The Name and the Mark (Vattu #1)

The spectacular first volume of Dahm’s long-running webcomic ushers readers into an instantly immersive fantasy world. In the year “855 of the Blue Age,” a girl named Vattu is born into a nomadic tribe of diminutive, musical people called “fluters.” As Vattu grows up, she develops a contentious relationship with Vanni, a boy shunned for being disabled but who eventually becomes the tribe’s priest. Then soldiers from the militaristic, Rome-like Empire of Sahta conquer the fluters’ territory and take Vattu as a slave, sending her on a journey beyond her people’s hunting grounds and “almost to the edge of the world.” In bold brushstrokes and rich, organic colors, Dahm creates a fully realized world of competing intelligent species, sweeping vistas, labyrinthine cities, and tantalizing details like the faceless warrior War-Man and enormous animal skeletons half-buried in the earth. The first volume is packed with adventure, but also enough mystery and worldbuilding that the story’s horizon seems to stretch on forever. This epic deserves a place on the shelf next to Jeff Smith’s Bone series. (Jan.)