The House of Lost Horizons introduces (or reacquaints) Mike Mignola’s Sarah Jewell and Marie-Thérèse LaFleur. In this new story, the intrepid female detectives investigate murders in a house on an island. There is a storm, there is a vault filled with occult items ready to be bargained off. It’s not an original tale, but it has been masterfully presented.
Introduced in Rise of the Black Flame, this is one of the first times the lady detectives star in their own story, and it hits the mark straight out of the gate. You don’t need to have read their debut (which is for the best, considering the prices paper copies seem to go for these days), as there is just a passing allusion to The Black Flame Cult that will hit home with those who have.
No, all you need to do is pick up and enjoy this story, and live though the storm, just like the characters, to discover what the blazes is going on.
The addition of the first story the artist did for the Hellboy-verse at the end is definitely fun, as are the sketchbook pages. They include excellent portraits as well as costume designs. True to the Roaring Twenties, the reader is presented with an array of period fashion, so it’s nice to get a slightly better look at the pieces.
I am not a habitual reader of the Hellboy or Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense franchise, but I look forward to the next installment of The Sarah Jewell Mysteries. If the sequel isn’t lost on the horizon, pun intended. I do hope this won’t be a standalone, because I feel that would be injustice to the series.
On a side note: while the characters of Sarah and Marie-Thérèse were created by Mike Mignola, The House of Lost Horizons was written by Chris Robertson with the art by Leila del Duca. Both, like the rest of their team, did a smashing job!
