Fables Encyclopedia
Hardcover | Kindle Edition
256 pages
Introduction by Bill Willingham, Mark Buckingham
Written by Jess Nevins
Cover by Adam Hughes
Vertigo Comics
Release Date: October 29, 2013
Cover Price: $39.99

The Fables Encyclopedia, by Jess Nevins, covers issues 1 – 121, and 1001 Nights of Snowfall. After only a few pages, it became clear to me that this is an indispensible tome, serving to compliment, and enhance the issues it covers. Hopefully, there’ll be a second volume in another decade or so.

It’s loaded with panels from the comics, helping to refresh memories for more obscure characters, and includes enriching sidebar comments from Bill Willingham “” check out his notes on the Hope character “” cryptically cool! Plus, there are also fourteen pages of issue by issue annotations, as well as lots of behind-the-scenes tidbits, and clever revelations, such as artist Mark Buckingham‘s inspiration for Tom Harrow.

The sheer depth of the Fables Encyclopedia serves as a demonstration/reminder (as if the monthly comic wasn’t enough) as to just how well-read Willingham is, especially with regards to fairy tales/mythology from a number of cultures. It’s also testament to the staggering achievement in comics literature that is Fables.

Well before the halfway mark, this encyclopedia made me want to go back and re-read my Fables trades.

So I did.

Highly recommended.