I would have been eight or nine, as I also remember reading a magazine article the same day about a horror film called A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984, released in the United Kingdom on July 12, 1985). I think I found it at a church hall jumble sale. This was my memory of a story in a comic that I read as a child and have never, ever forgotten. How would you like to wake up every day … like this? And it worked! But as she got more lovely, she also became mean and vain, and one day she did something wrong with the instructions, and when she woke up the next day and looked in her mirror, her beautiful face was shattered and warped. She was given a magic mirror and told it would make her beautiful if she followed its instructions correctly. Once upon a time there was a girl who was not very pretty. It surveys existing work on childhood and Gothic and offers a working definition of Gothic for Girls, a subgenre which challenges and instructs readers in a number of ways. Richly illustrated with previously unpublished photos, scripts, and letters, this book uses Misty as a lens to explore the use of Gothic themes and symbols in girls’ comics and other media. Largely based on Round’s own archival research, the study also draws on interviews with many of the key creators involved in this comic, including Pat Mills, Wilf Prigmore, and its art editorial team Jack Cunningham and Ted Andrews, who have never previously spoken about their work. In the first book on this topic, Round closely analyzes Misty’s content, including its creation and production, its cultural and historical context, key influences, and the comic itself. To this day, Misty remains notable for its daring and sophisticated stories, strong female characters, innovative page layouts, and big visuals. It was a hugely successful anthology comic containing one-shot and serialized stories of supernatural horror and fantasy aimed at girls and young women and featuring work by writers and artists who dominated British comics such as Pat Mills, Malcolm Shaw, and John Armstrong, as well as celebrated European artists. Misty ran for 101 issues as a stand-alone publication between 19 and then four more years as part of Tammy. Bridging this scholarly gap, Julia Round presents a comprehensive cultural history and detailed discussion of the comic, preserving both the inception and development of this important publication as well as its stories.

Yet its unique history has drawn little critical attention. Today fans still remember and love the British girls’ comic Misty for its bold visuals and narrative complexities.

Winner of the 2019 Broken Frontier Award for Best Book on Comics

Misty and ephemeral meaning