Map of Days by Robert Hunter – review

The small, London-based Nobrow Press produces lovingly made, rather individual graphic novels. They have a concise and fun illustrated Freud biography out this month, but this beautiful work is harder to categorise. It begins with a myth of origins: an account of nine celestial siblings who have shaped the universe. One, a face cocooned at the Earth's core, reaches out to the sun: his love for it shapes our world. A boy discovers a route to the face, and determines to help it – but his efforts throw the planet out of kilter. Hunter's visions of the deep stuff of creation use a vivid palette that is bright but never jarring: tendrils snake through strata, orbs glow with primary light, and flowers and leaves reach up to the sun, while the woodcut-style panels move, with their own weird geometry, through an old-fashioned child's adventure. The story is engaging but slight, and the functional text rarely matches the lyricism of the artwork but, with its strange symbols, alien landscapes and rich hues that speak of dreams and mystery, Map of Days bewitches.