Writer: B Clay Moore
Artist: Steven Griffin
Collecting HAWAIIAN DICK #1-3
Price: $14.95
Publisher: Image Comics
ISBN: 1-58240-317-1

HAWAIIAN DICK is a fabulous story. Not just a fabulous comic, but a fabulous story, and that's part of what makes it so great. If it were a TV show you'd plan your social life around it; if it were a movie it'd be a licence to print money; and if it were a book you'd be sick of hearing about it by now. But it's to the benefit of everyone that this story is a comic, because in no other medium would we be able to enjoy the gorgeous work of artist Steven Griffin.

The art is the first thing you'll notice. The book begins with two wordless pages that quickly establish the scene. The art is neither experimental nor derivative, but offers a kind of quietly unassuming realism. It's the colours that will make you pull the book closer and examine the line work. Making Hawaii look beautiful doesn't sound like something that would take a great deal of effort, of course, but Griffin's washed pastel shades manage to capture the tropical paradise in a way that is breathtaking, realistic, and yet very consciously and subtly stylised so as to perfectly fit the story that's being told.

The story is set in 1953, but don't worry, this isn't some tiresome nostalgia trip. Byrd has moved to Hawaii after leaving the police force on the mainland, having killed his brother under circumstances that are unclear, but which continue to haunt his dreams. He looks up an old friend he served with in the Philippines, Mo Kalama, a frustrated detective who always wears a black suit and porkpie hat.

Byrd is hired to find a stolen car for a large sum of money - a car that ends up being connected to a kidnapping, a Japanese crime boss named Bishop Masaki, and the mythical Night Marchers, who watch over the Pali Highway. The story also involves a bartender named Kahami and her sister and aunt.

The back of the book makes it sound like another "investigators run up against supernatural elements" story, of the kind that comics were saturated with even before THE X-FILES became popular. The truth is that the story is much more subtle and interesting than that, and the story's supernatural elements never manage to overwhelm the characters or the other story elements.

Of the three leads, Mo is perhaps the least realised of the characters, coming across as the archetypal frustrated detective who argues with his superiors. While Mo has plenty to do in the story, it's Byrd and Kahami that get the character moments and have the best-established personalities. Even then, Byrd projects such a laidback attitude - walking around with a constant five o'clock shadow and loud Hawaiian print shirts - that we rarely get to see beneath that carefully cultivated exterior.

The story is not particularly groundbreaking, nor does it manage to turn noir on its head, but it is a very solid and engaging thriller that pulls the reader along with its strong pacing and draws him in with its exquisitely portrayed setting. It's only in terms of the occasional sketchiness of the characters that the story falls short. In every other aspect, it's a fabulous work, with a compelling plot that answers all the important questions, but takes it's time to get there. Perhaps the most extraordinary thing about HAWAIIAN DICK is that it's the first time out of the gate for Moore and Griffin, which suggests they're destined for great things.

HAWAIIAN DICK is a great beach read. Other people will be lounging in chairs flipping through James Patterson or Mary Higgins Clark, or whatever crap was released that month. But reclined in a lounge chair with Griffin's stylish cover propped up against your chest, you'll be having a lot more fun than the other people flipping through their cardboard characters and dull backdrops.

This collection is like a Criterion Collection DVD in trade paperback form. There's an introduction by San Francisco retailer James Sime, and an afterword by Oni editor Jamie S Rich. Moore throws in a prose story of how Byrd and Mo met during the war, plus there are character sketches with comments from Moore and Griffin, a drinks menu that's also an illustrated story, and a gallery of sketches by other artists. The highlights of the extras are a series of seven online comic strips used to promote the series, which serve as the perfect complement to the main story and perfectly set the tone. I've come to enjoy each one of them more every time I read them.

HAWAIIAN DICK is one of the best comics debuts in years; Moore and Griffin are two talented guys, and I can only hope that this is the first of many books they'll produce, both working together and separately. And hopefully they have a lot more stories to tell about Byrd, Mo and Kahami.

Alex Dueben is a Los Angeles-based freelance writer.

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