Cutely drawn but serious? Sounds like 'Bone'. Nope, it's a semi-historical graphic novel about the explorers, traders and colonists of North America in the early days. It's battle, blood-shed, families and friends torn apart in the New World.
Northwest Passage is not a rude term, it's a reference to the once-elusive stretch of water over North America to connect the Atlantic and Pacific. Before they discovered Cape Horn, or even thought of creating the Panama Canal. The graphic novel doesn't deal with it much, except as a point of dreaming reference.
This is quite good, and yes I was surprised. The art had led me to expect a much more shallow plot, and a complete lack of characterisation. Instead, it's sophisticated (29 pages of annotation at the end give a much fuller idea of how complex a beast the book really is), harsh, and the art belies its intensity, constantly entertaining us and smoothing a ride that could have been drier if the art hadn't been so appealing.
I don't want to give away too much of the plot, except to say it involves opposing factions of colonising explorers, some hungry for power, land and money, others wanting to carve a nation and peace and a name for themselves. It always remains very human though, despite these big ideas. Each character is fully felt, and plays a part. There are few pointless panels, and everything serves a fast paced plot, with characters always adding a solid tension alongside the good violence.
This has the feel of a European comic book - clever, beautiful, sensitive and fun. I hope that's not seen as an insult, I wouldn't care where this came from, it's a pleasure to read even if it comes from those colonists we once sent to the New World but who got big ideas of their own!