If you want to read something fun this year, pick up I Hate Fairyland, Vol 1. While A Promise of Fire was my favorite book I read in 2016, Fairyland was the most fun reading experience I had. The colors, the characterization, the mix of a child-like appearance with adult humor – it was great on all levels.

Between holds at my local library, I wanted something quick to read until I could pick up my books the next day. Thanks to Sarah’s post on Hoopla, I signed up and found that my library has a great selection of graphic novels and comics available to check out digitally, which I love. I can breeze through a graphic novel in an hour or so, and I honestly don’t want to waste any time waiting for a hold to come in, only to finish the book so quickly.

I was overjoyed when Fairyland was available in Hoopla’s offerings. If your library uses Hoopla, you probably have access to it as well.

Gertrude is a young girl (around age ten) who gets transported to this magical and colorful world called Fairyland. It’s any kid’s dream, really. She gets to explore and play around, but she also has a quest. In order for her to leave, she has to find a key. Cut to twenty-seven years later and Gertrude still hasn’t found the key. She’s a thirty-seven year old woman trapped in a kid’s body, because while her mind and personality has aged, her physical form hasn’t. She’s bitter and angry and just wants to leave, leaving her to take out her aggression on Fairyland’s inhabitants.

 

Meanwhile, the queen of Fairyland just wants Gertrude gone. However, she can’t lead Gertrude to the key and she can’t kill her either, because she’s a guest. So the queen invites a new child to Fairyland. If the new kid finds the key before Gertrude, then Gertrude becomes a citizen of Fairyland, enabling the queen to rid Fairyland of her once and for all.

One thing I really love is that Gertrude can’t curse. Fairyland censors her harsh language with cutesy alternatives. There’s also a revolving door of narrators. Each issue begins with a new narrator telling Gertrude’s story and without fail, Gertrude winds up killing them.

The artwork is gorgeous, with bright colors and detailed backgrounds. Add in cartoony versions of gore and it reminds me of a love child between Adventure Time’s bright color scheme with Deadpool’s tongue-in-cheek, potty humor.

The first volume ends with a little bit of a cliffhanger, admittedly. And I have to wonder what the hell Gertrude is going to do now. I mean, I could satisfy my curiosity by reading the single issues, but I like everything packaged neatly into a trade volume. Thankfully, volume two ( A | BN ) just came out. I just have to wait for it to show up on Hoopla!

Despite the kid-friendly artwork, I would not give this to young children as Gertrude is chopping off heads right and left. But if you want a visually-appealing new comic to start, that has an incredibly funny and raunchy Alice in Wonderland feel, run…don’t walk to get volume one.