Review: Southern-Fried Horror Served Up On A Budget In ‘Harrow County Omnibus’ Vol. 1

‘The first half of the highly acclaimed, Eisner-nominated horror fantasy tale, collected in a value-priced omnibus.

Emmy always knew that the woods surrounding her home crawled with ghosts and monsters. But on the eve of her eighteenth birthday, she learns that she is connected to these creatures–and to the land itself–in a way she never imagined.’

Every place has a little piece of their history they’re not proud of. Something dark and twisted and evil that no one talks about. The residents of Harrow County all got together a couple decades ago for a good old fashioned witch hunt, resulting in the gruesome murder of Hester Beck. To be fair, Hester was a legit witch. She did some good work for the townsfolk, but she also blighted their livestock, lured their youth into dark arts, and stole their babies to feed her friends.

Flash forward 18 years. Emmy’s about to celebrate adulthood, and she may or may not be the second coming of the most powerful presence of pure evil the town has ever seen. Hester used her last breath to prophesize her own return, “whether to tend or murder.” Now Emmy must learn to control her unusually inherited powers to survive the very same townsfolk that brutally murdered Hester all those years prior.

Cullen Bunn deftly weaves occult themes, suspense, and horror into a classic Southern coming-of-age tale. Emmy is blissfully unaware of the town’s dark secret and her own origin, yet her dreams are haunted by shadows and screams of the past. Bunn has been doing a brisk trade in horror for years and Harrow County is arguably his finest work.

Art, color, and letters by Tyler Crook bring Bunn’s script to the page in a way that is uniquely horrifying, while somehow maintaining a wholesome small town feel. It’s an odd balance, but it works so well, it’s absurd. Even in the quiet moments, there’s a presence, some awful thing cooking in the peripheral, just out of sight.

This is the TPB softcover collection, not to be confused with the Library Edition HC that dropped back in 2018. Harrow County Omnibus Volume 1 is the entire first half of the series, chapters 1-16. The Library Editions are eight chapters apiece for the about the same cost per Volume. Stands to reason they’re going to drop a second Omnibus to complete the series for about sixty bucks total, versus about double that for the oversized hardcover Library Editions. 

I personally prefer the Library Editions for my book case, but this Omnibus is a great way to build your collection on a budget.

Harrow County Omnibus Volume One, collects chapters #1-#16, Dark Horse Books, 06 January 2021. Written by Cullen Bunn, art and lettering by Tyler Crook.