Acid Nun

Halbert’s wildly surrealistic debut collects her previously self-published horror fantasy comics series, filled with bloody violence and explicit sex—all in service to an ultimately positive narrative about healing from trauma. The fast-paced script features Annie, a nun with an unhappy past, who meets and falls mutually in love and lust with a beautiful but cannibalistic hell-spawn named Eleanor. But one night, Annie takes a “crucifixion acid” trip that goes awry and she is “transported through a portal to an alternate dimension,” becoming “a prisoner of her own mind.” Eleanor attempts to find and rescue Annie with the help of her demonic but benign brother/lover. Meanwhile, Annie is taunted by a shadowy goblin determined to keep her forever frozen in her memories of childhood trauma and self-loathing. Eventually, with Eleanor’s support, Annie is able to free herself and destroy her tormentors (“Don’t come near Annie ever again, fuckers!”). Halbert’s art and writing throb with uninhibited scenes of sex and gore, crude but portrayed with wit. Each chapter concludes with her frank confessions about processing her own childhood trauma through creating these comics. Her openhearted emotional arc combined with such shock-erotic visceral imagery make for an entertaining and unexpectedly moving experience for gore-horror fans. (Sept.)