'Deep in the heart of an enchanted forest, a small village of children lives unaffected by the passage of time thanks to a powerful stone that protects them from it. But when the stone is shattered and a thief runs off with one of the shards, four of the children must set out at once in search of the missing shard before their village is swallowed up by time and everybody in it dies. Armed with four crystals with special powers, the children bravely make their way through the dangerous forest to hunt down the thief, making friends and enemies along the way and encountering one strange creature after another.'
The Forest of Time is a new fantasy graphic novel series coming from Europe Comics that takes readers to a strange world where a small enclave of children have been living deep inside an enchanted forest, where time stands still. These children have been living with the Worshipul One, the only adult, who leads them in their life of science and experimentation.
The children of this small village have lived together for years, longer than their ages would imply, and have dedicated their many years to furthering their knowledge and understanding of the universe. There are philosophers, astronomers, mechanics, and biologists. The children and the Worshipful One have used the agelessness of their village to their advantage, spending years in study of the fields that fascinate them. However, one night a mysterious young woman breaks her way into the village, and shatters The Stone, a magical artefact that kept the passage of time at bay. Stealing one of the pieces of the stone, the thief has destroyed the village's way of life.
With the stone's powers failing, and no way to repair it without the missing piece the thief took, four of the children set out to find the woman and get the missing piece back. However, as they begin their journey into the world beyond their village they encounter new allies, and new dangers; including a masked old man who draws the life force from those around him, who seems bent on stopping the children.
The Forest of Time: Children of the Stone is an interesting start to this new series, and establishes some pretty firm foundations for things to come. The first thing that the book does well is to establish our lead characters, giving us a good idea of who our main children are before things have even gone wrong. Max is the oldest of the children, a brave young man who seems to make taking care of the younger kids a priority, and is the first to step forward when they need someone to go looking for the stone. Theo and Leo are a pair of inventors, and are the comedic duo of the book. When we first meet them they're working on their latest invention, a mechanical bird that can poop on people. Whilst they initially seem to be something of a joke, they prove to be incredibly resourceful, and because of their outgoing nature it's no surprise when they step forward.
The fourth of the heroes sent from the village is the one that makes the least amount of sense to begin with. Marie is one of the youngest of the children, and hasn't yet found the thing that grabs her. Whilst others have chosen their paths to explore she seems like something more of a daydreamer. However, she chooses to go on this mission because she saw the woman who broke the stone, a woman she thinks could be her mother, and who told her to leave with the others. Whilst Marie's thoughts that this woman who looks just like her might be her mother isn't a bad one, thanks to clues scattered throughout the book, and the focus on time an its manipulation, I think it's a lot more likely that the female thief is actually an older Marie, and that she was spurned onto her adventure by her older self.
This is something that I also think might be happening with other characters too. We see time being manipulated in a few different ways, so going backwards in time isn't a wild an idea as it sounds. I do look at both the Worshipful One and the Time-Eater and think that they're pretty similar looking. If the Worshipful One's beard got a bit wilder and greyer it would fit; plus he could easily be wearing the mask so that the children he raised don't recognise him. Tristan Roulot has certainly seeded a lot of potential plot ideas in this first volume that make it feel like this story is going to be a bit more complex than I was expecting, and will be doing some sneaky and surprising things with the story.
The art for the book has been provided by Guerrero, and looks really nice. All of the children have bold, distinct designs that make them instantly stand out on the page and you never get confused as to who is who; which is a good thing with how many children there are at times. The environments all look really pretty and have a huge amount of detail to them, and you can spend ages looking through some of the locations picking out small details.
Overall I had a really good time with The Forest of Time: Children of the Stone, and am looking forward to finding out where the story goes from here. There's been some interesting stuff introduced so far, and promise of more exciting things to come.
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