General Zhao Ming of the Song Dynasty escapes the overwhelming Mongolian invasion forces with his family, against all the odds.

Living quietly under different identities in a small village, Song and his family do their best to survive despite the increasingly oppressive rule of the Mongolian rulers.

As Zhao’s sons grow towards adulthood, can he continue to keep their survival a secret? Can the honour he’s instilled in his family allow them to ignore injustice, even when it’s blatantly, senselessly and brutally applied in the open for all to see?

All it takes for evil to triumph is for good people to do nothing, to paraphrase a famous quote – but by the same token, intervention will have serious consequences for Zhao and his family.

I found Zhao Volume 1 to be an absolutely phenomenal read; kicking off with the depiction of the final stages of the invasion and the desperate Zhao fleeing with his family, there’s barely a pause for breath in the pages of the first chapter.

We get a great sense of who Zhao is and why he’s so feared by the opposition; the exposition of character through action, as well as the dialogue between our protagonist and his family, is very well handled by creator Kang Jing.

Not only does Kang Jing write the entire saga, but he wears several other hats too; doing a phenomenal job with the dynamic, detailed art – full of action sequences that have a remarkable clarity of storytelling, not to mention a great distilling of the wuxia style onto the page – and even the lettering.

Alan Bay’s colours also do a fantastic job of imparting not just the realistic parts of the historical story, but helping the more fantastical elements leap off the page in bursts of kaleidoscopic colour too.

Following the conclusion of this excellent first volume’s story, there’s a wealth of bonus supplemental material too, including a historical recounting of The Battle of Yamen by Api Ngo, concept art, script-to-page art examples and more.

So in summary, despite a page count not far off 200, the first volume of wuxia saga Zhao has a lightning pace, and reaches its end at a point that’ll have you desperate for the next part of the story.

It’s a fantastic graphic novel and I’m genuinely impressed by the level of detail, craft and the clear passion that’s been poured into its creation.

You can buy Zhao Volume 1 direct from Chiral Comics, as a hardcover here or digitally here.

Many thanks to Chiral Comics for providing me with a digital copy of Zhao Volume 1 for review purposes.

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