“She pressed herself against Joe, but instead of human warmth,
she had to take what meager comfort she could from the rough, stone embrace of the golem.”
– Joe Golem and the Drowning City by Mike Mignola and Christopher Golden
The collaboration between renowned artist/writer Mike Mignola (Hellboy) and insanely prolific novelist Christopher Golden has produced some extraordinary results in the past – namely Baltimore, or, The Steadfast Tin Soldier and the Vampire – so it comes as no surprise that their latest collaborative effort is equally unforgettable.
Joe Golem and the Drowning City is an illustrated novel set in a 1970’s New York City that is largely underwater – a “strange, flooded jungle of stone and iron” – after a cataclysmic event involving earthquakes and floods submerged the city decades earlier. A strange but compelling fusion of steampunk, alternate history, supernatural mystery, and Lovecraftian horror, the story revolves around a quartet of undeniably intriguing characters: Felix Orlov, an aging conjuror haunted by a nightmarish past; Molly McHugh, a spunky 14-year old orphan who is Orlov’s assistant; Simon Church; a seemingly ageless Victorian detective who specializes in mysteries involving the occult; and his giant (and quite possibly not human) sidekick Joe, who looks like a “back-alley legbreaker” and dreams of hunting witches.
Orlov is desperately trying to keep an ancient object that resembles a human heart – something called a Lector’s Pentajulum – out of the hands of a maniac named Dr. Cocteau who is obsessed with exploring that which is outside of our understanding, the dangerous shadows between science and magic, parting the veil that separates our universe from other dimensions. And although his occultist research has killed numerous innocents and could quite possibly lead to the end of the world – his only objective is to travel past the dimensional curtain, to become a dark god. When Orlov is captured by Cocteau’s weird gas-men – beings clothed in wetsuits and breathing yellow gas – Molly barely escapes with her life and eventually teams up with Church and Joe to not only save Orlov but to locate the Lector’s Pentajulum before it falls into Cocteau’s hands.
As the story unfolds, readers learn more about the horrific events surrounding Orlov’s birth, Church’s seeming immortality, and Joe’s mysterious origins – and it all culminates with a conclusion that would make H.P. Lovecraft proud. But this wildly entertaining illustrated novel is so much more than the sum of its parts – two things in particular should stand out for readers: the dark lyricism of the narrative and the heroic – and incredibly human – character of Joe Golem.
The steampunk and horror elements are powerful throughout but above all else this novel reads like an adult fairy tale, a dark fable. Like the drowned city of New York, this fluid storyline will submerge readers in its dreamlike narrative. Here’s an example from one of Joe’s dream sequences:
“Quiet spreads its wings across the water and through the bare woods behind him. In the distance to the south, along the bend in the river, he can see the light of lanterns and torches from the village, and as he drowns the witch he thinks of the tears of joy the girl’s mother will weep when he carries her home. Yet he does not kill the witches for gratitude or out of some sense of nobility. He kills them because they are witches, and killing them is his purpose… the very reason he has been made.”
And the reason why so many millions of readers love Mignola’s Hellboy is the very reason why those same readers will embrace Joe Golem. In a fallen world populated by the very worst that humankind has to offer, one decidedly not human being created from stone and dirt exhibits more heroic human qualities than all of the other characters combined. Joe is brave, courageous, determined, has a firm sense of honor and loyalty, and is the kind of friend that anyone would love to have.
Fans of Hellboy will absolutely love Mignola and Golden’s newest stone cold hero – and so will anyone who is interested in steampunk and/or alternate history.
Will Joe Golem become the next Hellboy? Only time will tell....
FYI: Joe Golem can also be found in a $0.99 e-story entitled Joe Golem and the Copper Girl, in which the (literally) hard-nosed detective tries to solve a mystery involving a strangely luminiscent 12-year old girl being threatened by a nightmarish creature.
Paul Goat Allen has been a full-time book reviewer specializing in genre fiction for the last two decades and has written thousands of reviews for companies like Publishers Weekly, The Chicago Tribune, Kirkus Reviews, and BarnesandNoble.com. He is a member of the National Book Critics Circle.
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