Strange and dark and lovely. I'm not going to get into all of the world-building details because it goes so deep, but I'll leave it at this: Maika Halfwolf has a score to settle. We don't know the details of the score, but we buy her intensity from the first page. 
 The artwork is phenomenal. The cover's a good example of it, actually. It all looks like that--luminous and distressed. The people are great and the cats are frickin' adorable. Cats play a huge role in this. And some have multiple tails, which is kinda fun? Most of the characters are women. There are a few men, but they mostly play ancillary roles. 
 I'm overemphasizing how enjoyable this is. It's really not. Liu's story is twisted and violent for reasons that aren't entirely clear yet, which is frustrating. I was talking to my husband, who'd read it days before I did, and I expressed my frustration with not knowing where things were going. He dryly responded, "They all turn into children. Then they're murdered." (Full disclosure, the comic does have a weird preoccupation with child murder.) 
 Monstress is a fascinating look at the things we do out of fear and hope. I'll stick along for the ride.