THE NIGHT WANDERER

A troubled young girl and an old vampire cross paths in a graphic-format adaption of a 2007 novel by the same name.

Sixteen-year-old Tiffany lives in Otter Lake, Toronto, an Anishinaabe reserve, with her father and paternal grandmother. With times being tough, her father decides to take in a boarder. Brimming with teenage angst, Tiffany isn’t thrilled with the situation. In fact, she’s not thrilled with her life in general: Her mother abandoned her to start a new life, and she’s pretty sure her boyfriend, Tony, is cheating on her. Enter the shadowy and mysterious boarder, Pierre L’Errant, who’s returning to Otter Lake to settle unfinished business and unexpectedly helps Tiffany toward an important realization. L’Errant and Tiffany’s relationship is refreshing: They are not romantically involved, and he, thankfully, doesn’t sparkle. Taylor’s story is engaging in its mixing of diverse elements, especially his synthesis of the tales of the Anishinaabe with vampire legend. However, the lackluster black-and-white art (with bursts of emphatic red spattered about) doesn’t add anything to a narrative that already feels rushed. Readers may feel as though they’ve just seen a filmed adaptation of a book that had to scramble to cram in the best parts.

An intriguing mix of vampires and Native lore with a whisper of Gothic charm, ultimately bogged down by a cramped abridgement and then squeezed into an ill-chosen format.