The Plucker: An Illustrated Novel - Hardcover

Brom

4.3

2,393 ratings by Goodreads

9780810957923: The Plucker: An Illustrated Novel

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0810957922 ISBN 13: 9780810957923

Publisher: "Harry N. Abrams, Inc.", 2005

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World-renowned dark fantasy artist Brom in this illustrated novel intimately combines his dramatic storytelling with his uniquely arresting images, to create a work of striking imagination, a world where fairy-tale tradition collides with vileness and depravity, love and heroism, suffering and sacrifice. A shadowy land of make-believe where Jack and his box are stuck beneath the bed with the dust, spiders, and other castaway toys, forced to face a bitter truth: children grow up and toys are left behind. Jack believes this is the worst that can happen to a toy.

But when the Plucker, a malevolent spirit, is set loose upon the world of make-believe and Jack is thrust into the unlikely role of defending Thomas, the very child who abandoned him, he finds out there is worse that can befall a toy-far worse. As desperation mounts, Jack is thrown together with Thomas's other toys-Monkey, the Nutcracker, and the ethereally beautiful porcelain doll Snow Angel-as they struggle to rise above their simple roles as playthings in an effort to save the boy they love.

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About the Author:

Over the past few decades, Brom has lent his distinctive vision to all facets of the creative industries, from novels and games to comics and film. He is the author of Lost Gods, Krampus the Yule Lore, The Child Thief and the award-winning illustrated horror novels The Plucker and The Devil's Rose. Brom is currently kept in a dank cellar somewhere just outside of Seattle.

From School Library Journal:

Grade 5 Up–If the Velveteen Rabbit had a satanic bent, it would have much in common with the Plucker, the spirit doll that young Thomass father brings him from Africa in 1942. In Broms fevered imagination, the love and imaginative play with which children imbue their toys–their gusto, as he terms it–can be sucked out and turned to evil purposes, destroying the soul of the child and enlivening creatures too horrible to contemplate. It is up to Thomass old Jack-in-the-box to prevent the boy from such vitiation. Aided by the herbal and hoodoo wisdom of Mabelle, Thomass stalwart old nurse, and a few other plucky cast-off toys, Jack challenges the monstrous Foulthings spawned by the Plucker and vanquishes its malevolence. Broms descriptive powers are revealed equally in his prose and his illustrations. The paintings are so detailed and so layered that they yield their secrets further the more closely they are examined. Poring over them is an exercise in fascinated revulsion. Almost every page–from the opening, What the hell? to the resolution–contains abominations calculated to stir up nightmares. Despite its bittersweet, triumphant ending [...] this book will stir discomfort everywhere it goes. Brom is surely aware of this, as he is photographed on the dust jacket, poised to consume an eviscerated teddy bear with an oversize fork and spoon. Not everyone will be amused, and not everyone should be exposed to this macabre tour de force.–Miriam Lang Budin, Chappaqua Public Library, NY
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