Good morning! How’s everyone doing? This week has been relatively quiet, book-wise — just comics for me!
TPBs
And some single issues…
Yep, a very Marvel week. What’s everyone else been picking up?
Stacking the Shelves
Tag: comics
Review – Persepolis
The Complete Persepolis, Marjane Satrapi
I’ve been meaning to read this one for ages; I first picked it up around when I got Fun Home (Alison Bechdel) and Maus (Art Spiegelman), but it takes time to get round to reading an autobiographical graphic novel, for me. It’s a different kind of reading, and for some reason it always takes way more of my attention than ordinary comics or ordinary non-fiction.
I think the first half, depicting Satrapi’s childhood, is actually the best part. The way the art compliments her childhood naivety, the particular view you get of the conflict coming from someone who was a child during it, all of this comes across really well. The latter half of the book is more about growing up in Iran, and less about just being in Iran, to me, and so it was less interesting, because a lot of the issues are shared between cultures. Although, for some people, that might be a revelatory thing to realise, so I’m not criticising the fact that Satrapi wrote about it — it just wasn’t as interesting for me.
I wanted to know more about Marjane’s mother, where she came from, how she formed her beliefs. Her father too, actually. Both of them sounded pretty wonderful, from Satrapi’s point of view, and that’s perhaps unexpected for the Western reader. I wish we’d got to know them a bit more through this, rather than as rather all-knowing, all-tolerating parental figures on a pedestal.
Rating: 4/5
Stacking the Shelves
It’s been a bit of a spree week for me again, I’m afraid. I’m going to blame the heady feeling of getting paid for freelance work several times this week!
Bought
So excited to fiiiiinally have my hands on The Fifth Season. The Rights of the Reader was pretty interesting; I’ve been meaning to read it for a while. The Scott Lynch books were just because I didn’t have a physical copy of any of them, though I am intending a reread! The Lackey book is for a challenge to read a book published in the year I was born… The Kitty Norville books came as a bundle from The Works, always worth checking there for good deals like that.
Comics
Rat Queens… well, I wasn’t sure about the first volume, but I have been encouraged to try the second, so. I’ll try. The Wicked + The Divine was gorgeous in the first volume, so is probably just as stunning. And this issue of Ms Marvel is the one we’ve been waiting for, really: the team-up between Captain and Ms Marvel.
Library
A somewhat random grab bag of library stuff, really. I blame The Stainless Steel Rat on Ryan from SpecFic Junkie, of course, and Soul Music on Cardiff’s SF/F bookclub — I figured I’d read it even though I won’t make it to the meeting.
What’s everyone else been getting their hands on? Anything particularly exciting?
Stacking the Shelves
Sooo, it’s been a nice week for books for me. I did buy a few more that aren’t here just to have physical copies, but I’ve featured them here before.
Bookshop haul
Dark Run basically sounds like Firefly. Colour me hopeful. The Godless, I, uh, had to review. Long ago. The Child Eater just caught my attention.
My copy of Half a War is actually signed, too! It’s not as special to me when I don’t actually meet the author/get a personal inscription, but it’s still kind of cool. And hurrah, I can take Half the World back to the library for whatever poor person wanted it after me… Speaking of!
Library
I don’t think I ever owned these Harry Potter books, though I might’ve had Order of the Phoenix. So, raided the community library for them. Order of the Phoenix, though, the size of the thing! Did Rowling’s editor quit? Heh. I haven’t got the third of Freda Warrington’s books — The Dark Blood of Poppies — so I’m really hoping the library gets it in before I go away… Other than that, a round up of stuff I’ve been recommended.
Comics
Just one comic this week; most of the comics on my pull list seem to be on hiatus or something? Probably a good thing, I’m spending enough money… Thinking I’ll pick up Bitch Planet soon, though.
What’s everyone else been getting? C’mon, show off your hauls.
Review – Sex Criminals: Two Worlds, One Cop
Sex Criminals: Two Worlds, One Cop, Matt Fraction, Chip Zdarsky
No, really, what the hell am I reading?
I like that this discusses depression. I like that Suzie and Jon aren’t automatically super happy forever just because they can both stop time with their orgasms. I like that Jon goes to therapy, and the first therapist doesn’t do him much good, and that the one who does begin to help (and it is only beginning) is idiosyncratically suited to him. That’s the way it works. (I’m not as keen on the exhortation to get out there and exercise ’cause that’ll fix it. It’s true for some people. It’s not always true, and it’s not always possible.) I like the portrayal of Jon’s depression where he goes all grey and there’s a bad Jon-voice telling him everything’s terrible, and the meds level him out and take the edge off everything. That, too, rings true.
It’s also cool that the porn star from the first book is fleshed out a bit, and has a whole backstory of her own and a relevance to the plot. Also cool that female sexual health is a key thing, and that it acknowledges that not all women like the same stuff, just as they don’t think or act the same way. Whether they’re porn stars or not.
The plot, though? The timeline is all over the place, Jon is kinda creepy sometimes, and I just do not care about all this sex. And it’s difficult to root for people who’re using secret powers to rob banks, however noble the cause — or at least, it’s difficult to find someone trying to stop them totally evil.
I think there’s two strikes against me and this comic here: one, I don’t have that kind of sense of humour. We’re pretty sure I have one, but you need a microscope. This is not the kind of humour that works for me, nor the kind of weird that I find interesting. And two, I’m ace, and I just do not understand the appeal of all this sex. I don’t know if that’s playing into my lack of shits about this series, but probably.
Rating: 2/5
Top Ten Tuesday
This week’s Top Ten Tuesday celebrates diversity! So I’m gonna pick out some of my favourite diverse characters of all kinds.
- Yeine, The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms. She’s a minority (or at least lower-class) character in her own world and she’s from a matriarchy.
- Bran Davies, The Dark is Rising. An albino and a Welshman, how could I ignore him?
- Dave Brandstetter, Fadeout (and others). A gay detective — sorry, insurance claims investigator — in 1970s California.
- Alana Quick, Ascension. She’s a badass female mechanic (sky surgeon). And she’s got a chronic illness, and she’s queer. Wooo.
- Billy Kaplan (Wiccan), Young Avengers. Gay, Jewish, total geek. What’s not to love about this wiseass?
- Roshanna Chatterji (Tremor), The Movement. Asexual character!
- Peter Carmichael, Farthing. A gay detective in a Nazi society.
- Reese Holloway, Adaptation. A bisexual teenage girl, who also happens to have alien DNA!
- Savedra Sevaros, The Bone Palace. A trans* character, who is portrayed in a loving sexual and romantic relationship.
- Priya Darshini, Karen Memory. And Karen herself, of course. Lesbian heroes of a steampunk world!
Looking forward to seeing other people’s posts this week!
Review – ODY-C
ODY-C, Matt Fraction, Christian Ward
Wha… what did I just read? I’d vaguely heard of ODY-C before I picked it up for my partner in Chapters, and I thought it sounded pretty cool: genderflipped space-faring retelling of The Odyssey, done by Matt Fraction who is at least consistently entertaining, even if his humour isn’t always my thing and I’d rather worship at his wife’s altar, comic-wise.
The description on the front pretty much nails it: “A trippy, gender-flipped version of Homer’s Odyssey hurtling through space on psychedelic, science fiction wings.” Thanks, Wired. You said it so I don’t have to. And I guess there are people who love that kind of thing, but I don’t. The correspondences to The Odyssey weren’t actually close enough, for me; there’s this whole new backstory that changes everything. The backstory is cool, but… there’s so much going on here, I kind of wanted the familiarity of the original story to keep me with it.
The art is not a style I love, though it definitely fits the psychedelic nature of the comic, and some of it is pretty striking. Not a comic I’m going to keep up with, though — it’s just so completely not my thing in execution.
Rating: 1/5
Review – Rat Queens: Sass and Sorcery
Rat Queens: Sass and Sorcery, Kurtis J. Wiebe, Roc Upchurch
I might have to revise this review after some thought, because I’m not sure what to make of Rat Queens. It’s cheerfully NSFW, LGBTQ+, full of unapologetically kickass female characters of various types who are living it up and having a great time. The problem for me is with the drugs, sex and wholesale violence aspect; I’m not that interested by those as motivators for characters, and the total lack of background for the Rat Queens leaves me pretty cold. All we see for most of the book is the drugs, sex and violence. I want to know why they’re friends, how they know each other, where they’ve come from and where they’re going. There’s not much of that here, beyond a few hints.
On the upside, the art is gorgeous, and I do enjoy some of the banter, the camaraderie between the Queens, and the unapologetic nature of all of it. I just want more meat in terms of characterisation. I’m going to try the second volume and see if that helps.
Rating: 3/5
Review – Ms Marvel: Crushed
Ms Marvel: Crushed, G. Willow Wilson, Mark Waid, Takeshi Miyazawa, Elmo Bondoc, Humberto Ramos
Ms Marvel continues to be fun and cute, though I have to say this volume felt pretty fragmented. First there’s the Loki stuff, then a brief dodge back to the Inhumans plot, and then to an unrelated incident in Kamala’s school. Kamala’s geekiness and enthusiasm is still awesome, and the glimpses into her interactions with her family, but with the first bit dealing with Agent of Asgard stuff and the last dealing with SHIELD stuff (Coulson! <3)… I felt that the Inhumans plot was the only thing of substance, and it was over so fast.
I like most of the art in this volume, but the Loki section definitely isn’t my favourite style. And despite not being that fond of Wolverine/X-Men in general, I kind of miss that weird mentor relationship he had with Kamala in book two — there’s no sign of him!
It feels weird to me the way comic and movie-verse are collapsing together. This seems to fit in with what I know of Agents of SHIELD canon; does that mean it fits into the MCU too? Does that mean young!Loki is going to be a thing? Sometimes I long for the simplicity of a book series you can just read in order.
Rating: 3/5
Review – Sex Criminals: One Weird Trick
Sex Criminals: One Weird Trick, Matt Fraction, Chip Zdarsky
And now for something completely different to Nimona! Obviously, Sex Criminals is a pretty adult comic, though it’s not actually an “adult comic” in the sense of being porn. It just has a lot of sex-related humour and, of course, a completely bizarre sex-related premise: what if your orgasms could stop time?
It’s very ridiculous, with some fun art and quirky narration. It gets a bit confusing timeline-wise between what’s happening when and in what sequence, how people know other stuff. It’s also strangely cute, the relationship between Suzie and Jon: “this guy. This fucking guy.” And the holding hands, the immediate obsession, the way they talk about what happened to them and the coming-of-age aspects of it… Yeah, surprisingly cute.
It basically is one big bizarre idea carried to extremes, and I probably wouldn’t have picked it up myself — I just borrowed it after my partner grabbed it. It is funny, and weird, and perhaps worth a try if you don’t mind a lot of sex-based humour and some grossness.
Rating: 3/5