★★★★★ 5
An insightful concise book by Vansant
Format: Paperback
In this NORMANDY 102-page full-color trade, in 15 chapters of 6 to 10 pages each, Vansant covers various chronological aspects of the Normandy invasion, from U.S. entry into the war in Europe, up through planning and execution of "Operation Overlord", the final Normandy seige with gliders, paratroopers, air combat and the beach invasions, the liberation of Paris from the Nazis, up through August 1944.
Vansant's NORMANDY is remarkably informative for such a concise volume. And its attention to detail in accurately illustrating uniforms, tanks and planes is greatly appreciated.
My one complaint is the 6" by 9" size of the book. I would have preferred a standard 7" X 10" size trade, that is the standard for comic book trade collections. It is a sturdy book with a tight binding, and a slightly larger size would make the book to be less difficult to pry open, and the art easier to appreciate in a larger size.
I also wish Vansant had included more panels of maps, detailing the movements of troops at points througout the vast scope of what is described in NORMANDY.
Vansant's work is worth seeking out, in its accurate portrayal of various battles throughout history, from the Nazi battles, to the Civil War, to the Pacific War. And as far as I know, Vansant got his start illustrating the Vietnam war in Marvel's THE 'NAM for several years, back in the mid/late 1980's. And two other World War II stories in SAVAGE TALES (1987) issues 7("Tiger Tiger", about a Panzer tank fighting in Russia) and 8 ("Chindits", about British jungle fighters in Burma in 1944).
Vansant's newer work is slightly rougher than his 80's/90's work, but still very precise and detailed. I'd compare his work to that of Sam Glanzman, Gray Morrow, John Severin and Michael Golden.
And it's great to see a comics illustrator drawing war stories that makes an effort to tell a story with more than just a riproaring action story, but one where you walk away with factual information about actual combat. Chapter 14 ,"The Killing Ground", hit me especially hard in portraying the bloodbath horrors of war. I wouldn't want to be one of the Nazis in that bombarded field of 10,000 bodies.
I previously purchased BATTLE GROUP PEIPER by Vansant(1991) , which despite being in black-and-white and a shorter 32-page historical comic book, was in some ways more interesting to me than NORMANDY, because it followed one Waffen SS commander (Peiper) through the weeks of Battle of the Bulge.
(Peiper is breifly mentioned in the NORMANDY book, although "Battle of the Bulge" events in BATTLE GROUP PEIPER occur after the events depicted in NORMANDY.)
The only other weakness (unlike the 1991 separate 32-page BATTLE GROUP PEIPER story I mentioned above) is that in the scope of the 102-page NORMANDY book it focuses on an overview narrative, rather than spending any length of time on any one soldier or commander, and is therefore less personal than BATTLE GROUP PEIPER is. And is more of an overview synopsis. But still loaded with compelling and informative history.
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Reviewed in the United States on August 29, 2013
