Howard Lovecraft and the Frozen Kingdom by Bruce Brown

My biggest problem with the writing is that it started off consistent with it's time, at the turn of the century when Winfeild Lovecraft died. The plot was pretty thin, but heck, it's only a comic (although why would a Deep One confront Dagon to help a human? And its later petulant behavior seems like a real contrivance.). If you like the drawings of Howard, you will like Howard Lovecraft and the Frozen Kingdom a lot more than I did. I would not have minded so much bu the HPL character appears in just about every panel. For me, the children were not as well drawn as the adults, and were almost bug eyed.

The Lovecraftian monsters were all drawn with verve and were the highlight, even if the Deep One looks more like Cthulhu-spawn or something else, rather than a fish man. First of all, I did not care much for the art.

Ultimately young Howard returns to his room and has a book, which by inference will serve as inspiration for many years to come. He confronts and befriends a Deep One, meets some unexpectedly pleasant denizens of R'lyeh (one named Abdul) and agrees to recover a copy of a mysterious book from Dagon to help them. Late on Christmas Eve HPL begins to read the book and accidentally evokes a portal, that trasports him into some frozen world where his adventures ensue. HPL's mother gives him a package that contains that same book. Howard is told by his father that he has written a terrible book that must be destroyed. Young HPL is taken by his mother to to visit his father in the asylum on Christmas Eve. In Howard Lovecraft and the Frozen Kingdom the beginning is similar, and perhaps more dramatic than that for Lovecraft by Rodionoff. Minor spoilers may follow, so skip to the end if you don't like that. Howard Lovecraft & the Frozen Kingsom to me also has an echo of the sentiment attached to The Antarctic Express from Kenneth Hite, a yuletide mythos send up. He is then plagued by visions of monsters throughout his life that he places into his ficiton. In Lovecraft, the title character, as a child, receives a copy of the Necronomicon from his father while visiting him in the asylum. If this book is similar to any Lovecraftian comic out there, I guess it is the 2004 book Lovecraft by Hans Rodionoff from Vertigo. The creative team includes Bruce Brown (story) and Renzo Podesta (art and colors). It is a graphic novel, has ~ 94 pages and lists for $12.95. Howard Lovecraft and the Frozen Kingdom is a production of Arcana, released in 2010.

Howard Lovecraft and the Frozen Kingdom by Bruce Brown