I was impressed by Ben Dickson's Falling Sky, and from the samples I saw of Marraquai, James McKay's artwork was equally strong. Which shows straight away, as the first notable thing about Marraquai is the overall quality and presentation of the package. It's full colour, and I prefer McKay's artwork to a lot of mainstream comic artists.

The book read like two parts for me. Once the woman is discovered just after the middle of the story, it was a lot less interesting. The dynamic of the two places (the forest and the city) wasn't utilised as well as it could have been (the short time frame we had in the city was probably the reason), and I felt the ending was fairly weak compared to the beginning. Now, that isn't to say I didn't like it, but the opening half of the comic was so strong that it was let down by the ending.

McKay's artwork stayed strong throughout, his Marraquai dinosaur looking amazing, and the few pages with the tech buildings and vehicle looked brilliant. I'm a fan of the rough, pencil-like artwork that is rarely used nowadays, but McKay pulls it off, and it looks fantastic. The double cover (another cover on the back) looks beautiful - and thanks for someone finally using a barcode on the BACK of the comic!

Overall then, it wasn't bad. The ending wasn't fantastic, but the intro is very strong. James' artwork more than makes up for it, and the overall quality of the product really shines. Overall, worth a read.