Midnight Sun

by Ben Towle

This small graphic novel was the last purchase I made at TCAF this year, and I'm very glad I picked it up.  Midnight Sun is the fictionalized account of the rescue of the crew of the airship Italia.  In 1928, an Italian known as General Nobile (despite not being in the armed forces) captained an attempt to reach the North Pole by airship.  They achieved their goal, but crashed shortly afterward.

In Towle's telling, which differs from the historical reality in a number of ways (strangely, the real story is more complex and bizarre than ever could have been fit into a book like this), a group of survivors set up a camp on an ice flow, and attempt to reach possible rescuers through the use of their radio.  After a while, a small group decides to walk south to land before the ice breaks up.

The story of these two groups is told alongside the story of HR, a New York reporter sent by his boss to cover the rescue operations.  HR is aboard a Russian icebreaker attempting to reach the men, and he doesn't have much to do.  He eventually makes friends with a Russian female journalist whose fiance was on the Italia.

Towle has a good eye for building character and suspense, and tells this story very well.  I especially liked the Swedish Air Force pilot who, in attempting to rescue some of the men on the ice, himself becomes stranded with them.  Towle's artwork reminds me a great deal of Scott Chantler's - had I not known better, I would have sworn he drew this book.