Holding Patterns back

Featuring four of the finest pages ever in comics, this is a black, white and decidely blue collection of meticulously composed short stories; all bar one sad, mournful, some lamenting lost love.

'Footnotes' is John Cei Douglas' tour de force. Each silent page is a perfectly balanced composition of light, line and colour, the first three of which each find focus by dint of a borderless spotlight on a young couple together on a train station platform over a period of time. These are surrounded by train journeys to and fro, some shared, some solo, gazing out of the window with dreamy optimism or more melancholic doubt. Rarely have I seen these scenes through a carriage window so well conveyed; similarly the station and platforms themselves which, when empty, echo with a real sense of space and melancholy. The expressions are as subtle as they are economical – we're talking Andi Watson at the top of his game – but alas I can say little more when I have a dozen more sentences in me which desperately want to explain why this tale is so super. SPOILERS etc.

‘Living Underwater’, ‘Bottling It’, ’Lost’ and ‘Found’ are four poignant pieces about anxiety and depression, the last three silent and more metaphorical, the first direct, autobiographical and explanatory. If you have ever sunk beneath a sea of suffocating, paralysing depression and anxiety you will find much empathy here and may want to share it with your friends. If you haven’t, welcome to John’s world: it will help you to understand.

It concludes with ‘Follow me’, and a moment of magic.

Please Note: this particular edition is limited to 100 worldwide. We took 20 and they are signed and numbered.