Walt Disney's Donald Duck "The Black Pearls of Tabu Yama": The Complete Carl Barks Disney Library Vol. 19

Maybe it's just me getting older and my tastes have changed. Maybe now owning nearly 12,000 comics and graphic novels that I realize that I don't have to own every comic book ever made. Or maybe it's just because I really love Scrooge McDuck and his nephew Donald. All I know is when it comes to a book that just warms my soul, I'd much rather read the complete works of the legendary Carl Barks than just about anything new that comes out on comic book shop shelves.

In this delightful volume, readers start off on a Pacific island adventure set during Christmas time with Scrooge Donald and Huey Dewey and Louie looking for the famed black pearls of Tabu Yama. The heartwarming ending is extremely predictable and yet this has immediately become one of my all-time favorite holiday reads to star the Ducks of Disney.

Lucky duck cousin Gladstone appears in at least 3 stories in this book. First, he'll race Donald around the world in a rocket ship for a pair of dueling scientists. For the last 2 stories, Uncle Scrooge is added to the mix as both Gladstone and Donald attempt to convince the wealthy businessduck to buy their prospective investment properties. Then the trio compete against each other in a series of competitive burro events for the rights to a lucrative uranium mine  For a character absolutely despised by Barks, he sure uses Gladstone Gander an awful lot.

Readers are also introduced to a new rival of Donald Duck in the form of the literal swine, P.L. McBrine. First, McBrine unleashes a pickle shortage in Duckburg by releasing a parasite that feasts on cucumbers. Donald and his nephews head overseas to bring back a wasp that is known to feast on those invasive bugs. However, McBrine is on their trail in hopes of keeping the Ducks from succeeding so he can make a killing by selling pickled rutabagas!

McBrine returns, now using the name McSwine as a customer scheming to take milkman Donald's job by making false complaints to the manager of the Duckburg dairy. Yet in an unexpected twist, Donald kinda snaps and exacts revenge on McBrine by issuing him his just desserts. As satisfying as it is to see Donald get the best of one of his foes with relish, it's no wonder that Disney and Dell passed on this story and was shelved for nearly 2 decades before being published in the Netherlands circa 1974.

Almost 2 dozen tales of various lengths abound in this nearly 200 page collection, along with covers and commentary from noted Disney comic historians on each adventure. 

Such a delight. I don't care if these reproductions show biases and stereotypes. Well, I care, socially. It just doesn't bother me to see how far we've come from those days of yore. It's how we learn from the mistakes of history and with that, I can't wait to get my hands on more books in this oddly published series of Barks' complete Disney Duck works. 

Worth Consuming!

Rating: 9 out of 10 stars.