THOUGHT BUBBLE MONTH 2024! Mystery, body horror, and a strange group of sacred women? I’m in! The Second Safest Mountain is a graphic novella from PRISM-nominated comic artist and writer Otava Heikkilä. Published by Scottish independent publisher Quindrie Press earlier this year after a very successful Kickstarter campaign, glossy hardback editions will be available at November’s Thought Bubble convention.
“In our time, and in your times as well, the world was swallowed by an unfair darkness”. So begins our narrative, as the reader is plunged into the world of Aru, a young girl living in a colony of white women. Aru’s voice tells us that “holy women” were able to seek refuge and godly protection on the second safest mountain when the “darkness” happened. We don’t know much about these women, or why they were chosen, other than they seem to live in a commune; they bathe amongst each other without being ashamed, brush each other’s long hair, and apply lipstick in an extensive line. Each woman dresses similarly, in nun-style, modest garments, and seems to live a relatively peaceful life. That is until the appearance of their father destroys any sense of peace the reader may have had about this haven.
A stark red, headless male torso which evolves into a phallic shape the further down the body you look, flaps its colossal wings towards the women, with cries of “father!” desperately erupting from their mouths. As the women cling on to the phallic tail of this god, he erupts from the tip, showering their white dresses in what looks very much like blood. What the heck is going on?! From the offset, we see that Aru in particular is sick of worshipping this god, and the monotony of chores and mundanity atop the mountain, and begins to sneak outside, to get away from the suffocation of the commune. But who and what she encounters will change her forever. What are the repercussions of entering a world outside of your cage?
Heikkilä’s minimalist, visceral illustrations work incredibly well to illustrate the stark, haunting landscape, and the uncanny nature of the ‘darkness’ the women find themselves confined to. The darkness is never elaborated on or explained; it just is, and forever will be, which makes it all the more frightening. Illustrated in mostly pinks and blues, everything soft and human about the women is juxtaposed with the otherworldly, empty sky and the encroaching, flying ‘father’ that appears from thin air. The idea of this world is terrifying; a place where women are forced into traditional gender roles and required to worship a man so that he can gratify his needs, even hinting that those who don’t fit into the mould of being desirable are disposed of. It is bleak and horrifying, which makes Aru’s determination to escape all the braver.
Even without the accompanying lettering, Heikkilä is hugely skilled at showing Aru’s growing disillusionment with traditional femininity, simply from subtle changes in her expression; whereas before, she was non-plussed, now, with eyebrows slightly furrowed, readers can sense the rage boiling within. While before her hair was long and luscious, now it is shaved, and it is revealed that she has been binding her chest, as well as allowing her arm muscles to more prominently develop. Perhaps most revealing is her choice to allow her hands to be free, compared with the other women, who are bound in sleeves with no exit.
At its core, The Second Safest Mountain is a visceral experience reflecting on gender identity. While many of the women are happy to live a controlled, safe life, Aru is desperate to choose their own path, not to fit into a certain mould because a god deigns it to be so. The nuanced allegory about femininity and gender reveals how these things can be exploited when power is in the wrong hands, and why devotion should never come at the cost of personal freedom. This is a revolutionary piece from Otava Heikkilä, and a comic I will definitely be picking up in print at the Thought Bubble Convention.
Otava Heikkilä (W/A) • Quindrie Press, £20.00
Review by Lydia Turner
Quindrie Press will be at Table C11 in the Bubbleboy Hall at Thought Bubble.
Thought Bubble 2024 runs from November 11th-17th with the convention weekend taking place on the 16th-17th. More details on the Thought Bubble site here.
Read all our Thought Bubble 2024 coverage so far in one place here.
Art by Rocío Arreola Mendoza
