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Nocturnals Carnival of Beast is an one-shot from Dan Brereton's Nocturnals series. This book collects the stories Beasts, The Scrimshaw Crown and Night of the Candy Butchers.

In this book Dan Brereton takes this motley crew and puts them in character centric stories. Here Doc Horror, Halloween Girl and Starfish get a chance to shine.

How is it?

I knew very little about Nocturnals coming into this book. However I didn't felt that it took much away from my enjoyment of the book. The recap of the characters at the beginning of the book, brings you up to date with the bare essentials of who's who.

The first story is Beasts. This is the only where I felt that some continuity knowledge would bring something to the reading experience.

Here Doc Horror takes most of the gang into the hoods looking for the carnival of beasts. There he finds an old foe and they end up having a bit of a rumble. This is my least favorite of the stories. On one hand it has great looking painted art, on the other the dialogue is somewhat wonky and the story moves at an awkward pace.

Halloween Girl

The Scrimshaw Crown, the second story, focus around Starfish and her short quest to help a lost soul find its peace. This story has absolutely gorgeous art. There is one single panel that tarnishes it a bit. In it someone forgot to draw Starfish's head, but apart from that it is absolutely wonderful. The story is a simple and short tale about doing a good deed.

Starfish

The last short story is Night of the Candy Butchers. I found this one to be a very sweet narration with cool looking art. This is one of those stories where what's narrated doesn't match whats being shown, but at the same time it does. The story is narrated by a very young Halloween Girl and she sees the world throw a kiddie lens. On the background Gunwitch and Polychrome fight the haunted occupations of a Halloween Fair.

Verdict?

I came into this book without any prior knowledge about the Nocturnals Universe but that didn't stop me from enjoying it. The dialogue might be a bit wonky at times and some character motivation not very clear, but its still entertaining. And the art is, for the most part, very good. I liked it, it entertained me.

On a side note, I want to thank Nuno Amado and his blog for hosting the contest from were I won this book.

Publisher: Image Comics
Year: 2008
Pages: 64
Authors: Dan Brereton
ASIN: B001G0JYA0

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About the Author - Rui Esteves

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Rui Esteves is definitely from Peru and has a blog!  Rui tries to find the good in everyone, which is difficult when he has to work for this hive of scum and villainy, but he makes do.   Rui does so enjoy graphic novels, as evident from the name of his blog:  http://readinggraphicnovels.blogspot.com, twitter handle: @RGNblog, and Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/rgnblog.

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