Review by Frank Plowright

The Crooked Man has just installed a giant gold statue of himself outside his castle, yet is astonished his numbers are falling. At the same time his toadies are going around picking up all black sheep. Bo Peep is cast as a resistance journalist, while Mary is scared, alone and fearing for her lamb. Other characters familiar from nursery rhymes are cast in appropriate satirical roles, such as the old woman who lives in a shoe being a refugee.

Little Bo Perp and Mary on the Lam is Marian Henley’s fractured fairy tale about the current state of the USA, and there’s no mistaking the anger that prompted the project. However, it’s both strength and weakness. It enables the almost visceral linework and righteous wrath, yet also seemingly blinds Henley to the strained nature of much of the book. Having come up with the idea of using the nursery rhyme cast some opportunities arise, sheep being fleeced for one, but other items are strained in fitting the pattern. They’re combined with jokes that are just too obvious, mainly concerning the vainglorious and self-obsessed Crooked Man, his infinite ego, and those feeding it, along with messages hammered home without subtlety.

It’s also a plot artificially extended by use of full page illustrations, pages of expressions, quixotic moments and repeated scenes such as Mary losing her little lamb. Many will agree with the points being made, but a lack of editing and focus results in a project feeling rushed as a response to presidential iniquities.