LDCOMICS ONLINE COMICS FAIR 2025! Back in college, Adele Pound baffled her fine art tutors by stubbornly painting wildlife instead of whatever was ‘in’. She’s never grown out of it – all of her work is inspired by the natural world! Whether she’s peering at wintering birds through a telescope or crouched in the undergrowth sketching insects, the earth has always been her biggest muse – even in her comics.
Pound’s comic McNab is a true story about an encounter she once had with a hermit crab. Whilst out snorkelling one day, Pound and her partner came across a very frightened little hermit crab, hiding away from them in his shell. When picked up, he grows so scared, that he abandons his shell completely, leaping into the ocean! Thankfully, the story has a funny and happy ending.
McNab is completely wordless, aside from onomatopoeia noises and occasionally speech bubbles of laughter, which I found quite lovely. It was nice not to be distracted by noisy words, and simply focus on the beautiful beach surroundings. The crab is the star of the show, taking over most of the panels with his wide-eyed expression – we needed no inner dialogue to know exactly what he was thinking.
The art is beautiful – waves ripple and gleam, feet make imprints in the sand, and the cool blue water floats over our protagonist’s legs. Whilst I can’t confirm for definite, its backgrounds look to be painted, or at least, strongly give off that beautifully crafted artistic feel, in a way that reminded me of Tim Bird’s mother’s paintings in Adrift on a Painted Sea.
McNab is available throughout July at LDComics Fair.
Adele Pound (W/A) • LDComics Online Fair, £3.00
Review by Lydia Turner
The LDComics Online Comics Fair runs across the month of July. Read all our coverage of the comics on offer here at BF.
