"Milton's Dreams" is just not my cup of tea. I lacked interest in it overall. The art style isn't for me and I didn't find the story all that interesting.

The Grapes of Wrath meets Of Mice and Men through a dark lens.

This is the grim story of a Depression era family joining the westward migration in search of a better life. The story focuses specifically on the two elder sons - Milton, a simple minded gentle giant and his younger brother, Billy, a bitter little fellow with a crippled hand.

Unfortunately the character of Milton - the most sympathetic of the lot - never really comes into clear focus leaving things unrelenting in a bleak and unpleasant way. The story ends on a cliffhanger of sorts ... to be continued in a second volume.

The art has a primitive quality that emphasizes the nature of the story with muted color schemes and an almost rough sketch sensibility. It works quite well.

I would stop short of recommending Milton's Dreams. It just doesn't come together all that well.

***Thanks to NetGalley for providing me with a complimentary digital copy of Milton's Dreams in exchange for an honest review.

A very interesting graphic novel. The art style was well crafted and the story itself was engaging too.

So here's the thing: Steinbeck, in The Grapes of Wrath, took the abject poverty and hopelessness of Depression Era farmers and created a story with heart. People wanted to do right even though the world was conspiring to tear them down. But that isn't he case with Milton's Dreams: there are no redeeming characters, no careful musings about life and American dreams. Instead, we're given ugliness and more ugliness - from the people to the artwork. And sadly, all I could think was that the French author/artist really are disgusted by Americans and decided to take an American classic like Grapes of Wrath and murder it completely.

Story: Youth Billy accidentally watches a neighbor kill a relative over a property squabble. To ensure the boy's silence, his hand is crushed by a sledge hammer by that neighbor. Years later, the Depression hits, crops are failing, and Billy's large family is suffering. His father is bullied into selling all his property and they decide to caravan with others out West (very similar to The Grapes of Wrath storyline). When the neighbor ends up missing, Billy suspects his simple older brother, Milton, of having murdered him after Milton dreamed of doing so. Billy then later plants the seed to brutally murder another person - and when she ends up dead as well, Billy decides to hold it over his brother Milton's head - thereby controlling him further. Suddenly, all the bitterness and viciousness from living in poverty and having a multilated hand (and wanting to kill everyone) is given an outlet in the form of simple sweet older brother Milton.

As noted, there is not beating heart here - it's all people being nasty and terrible to others and brutal deaths. From the mother forced to sleep with a land owner for scraps, to an ineffectual husk of a father easily bullied to giving up everything, to a drifter from Canada (itinerant farm worker) who hates on everyone in the story. There really isn't a lot of reason to read this graphic novel because it is so unrelentingly dreary. Add in artwork that servers to make the characters even uglier (as if Munch's The Scream was done in cartoon line drawing style) and yeah, we get the point: Americans are ugly, selfish, greedy, and amoral.

I am not sure why anyone thought we needed an ugly retelling of The Grapes of Wrath but here we have it. Reviewed from an advance reader copy provided by the publisher.

A family hit by the depression decides to set out for California and a new life but this is a family beset by violence and cruelty.

Billy the second child in the family is riddled with anger and spite. As a child he was injured by a neighbour who he saw kill a man. Billy's elder brother Milton has learning difficulties and so Billy has to take over the leadership of the children and he resents the responsibilities that fall to him.

Billy suggests Milton wreak violence against people that Billy detests including the violent neighbour and Milton dreams of hurting the people who have hurt Billy but when a dead body turns up Billy begins to wonder if Milton is a murderer.

This is book one of the series and so the story ends on a cliff hanger.

The art work is good and manages to convey tension and malevolence. It is a story that keeps the reader on the edge of their seat because it just doesn't feel as if it will end well and yet Milton is such a gentle giant. Whether he actually committed the murders is yet to be seen.

Copy provided by Europe Comics via Netgalley in exchange for an unbiased review.

'Milton's Dreams' by Ricard with illustrations by Fejard Mael is a sort of depressing slog through the dust bowl.

Young Billy sees something he shouldn't have and gets a beating and a maimed hand to ensure his silence. Years later, his family is struggling. Crops are failing and there isn't a lot of food. Billy has a large and gentle older brother and two younger siblings, and he's kind of a bully. He convinces older brother Milton that the person who maimed Billy needs to be killed. Milton dreams about it, and wakes up to find that it happened. But was it really Milton who did it?

The story is not completed in this volume, but it is so dreary that I have no interest in finding out what happened. The art has a weird shaky line style and bland coloring (to match the surroundings). There is probably a good story that could be told with these characters in this setting, but this wasn't it.

I received a review copy of this graphic novel from Europe Comics and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Thank you for allowing me to review this graphic novel.

You don't really expect France to be a source of hillbilly horror, but this approaches that sub-genre. When the Great Depression and the dust bowl and everything else conspire to make one downtrodden family even more down and out, they sell up and try and ship off to a better world. The second eldest of the many children, an ugly teenager, certainly aims for a better world – without the aged bully and blackguard who maimed his hand in the prologue, and possibly without several other people who he thought did him wrong. Luckily enough, nasty things keep happening to these people – why, it's almost as if his older brother, the 'simple' Milton, is dreaming vengeance upon them… You'll either really like or hate the artwork, for it makes everyone ugly and nothing gets an attractive appearance whatsoever. But cinematic angle and a strong sense of design do improve the pages, and once you've worked out who's who and what's what and why, this is a good book to try on for size. I'd like to know how much more there is before I returned for the second part, but for now this remains a potentially very intriguing series – especially if the breakdown of 'Steinbeck meets Stephen King' appeals. Three and a half stars.

Milton’s Dreams incorporates both intense content and powerful characters, but the story didn’t appeal to me.

I hate to sound harsh or obtuse as the gritty material is appropriate to the desperation and deprivation of the Great Depression, but this piece turned my stomach and failed to inspire interest in future installments of the series.