Fishflies by Jeff Lemire

w a terrific guest chapter by Shawn Kuruneru that really exemplifies the benefit of having someone else come in and contribute their entirely different style to your already well-told story.

Three boys are walking to the convenience store one night during fishfly season, when the titular insects rise in swarms off of the nearby lakes and make a general nuisance of themselves in certain waterside towns of Canada. Paul, the most beleaguered of the three, is dared to cross the fishfly-infested parking lot in his bare feet for the reward of twenty bucks. Wanting the money, he takes off his shoes and walks into the minimart, where he’s struck dumb by a scene that could change his life… if it doesn’t end it for good.

Franny Fox is a lonely little girl whose mother left her and her asshole dad years ago. She has poor hygiene and the other kids at school pick on her. When she finds a strange man in her barn one afternoon, her greatest concern is making sure her dad doesn’t find him. The man is bleeding and clearly unwell, but Franny knows better than to judge a book by its cover. She’s determined to help him, whether he wants the assistance or not.

And so begins a strange but ultimately hopeful story of horror, redemption and the breaking of cycles, as a naive young kid, a well-meaning cop out of his depth, and a determined mother whom others have long labeled “crazy” work — not always together, but generally in the same direction — to break the curse that’s haunted the town of Belle River. It’s a weird but strikingly original coming of age tale which has a profound sympathy for so many of its damaged characters.

Jeff Lemire’s art here is unpretty but uniquely suited for a story of ordinary people up against the grotesque and unfathomable, with Mr Kuruneru’s work serving as a mythologizing counterpoint. The colors throughout are stark washes of muted ink except for the bold splash of color that characterizes, if you will, Franny’s red coat: a visually arresting choice that helps keep the focus on the young girl and her drive to make the world a better place.

And, y’know, I don’t want to make this sound like a simple morality play of good versus evil in the form of regular townsfolk vs monsters. It’s so much more nuanced than that, doing in around four hundred tightly drawn and edited pages what prose novels of greater length struggle to do. The origins of the curse aren’t simple and neither is its resolution, but the hope in a better way forward at the end had me weeping at the courage and basic decency of everyone involved.

Aside: it was a little weird to have Stela Cole’s Die Hard playing over and over again in my head while I read this, but I think if you’ve heard the song and seen the movie, then you’ll get why. Check out her latest album, I Die Where You Begin: it’s so good, I can’t shut up about it!

Fishflies by Jeff Lemire was published March 25 2025 by Image Comics and is available from all good booksellers, including