The premise sounded interesting, and the artwork was really good....

However, I couldn't really get into the story and found myself just mostly skimming through the pages.

Didn't work for me.

I loved this book, an exciting story, lots of drama, the broad skies and the natural beauty of Africa. What's not to love? And the designs of Chrys and Erik are perfect. The script by Kraehn is clearly brilliant. I recommend this book.

A hardened old war pilot recounts the story of how he became an aviator to a young officer. The story takes him back to a war in the Congo, where Joseph, the aviator, was growing up as the teen son of a doctor/pastor who made his rounds by flying to patients in a small plane.

I sadly had to DNF this. I just could not get into it for the life of me which is a shame because the premise interested me! The art was good though.

@Thanks NetGalley for giving me the access to read the first volume of this story. I really love reading these kinds of stories. The author created a new world with new characters like this one. I liked a lot of the story. Furthermore, I give 3 stars to this book.

Full Disclosure: I didn't read the graphic novel in which this character first appears, but now I want to read it. This is the story of Josef or Tanguy. His back story is at once heartbreakingly tragic and filled with adventure. War has reached Africa where Josef's family serves as a missionary and medical support in the tribal plains. Josef's mother is a saint for moving across the world, helping with the mission and raising her family. Josef learns from his father how to help people medically and how to fly his plane.
Josef's young life is marred by tragedy. A married woman takes a shine to the young, innocent boy. She steals his heart and his innocence. Their fates twist together and led to his running away from home. HIs father tries to rescue him. It gets even more tragic from there. A series of unfortunate events leads him to be the hardened pilot he is now.

This is volume one of what appears to be a three-part series. It is a story about a young man who becomes a pilot. Set in colonial Africa in 1917 during World War One, Josef is abyoung man who finds that his actions lead to tragedy for his family but these same actions shape the path of his life.

The focus of the story is how Josef becomes a pilot during the war when the allies were fighting the Germans in Africa. The story is interesting but also very brutal in places and it gives us a view of the discrimination embedded in colonialism, the exploitation of the local people, and the impact of the war on the colonies at the time. It also shows us how women were treated at that time.

It isn't that we don't know about these things, but illustrated stories can emphasise aspects of history in a way that brings the challenges of the time to life. It was an interesting story with good artwork and if you like historical adventure stories then this might be one for you.

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

A wonderfully illustrated story. It traces life of an aviator who is trapped in circumstances and war.
He flies an albatross plane which he has learnt to fly with his father. His life is full of adventures and tragic turns.
Story is engaging and artwork is realistic. I like the style of sunlight appearance of illustrations.
A wonderful comic about war and it's widespread reverberations.

I loved the art, the story was okay, but not too engaging.

This was a solid intro to something that can be a good story of WWI. I can't wait to see more of it. Hopefully, the story will develop more in the volumes to come.

The art was gorgeous, but the story wasn’t as engaging. It’s only the first book so I will be looking forward to see how the story can further develop.

Historical comic that did not engage, spinning off most awkwardly from a separate franchise. Not my thing, so I'll not be reviewing it elsewhere.

This graphic novel is set around World War I in Africa. Josef, the son of a harsh and demanding pastor/doctor, uses his plane flying skills to get even with an enemy and aid his uncle in the war. A great adventure with excellent artwork sets this above other books I have read. The sexual situations and violence make it suitable more for adults than for younger readers. Recommended.

Aviator is the latest graphic novel that spins out of the pages of Tramp, this time focusing on the character of 'Hard-Knock' Tanguy, a grizzled pilot who was taking part in the First Indiochina War. In this book we go back to his teenage years, to when he was growing up in East Africa during the First World War.

When Tanguy is asked about his past by a young navy commander, but seems to dodge the question, however, a few days later when the commander is getting ready to ship out he receives a package, a journal from Tanguy, filled with the answers to the that question, as well as photographs from his past.

The diary takes us back to 1917 East Africa, which would later become Tanzania, where Tanguy was then simply Josef Schafer, son of doctor and preacher Lothar Schafer. Over the course of the book we discover that Josef had grown up in a rather strict, religious home, yet was afforded some freedoms, such as learning how to fly his fathers plane. A great pilot from a young age, Josef fell in love with flying, and would accompany his father in his work just so that he could get the chance to fly.

One of these tasks was taking his father to the Becker farm, where he would meet Silke Beckert, the young wife of the much older Klaus. Silke is obviously taken with the young Josef, and openly flirts with the young man, trying to encourage him to stay and help fix their tractor, thanks to his knowledge of engines. Both Klaus and Lothar notice this situation brewing, and Joesf receives a stern talking to, whilst Silke receives a black eye. Despite this, the two of them still try to steal some time together, and when Josef is sent to the farm for a few days to fix the tractor the two of them are caught sleeping together.


Josef is whipped by his father, and locked away in a small room for days to think about what he's done; but when he learns that Silke is dead something inside of him snaps. He decides to steal his fathers plane and take revenge on Klaus, before setting out to go and find his uncle, who's a part of the army so that he can lend his flying expertise to the war effort.

This event is clearly a major turning point for the character, and it's really the moment when he matures into a man. Not because he's finally slept with a woman, but because he's chosen to break away from his father and pursue his own life. Sadly, things are rarely that simple, and this is just the beginning of a series of events that would lead to a number of deaths, and a change to Josef's relationship with his father than can't be undone.

Aviator proved to be more interesting than I was expecting, and I quickly came to like Josef as a character. He's a passionate young man, one who feels a strong sense of right and wrong, and believes it's his duty to stick by those principals, even if that means that he comes into conflict with his father; who he sees as being stubborn and behind the times.

The book also has a more interesting location for a story that involves World War One than a lot of stories have, focusing on the conflict in Africa, rather than the one in France and Europe that tends to be more common. Not only does this give readers a more of an interesting setting, but it really showcases the artwork by Erik Arnoux and Chrys Millen, who have managed to create so truly beautiful scenes, especially when you have the characters flying above the African countryside and can see so much wonderful beauty and detail in panels.

This is a book that's going to appeal to fans of Kraehn's other work, particularly those that like Tanguy's character in his appearance in Tramp. But I think that this is a book that anyone can pick up and read. It's got drama and action, it takes readers to a time and place that they might not be familiar with, and it tells an interesting story with engaging characters. I'm certainly looking forward to seeing what happens in later volumes, as Josef has a very interesting story.

Sorry to inform the eARC copy didn't have more than the cover and no contents.

Kindly look into the matter. I tried downloading the book multiple number of times giving me the same result.