Histoire dessinée de la France #3

Part of the ambitious Histoire dessinée de la France series from La Découverte, this third volume — Pax Romana! D'Auguste à Attila — brings together writer Blaise Pichon and artist Jeff Pourquié to explore the sweep of Roman history from Augustus to Attila. Pourquié's cover draws you in with a wonderfully odd procession: two modern-looking figures and a bearded elder emerge through a narrow passage accompanied by a grinning wolf-like beast and a red deer's head, while a wild red imp brandishing a wheel leers from above — all set against the warm terracotta tones of an ancient Roman streetscape with a sculpted figure looking on from a niche. It's a pleasingly strange collision of eras and creatures that promises a history told with real imagination and wit.