Five Wounds: An Illuminated Novel

by Jonathan Walker

Inspired by Italo Calvino, Jeanette Winterson, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and the Uncanny X-Men, this surreal, darkly beautiful, and unsettling graphic novel about five wounded orphans is by turns hilarious and horrific, grotesque and tender

On an unnaturally dark night, an unnaturally black dog took a baby from its cradle. Behave, child, or the same might happen to you!

In a cruel and arbitrary world, where disturbing lapses in logic are commonplace, five orphans must face their traumatic origins. Gabriella is a crippled angel, haunted by her inability to interpret prophecies. Cur is the rabid leader of a sect of dogs, desperate to escape his inheritance. Cuckoo is a gambler with a wax face determined to find a fixed identity before his luck runs out. Magpie is a thief in search of the perfect photographic subject, but terrified of going blind. Crow is a leper trying to distill the essence of death as an antidote to dying. Each of them is deformed; each has a special ability; each is connected to all of the others. And each gets exactly what they deserve—or do they? This sumptuous, densely layered medieval-style illuminated novel features richly illustrated endpapers, a midsection of plates on vellum finish, and a red ribbon bookmark.

Genres: Graphic Novels, Fantasy

178 pages, Hardcover

First published May 1, 2010

Reviews

[Alan (the Lone Librarian rides again) Teder · Rating 3 out of 5]

Venice Horror Fantasy
A review of the 636 Press paperback (October 31, 2023) of the Allen & Unwin hardcover original (2010).

‘Everyone’s connected,’ Gabriella said. ‘You, me, Cur, Crow, Magpie.’ She ticked the names off.
‘Five fingers,’ Cuckoo said, watching her hand.
Gabriella picked up the theme. ‘Five wounds.’
‘Five wild cards,’ returned Cuckoo.
‘Or five marked cards. Someone’s playing games with us.’

I had enjoyed Walker's story of religious obsession in The Angels of L19 and especially enjoyed Push Process, his photo novel of Venice. Five Wounds is something quite different though, but it does touch on religious fervor and it is set in a fictitious but especially vicious world of Venice. The chapters and paragraphs are rather oddly set out in two columned print on each page with numbering i.e. in biblical style, as if they were Chapter and Verse. The title itself would appear to allude to the Five Wounds of Christ.

It features a main cast of 5 characters, the assassin Cur, the face-changer Cuckoo, the apothecary Crow, the photographer Magpie and the angel-without-wings Gabriella. Cur seeks escape from the league of dog assassins. Crow seeks to take over Venice. Cuckoo marries Gabriella having changed his face with that of her fiance. Magpie documents everyone on his daguerreotypes, with that technology making for a mid-19th century setting. Everyone is ruled by a Duke and there is a Parliament and a Treasurer of the Public Conscience. A rather apocalyptic conclusion is softened by a flashback epilogue.


There are some interesting Easter Eggs inside Dan Hallett's illustrations. A magnifying glass view of a postage stamp sized picture of Gabriella's In-Laws' bookshelves reveals anachronistic 20th century titles alongside medieval ones.

It is all lavishly illustrated with full page plates, small inserts and various colourful heraldic designs by Dan Hallett. These do sometimes verge on the grotesque though, somewhat like the war atrocity sketches of Goya (I encountered those recently while reading Paris in Ruins: Love, War, and the Birth of Impressionism, so they came to mind immediately).

The horror fantasy imagination here by both the author and illustrator is ambitious but it is difficult to completely love a work of such a nihilistic nature.

Trivia and Links
Read more about Five Wounds at the author's website here where you can also sample a free download excerpt of the first chapter. A YouTube video introduction is also available here.

[Jonathan Walker]

I'm the author of this book. I'm just writing here to say that since the first edition from Allen & Unwin is now out of print, I have self-published a revised second edition. You can buy a paperback of this at my website www.jonathanwalkerwriter.uk

There's also a short introductory video on my author profile here.

This differs from the first edition as follows: I've rewritten and improved the text (although I haven't altered the structure of the story). I've also simplified the design (which is why the new edition is no longer 'an illuminated novel').

[Jens Hieber · Rating 3 out of 5]

2.5 stars rounded up for having a good idea.

While I appreciate what Walker was attempting to do, it just doesn't seem to quite come off. Some of the central ideas were fun (an angel that is meant to be a conveyor of prophecy but can't quite interpret them) the whole thing feels a bit snarly and purposeless. It took too long to get going, was at times not written well, had some POV head-hopping issues, and copped out by having an alternate ending. The illustrations were mediocre (though not bad), the odd scrawling of corrections into the manuscript seemed quite purposeless (I read through and deciphered them all...they didn't add any extra meaning as far as I could tell), the allusions were not deep, if at all relevant (the reference to the 'convocation of politic worms' from Hamlet was particularly odd), and the numbering of paragraphs and sentences could have been meaningful but really just seemed gimmicky.

I can't quite make sense of what the purpose was. There's a good story in here, certainly. The characters have so much potential in how they intertwine in their stories, and I suspect a better author (maybe Neil Gaiman) could make something brilliant out of this.

[Always Becominging · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this a lot more than I thought I would. I was initially put off by the design, which I thought was over-the-top and unnecessary. I still think that and probably would have preferred if each numbered list had a smaller page to itself, still including the illustrations but not the textural design which I didn’t think added to the experience.

The text itself is very well done though. The five characters are well developed and interesting and there are some really fantastic minor details throughout. The ways the characters’ stories intertwine is masterfully done. I like how many ideas are included in the book; two of my favourite passages were the fencing lesson and the discussion of tarot cards.

The overall viewpoint of the novel was a little pessimistic for my taste, but that was made up for by the compelling narrative and creative world building. Unfortunately the end of the book was unsatisfying, with not all of the characters getting strong conclusions to their stories.

[Adrienne · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book is obviously meant to be read several times to get the full enjoyment, but the story is so confusing and almost indecipherable that I'd rather cut off a toe than read it again.

[Joshua Donellan · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a profoundly fascinating piece of work, but not an easy read by any means. Visually it is inventive and captivating, simultaneously old and new. The story content is interesting but quite hard to follow and incredibly dark. I tend to enjoy fairly morbid territory in literature but this was a little to grim even for my tastes. However, if you enjoy particularly macabre writing then this might become one of your favourites.

Definitely worth the cover price just to see what the creators have done in terms of aesthetic and layout, but if you're into conventional structures or are looking for an easy read you're probably better off searching elsewhere.

[Dee · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not entirely pleasant, but undeniably beautiful. This is a visually magnificent piece of work. Everything about its production only serves to enhance the story itself, which is both unflinching and humble, elegant and crude, outright and delicate. Short, pithy, redolent - like a woodcut carving in words, showing more than the simple lines. And like most woodcuts, the subject is something I'm not entirely sure I wanted to spend that long and that much art upon, but its power cannot be denied.

[n* Dalal]

I have no idea how to review this book. I need a special star rating for it, like a deformed star that means "Ummm.....That was interesting." I would give this book at least three deformed stars. That's about how interested I was.