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Summary
Summary
A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
Sherwood and Orson should never have gone into that cave.
That day, a door was opened from our world into a dark and profane realm...and earth's destiny was changed forever.
In this demented future, whatever life remains on earth is oppressed by the evil shadowsmen. Only a gang of ruthless and powerful children called the Wrenchies can hope to stand against them. When Hollis, a lonely boy from our world, is magically given access to the future world of the Wrenchies, he finally finds a place he belongs. But it is not an easy world to live in, and Hollis's quest is bigger than he ever dreamed of.
Farel Dalrymple brings his literary and artistic powers to bear in this sprawling science fiction graphic novel about regret, obsession, and the uncertainty of growing up.
Author Notes
Farel Dalrymple is the creator Pop Gun War (Dark Horse Comics), which was a Xeric Grant recipient and won a gold medal from the Society of Illustrators. Dalrymple drew the critically acclaimed superhero comic book Omega the Unknown (Marvel) for author Jonathan Lethem and is also creator of the Eisner-nominated It Will All Hurt (Study Group Comic Books). He is a cofounder of and regular contributor to the comic book anthology Meathaus and has worked on a range of illustration and cartooning projects. Farel is currently residing in Portland, Oregon, but really would rather be living alone in the woods somewhere. The Wrenchies is his most recent graphic novel.
Reviews (4)
School Library Journal Review
Gr 10 Up-In the far future, demonic Shadowsmen rule over a grim wasteland. They inflict adults with despair, corrupting them into zombies-or worse. Bands of fierce, foul-mouthed children fight against this oppression, and the Wrenchies are the greatest of these gangs. An ancient and arcane comic book creates a portal between our time and this bleak future, allowing a lonely outsider named Hollis to join the Wrenchies on their crusade. Together they embark on a quest to destroy the source of the world's corruption. Kind, sensitive Hollis feels out of his depth, not born to battle like the rest of the gang. He wrestles with his hopes and fears for the future. Readers will connect with his need for belonging and delight in the acceptance he finds among the Wrenchies. The plot unfolds in a stream-of-consciousness, reality blending with dreams, mystical visions, and drug-induced hallucinations. Dalrymple's art vibrates with violent action, awash in colors alternately lush and lurid. His masterfully detailed panels reward careful study, from devilish grotesqueries to intricate architectural cutaways. With its abundant violence, profanity, and drug use, The Wrenchies is not for the squeamish, but offers breathtaking adventure for those with a strong heart and a stronger stomach.-Tony Hirt, Hennepin County Library, MN (c) Copyright 2012. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Publisher's Weekly Review
With its plot in constant flux and scant exposition, it's easy to get lost in the violent fever dream Dalrymple has concocted. But far from being a detraction, the book's untethered structure plays into its overall weirdness and elusive premise. The Wrenchies could be a band of preteen freedom fighters from a barren, postapocalyptic future; comic-book characters come to life for a nervous, imaginative boy named Hollis; or the twisted fantasies of Sherwood Presley Breadcoat, a disillusioned 35-year-old who never got over the childhood disappearance of his brother. Trying to suss out the truth is likely missing the point. The book is more like an abstract painting, insofar as what it evokes matters more than what it literally communicates. The plot and characters adhere to a dreamlike logic, one where interdimensional travel, arcane magic, complex quests, and explosively gory deaths are treated at face value. Dalrymple uses simple language to convey the book's nightmarish concepts and depicts them in lurid yet childlike watercolors that combine in a haunting, strange, and frequently stomach-churning exploration of human insecurity and pain. Ages 14-up. Agent: Bernadette Baker-Baughman, Victoria Sanders & Associates. (Sept.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Kirkus Review
Children must fight a complicated evil in this dark, disturbing sci-fi tale. While out playing one fateful day, brothers Sherwood and Orson stumble upon a horrible and mysterious cave. Inside, the boys encounter a demon that will forever alter the paths of their lives. In a parallel universe, a motley crew called the Wrenchies band together in a violent, futuristic wasteland trying to survive numerous foes, especially the Shadowsmen. In yet another place/time, a comics-loving misfit named Hollis (who takes to running about in a scarlet superhero costume) finds himself immersedliterallyin the pages of an enigmatic, purloined comic. These three tales twine together in a somewhat confusing fashion, full of reaching sci-fi leaps into other times and dimensions, creating a brain-aching nonlinear plot. Couple this with a handful of epilogues and an esoteric "fotogloctica" that kind of but not really wraps things up, and expect readers' brains to be smoking. Dalrymple's art is impeccable, capturing the horrors of demons that routinely spear eyeballs and great swarms of parasitic insects that can crawl into ears and need to be killed by swords and/or knives; it's beautiful, dreamy and nightmarishly violent. Think of this as an insidiously macabre Coraline-esque tale meets Charles Burns. Morbid and discomfiting; not for the faint of heart, but what a ride for those who go with the flow. (Graphic science fiction. 15 up) Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
*Starred Review* It's a sure bet that summarizing The Wrenchies, as book as vibrant and disturbing as if David Lynch directed The Goonies, isn't the way to convey its great strengths. But here goes: entering a cave, young Sherwood is attacked by a creature and finds an amulet that blows open the gates of hell, disgorging shadowsmen, whose infectious apathy and corruption only the strongest teens can resist. Emerging in this postapocalyptic world are the Wrenchies, an adolescent gang who sets out, with an insecure, superhero-obsessed boy named Hollis, to kill Sherwood and save the earth. Clearly, it doesn't pay to demand sheer narrative coherence here, but the raw emotional weight of Dalrymple's anger forcibly tows readers through the obfuscating narrative, and the intricate, gritty, and rivetingly grotesque art, in sickly greens and browns peppered with bloody red, plays no small part in that. Dalrymple takes a deep affection for comics and role-playing games and a deep distrust of adulthood itself and combines the two in an offering unlike anything else in the field today. For a certain demographic of angry, alienated, and demoralized older teens, this graphic novel will resonate powerfully. Includes copious gore, cursing, drug references, and drug use.--Karp, Jesse Copyright 2014 Booklist