Bayou (Volume 1) by Jeremy Love

Bayou, which originated (and is still being released) as a webcomic, follows Lee, the daughter of an African American Mississippi sharecropper in the 1930s. Lee is a young girl, but wise beyond her years. She knows that a young black man in her town was lynched for whistling at a white woman, and she knows that nothing good ever came out of the bayou near her home. Her best friend is Lily, the daughter of her white landlady, but when Lily’s favorite necklace is lost in the bayou, Lee is accused of stealing it. Lily feels guilty, so she goes back to the bayou to find the necklace, and is stolen away by a monstrous creature named Cotton Eyed Joe. When Lee’s father is blamed for Lily’s disappearance, Lee must journey alone into the Bayou, battling terrifying creatures to rescue her friend and clear her father’s name.
 

Love’s first book in this ongoing series is mesmerizing and truly frightening. His use of dialogue is pitch-perfect, and his art is stunningly beautiful, even when it depicts the awful fantasies and realities of racism in the 1930’s deep South. Fans of Neil Gaiman’s Sandman, Bill Willingham's Fables, and Guillermo del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth  will enjoy Love’s use of magical realism, reimagining characters from American mythology and folklore.
 

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Recommended by Sara D.