sheriff of Fabletown is charged with solving the mystery.

This mystery is heavy on characters, but easy to follow because they are all familiar: the Big Bad Wolf, Snow White, Bluebeard, Prince Charming, and so on. The modern take on the fables is lots of fun, and there is a considerable amount of humor besides. ( )

David Eicke:
This weekend, I started reading a series of graphic novels by Bill Willingham called FABLES, and I think I’m hooked. The concept of the series is that all the characters from the world’s fairy tales and, well, fables, have been exiled from their homelands by some nebulous force called the “Adversary” and forced to live in New York City and surrounding areas.

We find out that things didn’t exactly work out to be “happily ever after”: Snow White and Prince Charming have divorced and he now womanizes female wait staff. Beauty and Beast are having marital issues. Big Bad “Bigby” Wolf is now the Bogartesque sheriff of Fabletown (the underground fable community within NYC), and is investigating the ostensible murder of Rose Red. Jack (of beanstalk fame), her boyfriend, is a prime suspect.

The mix of noir-detective mood with a cast of mythic Shrek-like characters is just bizarre. And bizarre in a really good way. Now I just have to find Volume 2. And 3. And 4…If I’m going to be addicted, I might as well be well-supplied.

From the back of the book:

Who killed Rose Red? In Fabletown, where fairy tale legends live alongside regular New Yorkers, the question is all anyone can talk about. But only the Big Bad Wolf can actually solve the case- and, along with Rose's sister Snow White, keep the Fabletown community from coming apart at the seams.

My Thoughts:

This was my 1st foray into graphic novels and I enjoyed the experience. It seems everyone and their brother are enjoying graphic novels and it convinced me that I must give them a try. I started with the Fables series as Ladytink and a few others seemed to be really liking these so it seemed like a good place to start. And it was! Legends in Exile is a fast-paced whodunnit filled with fairy tale characters. It was an easy read that I finished in one sitting...I just couldn't put it down. I knew that there were clues that I was missing but I just didn't care and let the story take me along for the ride. The pictures added to the story for sure and it was a neat experience all around. Except this is an adult story and it kept catching my son's attention. He wanted to know what Mommy was reading (usually he could care less) and wanted to look at all of the pictures too. There wasn't anything awful just not the type of book that I wanted him looking at :) So we busted out a Hulk graphic novel for him and he was content looking at his own pictures. There isn't much else to say about this one except if you are like I was and on the edge on whether or not to give graphic novels a try...well, just try them. It was definitely a worthwhile experience and I will be reading more in the future! ( )

I was recently introduced to the fantastical and captivating world of graphic novels through Bill Willingham’s Fables.

I have long admired the cover art of the Fables collections and, as I love fairy tale retellings and fractured fairy tales, I have no idea what took me so long to pick up the first volume. I am ecstatic that I finally did! I haven’t been this excited over a story since reading The Book of Lost Things by John Connolly last year. I can’t get enough!

Each volume is beautifully told and illustrated. The stories pull the reader in. They draw on the familiar characters of childhood fairy tales, albeit wonderfully fractured and grim. The tales range in mood from whimsical to touching or tragic. Each volume draws the reader further into the world of Fabletown and I try not to devour them all in one sitting. I can’t say enough how wonderful these graphic novels are. ( )

"Fables" continues the mythologically rich tradition that was Gaiman's Sandman series. Here Willingham deals with various characters from fairy tales and folklore--referring to themselves as "Fables" – who have been forced out of their "Homelands" by a mysterious enemy known only as the Adversary.

They have traveled to our world and formed a clandestine community in New York City known as Fabletown, living amongst the "Mundys". Fables who are unable to blend in with human society (such as monsters and anthropomorphic animals) live at "The Farm" in upstate New York.

The main characters of Fables are public domain figures from folklore, mythology, and literature, although most of the characters seen so far are from European stories. I can't wait until Willingham decides to use Eastern & Norse mythological creatures. He has already started incorporating Arab figures in the latest volumes in this series.

The covers are done by James Jean (in subtle ways changing the appearance of the more famous characters so that it becomes hard for the reader to guess the current story arc protagonist). The majority of the interior work has been done by Mark Buckingham, who reportedly will be given the reins to the story if Willingham becomes unable to continue it. Other artists include: Bryan Talbot, Lan Medina, P. Craig Russell, Mike Allred, and Linda Medley. And of course it features lettering by the master, Todd Klein.

The first volume of the collected issues #1-5 gives us an introduction to Fabletown, of who's really running the reins of government (it's certainly not the man who's just there for glad handling purposes), and of the different characters that will capture our attention and imagination from here on. It was delightful to realize that a lot of beloved characters didn't really live happily ever after (given the marital problems of Beauty & the Beast; the divorce between Snow White & Prince Charming; the angst of Pinocchio at being transformed into a real boy, albeit too literally by the Blue Fairy, etc.). The focus of this story arc is that of Fabletown's Sheriff Bigby Wolf investigation of the apparent murder of Rose Red, Snow White's estranged sister. Who killed Rose Red? Was it Jack of the Tales (of the Beanstalk legend), her boyfriend? Was it her betrothed, Bluebeard (the one who has an appetite of killing off his wives on their honeymoon night)? Or was it Snow White herself, who has a grudge since it was the arrival of her sister into her married life which caused the divorce?

This volume also includes a short story wriitten & illustrated by Willingham, titled "A Wolf in the Fold." It tells the story of how Snow White & Rose Red (as well as countless Fables over the centuries) were able to escape into the mundane world, as well as how the members of Fabletown were able to convince Wolf to become Bigby, the Sheriff of Fabletown. There's a brief appearance of Feathertop (the scarecrow from the short story of Nathaniel Hawthorne) as companion of Snow White, as well as a clue to the wolf sightings in Transvylvannia.

Book Details:

Title Vol. 1: Fables: Legends in Exile
Author Bill Willingham
Reviewed By Purplycookie ( )