Overview: MrBallen Presents: Strange, Dark & Mysterious: The Graphic Stories by the author known as MrBallen, is a vivid, frighteningly illustrated graphic novel collection of nine strange, dark, and mysterious stories, based on true events, from the mind behind the YouTube channel and hit MrBallen Podcast.

Verdict: John Allen, known popularly as “MrBallen,” has been enthralling audiences with his unique brand of storytelling ever since he burst onto the scene, covering strange and mysterious phenomena ranging from the unexplained screaming heard in parts of Nahanni Valley, the Kandahar Giant found in Afghanistan, UFOs appearing at a cattle ranch in Utah, and Allen’s own brush with the paranormal.

Deeply researched and seriously compelling, the show rapidly gained a devoted fanbase for the raconteur himself and for the rarely-before-covered unsettling occurrences and true crimes that have taken place throughout the world.

In MrBallen Presents: Strange, Dark & Mysterious, Allen reveals the creepy underbelly of the human experience, charting bizarre and downright terrifying instances of the paranormal, the horrors of the natural world, and the danger of our own minds. With new, exclusive stories and in collaboration with New York Times bestselling graphic novelist Robert Venditti and acclaimed comic book artist Andrea Mutti, this is a haunting collection filled with twists and surprises that will leave you thoroughly spooked.

Personally, when a graphic novel and/or comic book is sent to us for review, I myself never know what to expect it to look, to feel like before its arrival. Most times it is just as one assumes, a paper comic book, or a threadbare hardcover, but this one from Ten Speed Graphic via Penguin Random House is an absolute killer production of a publication!

My goodness, it weighs a ton, is a solidly made hard cover all round, and features nearly 200 lovingly-crafted, impassioned pages of informative storytelling prose.

And although latent in color (the colorists happier when creating in sepia tones, along with a softly-hued pallet of water color-styled imagery, save for moments of blood and scenes where a blaze of red is required to alert the eyes), nothing can distract the reader away from what is, quite simply put, one the of very best of its genre today.

Oh, and who can resist that new book smell when first opening it!

It features nine (9) chapters, along with some culminating Further Reading, Acknowledgments and such, whose story titles are as follows: The Valley of Headless Men, Thorns, What I Saw In My Room Still Haunts Me, La Mussara, Bells Canyon, The Beast of Gévaudan, Make It Rain, The Kandahar Giant, and finally, Cat and Mouse.

Having read this enthralling graphic novel three times through now, my own personal favorite is The Beast of Gévaudan, where between 1764 and 1767 a mysterious creature called the Beast ravaged the rural region of Gévaudan, France. About 100 men, women and children reportedly fell victim to La Bête du Gévaudan. While many French at the time presumed the Beast to be a wolf and many modern scholars agree, some have suggested that the Beast may not have been a wolf at all.

The other one would be the true story (to MrBallen) of What I Saw In My Room Still Haunts Me, which brings forth his encounter with the ghostly specter of his friend’s deceased father. Whilst up at his friend Nick’s family cabin in the woods in New Hampshire, snow all around, aged just 16, MrBallen awoke one restless night to see a high-hipped shadow figure walk into his bedroom, come to the side of his bed, only to eventually move, bend and then sink down and through Nick’s bed alongside him!

Thrilling tales like these and more are contained here in MrBallen Presents: Strange, Dark & Mysterious, a book that I can highly recommend to any and all avid readers of both comic books and graphic novels, for the way this book has been so expertly put together, along with the tales themselves, it just doesn’t get any better, trust me!

About the Author - Better known as MrBallen, John B. Allen is a former U. S. Navy Seal, the founder of the multi-platform content company Ballen Studios, and the creator and host of the popular podcast MrBallen Podcast: Strange, Dark & Mysterious Stories.

Allen uses his platform to give back and founded the MrBallen Foundation with the mission to honor victims and support families of heinous crimes through education, training, and financial support. Allen resides in Austin, Texas, with his wife and three children.

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