Rapid-fire round-up

Isn't the internet great? Just when I've got a couple of new posts up and running, Blogger.com decides it will remove all the recent posts as a crucial part in some pressing "maintenance". When they finally reinstate said pieces of writing, all comments, as well as any half-drafted new entries have vanished into the cyber-ether, or wherever it is that still-born pieces of writing go to quietly die.

That'll teach me not to back up my work.

Oh well, on with the reviews. I've still got 16 or so books to write up until I get to what I'm reading currently. At this rate, I'm not going to be able to remember enough about them to do them any justice, so here's my rapid-fire round-up of a few of them:

Fables Volume 4: The Mean Seasons, Bill Willingham and various artists


Ah, Fables. I haven't read nearly enough of this warm-hearted fairytale series. This is quintessential Vertigo comics, with well-known character in not so familiar settings. (Come to think of it, there's a certain thematic resonance with Angela Carter here). The central conceit behind Fables is endearingly simple - (which roughly translates as: wish I'd thought of it first!)... All the fairytale characters and magical creatures have been driven from their Homelands by an unknown Adversary, hell-bent on enslaving all those Red Riding Hoods and happy families of bears. Luckily, they managed to open a portal and escape into our world, the world of the Mundanes, and now live happily in central Manhattan. I've read a couple of books of Fables and it never disappoints. At times it's a thriller, at times a love story but Bill Willingham always writes a witty and engaging story.

In this volume, the Fables community are recovering from the aftermath of an attack and Snow White's baby is finally born.

Psttt: You can read issue 1 online here

Love and Rockets: Ghost of Hoppers, by Jaime Hernandez (2005)

Maggie's back in this recent Love and Rockets compilation. My first foray into the world created by the Hernandez brothers, this graphic album looks like a French Bande Dessinée collection in its similar presentation as an annual. The black and white artwork is beautiful, but Maggie's world has been around for 20 or so years now, which means this wasn't the best book to start with. Don't get me wrong: Superman, Batman et all have been around for 70 years or so, and I can still read those. Ghost of Hoppers is a story based heavily on nostalgia for the lead character's past; Maggie mourns for her fiery youth and reflects on how she's grown up. Unfortunately a lot of this was lost on me since I haven't read any earlier volumes of this long-running series.

I originally found this in the library as part of a Q Week display and planned to do a special post about LGBT characters in graphic fiction. As you can see, that didn't quite happen but is definitely a post for another time. See also: Stuck Rubber Baby, which I'll be reading and reviewing very soon. (As an aside though, American mainstream comics are still limited in their portrayal of gay/bisexual characters - this isn't a slur on representation of sexuality in comics though, Mexican/Jewish/Hispanic/Asian characters are heavily under-represented too. But isn't it interesting that mainstream comics contain a handful of lesbian characters, whereas virtually no gay males? Who'd have thought it, eh? What with the typical portrayal of women in superhero comics, that the audience would find lesbian characters more palatable. To be fair, I should mention that there was a bit of a furore when Kate Kane was first published as a lesbian superhero...)

JSA: Black Adam and Isis, Geoff Johns

This is the last volume of Geoff Johns's run on the JSA title. Once again, not the best place to dive in at: in the wake of a big storyline the Justice Society reassembles and welcomes some new members. Meanwhile, Black Adam (last seen instigating World War 3 in the pages of the year-long epic 52) attacks the Marvel family and resurrects his goddess girlfriend, Isis. I didn't expect to enjoy this book as much as I did, but it helps that I'd already read a bit of JSA and was vaguely familiar with some of the characters (there are LOTS). As such this is really not one I'd recommend to newcomers to the title or comics in general because there's so much back-story to absorb. You really need to have some knowledge of the DC Universe and its roster of characters to get something out of this one. If the last couple of sentences made your eyes glaze over, this isn't you.

Having said that, the covers are fantastic. Alex Ross does a great job throughout the series - just check out the above image of Black Adam, looking more evil and smug than Piers Morgan and Donald Trump combined. Now that's a villain!

The Road to El Dororo

It's hard to get within a mile of any manga without hearing the name Osamu Tezuka. Nicknamed "The godfather of manga" he's revered by comics fans across the globe and wrote and drew a staggering 150,000-plus pages of comics art. In the world of Eastern comics he's referred to with the same breathlessness that critics reserve for Will Eisner in the West, and lauded for reinvigorating and popularising the form of sequential art. He's best known over here for creating Astroboy - which recently lurched onto cinema screens to very little applause, (but as we all know, it's wrong to judge a book by its Hollywood adaptation). The other well-known work by him is his 8-volume retelling of the life of the Buddha. He died in 1989 and this is my first run-in with his work:

Dororo, Volume 3, Osamu Tezuka


The edition I found in the library is published by Vertical Inc., America and is a lovely little book which deserves special commendation for resisting an Americanized cover in favour of a more traditional style. And if that makes no sense to you at all, then check out the cover below:





There's no way that's a US graphic novel, everything about it screams manga. Although this is my first Tezuka read, Dororo is not my first encounter with manga. Whilst I would never claim myself to be an expert (or otaku if we're going to be pedantic about it), I've read a bit of the Blade of the Immortal samurai series and lapped up Junji Ito's surreal horror masterpieces. So I'm already used to reading right-to-left, which can be something of a stumbling block for first time readers. This is no reason to avoid manga though, since it takes no time at all to get used to.


Dororo is the story of two friends: the childish Dororo who seeks his father's buried treasure, and the wandering samurai Hyakkimaru. I'm a little hazy with the backstory (I jumped in at Volume 3, the last book) but Hyakkimaru has had parts of his body stolen by 48 demons. He must find and defeat them individually in order to regain his human body.


The book is divided into episodes rather than traditional chapters or issues. Along the way the two characters face off against bandits, rogue samurai and even a possessed horse. Dororo is a madcap adventure with a heart. Young Dororo may be childlike and naive, but he constantly fights against the injustices of sengoku-era Japan: rice taxes, dictatorship and the general trampling of the poor underfoot by the rich and powerful.


What struck me the most about Dororo was the incredible energy and expression in Tezuka's drawings. The cartoonish style of the illustrations fits the story perfectly. It's a very fast-paced story, but at times it can feel a bit inconsequential. The characters remain unchanged by their experiences and can seem a little wooden. The plot runs the risk of degenerating into a comfortable cycle: the two characters meet a demon, slay the demon, move on and repeat. The ending in particular feels slightly rushed. I don't want to ruin it for you, but there's no real conclusion and the story just fizzles out (although the anime based on the books has a definite ending, according to Wikipedia).

I don't want to discredit Dororo at all but, despite Tezuka's clear mastery of the form and playful sense of humour, it was a little disappointing. Although as I've already stated, I only read Volume 3 and this probably accounts for a lot of the problems I had with the book.

In other news, I'm doing well with my current reading and can't wait to get up-to-date with my reviews/reading diary. I've finished 3 books in the last week (albeit 2 very short ones - but they were proper ones, without pictures and everything!) as well as the usual haul of comics. Today I've turned the final page on Angela Carter's The Bloody Chamber. Whilst I can't wait to do a full write-up on it, I can only urge you all to go out and read it now: truly brilliant if a little bewildering!

The Night Book-Mobile

So it’s now May and my last update to this blog is dated... February. Oops. And my intentions were so good!

I’d like to try and get this blog going again – I’ve been reading lots since I’ve last written and I’ve got some new ideas about my own reading patterns to get down. I think I’ve stopped writing here because I’ve been afraid of doing justice to the books I’ve read. I have to keep reminding myself that I’m writing for my own pleasure, not submitting reviews to The Times Literary Supplement. So stay tuned for reviews of H. P. Lovecraft and China Miéville (my new favourite author). First up though, I have a few pages of notes from graphic novels I read back in February that

I’m going to type up. So let’s start with...

The Night Book-Mobile, by Audrey Niffenegger

The Night Book-Mobile is a graphic novel, originally serialised in The Guardian, from the author of The Time Traveller’s Wife. Nothing about it is conventional – from the oversized format (it sticks out on the shelves like a child’s picture book, with a short, wide shape rather than the traditional comic book size) to the lovingly painted interior art and spidery handwritten lettering. At the risk of sounding trite, it’s clearly a very personal book for the author. As if that wasn’t enough, a quote on the cover calls the book “a treasure”. And it’s from Neil Gaiman. That’s right folks: this book comes with the Gaiman seal of approval.

Short enough to read in one sitting, The Night Book-Mobile is a fable of a constant reader and her love of books. As it’s so short, I’m reluctant to give too much away about the plot, but it starts when the main character finds her own personal book-mobile, a mobile library that contains every book she’s ever read. Ultimately, it’s a bittersweet and thought-provoking meditation on why we spend our time reading when we could be out living our lives. Why choose to live vicariously, through the imaginations of others, often long-dead authors.

These are questions that many readers will have thought about at one time or another – and perhaps even have had to justify themselves in the face of such accusations - what's the point in reading? it's all make-believe anyway, isn't it just unnecessary escapism? (I know this reader has spent a lot of time puzzling out the kind of concerns that this author has).

The Night Book-Mobile is well worth reading and re-reading: ask your library to order it in! This story will stay with you long after you’ve turned the last page.

...and as an update, you can read the whole thing online. It's all available on the Guardian website here. So now you can no excuse not to experience this little treasure. [A Google search also brings up many other reviews, each more informative and exciting to read than this - damn you, Google!]