Some Graphic Novel Reviews

WINTER IS upon us, so what better time to stock up on graphic novels as we try to keep warm in front of the fire ... Here are a few interesting ones with a slight romantic edge.

True Story Swear to God Chances are...
By Tom Beland (AIR/Planet Lar)

Here we have an honest retelling of love refusing to accept barriers, conventions and goddamn rationality. It's about a chance trip to Disneyland by the author and how he and a Puerto Rican girl discover themselves soul mates. Simple as that, to use a phrase my own better half tells me I've been over using of late.

But sometimes simplicity wins out.

Beland's cartooning is adept enough to convey the visual emotions he needs in his art and his self-depreciating nature is kept in check by an enthusiastic conversational need to narrate that keeps this book two-steps shy from wading in too-cute a pile of sugary-sweet gooey-smulch.

This is a feel-good book, and one to pass on to the opposite sex, to show our supposedly sensitive side!

Jax Epoch and the Quick Forbidden: Borrowed Magic
By Dave Roman & John Green (AIT/Planet Lar)

This comes across like the Kim Possible cartoon series but with a fantasy edge. It also reminds me of early 80s US b/w independents, ready to take risks and have fun with the medium at the same time.

Jax is a teenage kleptomaniac with a heart-of-gold who finds herself in a Wizard of Oz meets Conspiracy Theory scenario. It's light-hearted and fun.

It's yet another book from AIR/Planet LAR I recommend. Females, kids and even grumpy old guys could dig this!

The Summer of Love
By Debbie Drechsler (Drawn & Quarterly)

A book that uses green and brown spot colour throughout so that it looks like it was dropped in a pool of murky mud is an odd choice at best. If its colours are intended to subliminally draw the reader deeper into the woodlands where some of the most important acts of the story take place I can see the point, but it doesn't work for me. You've then got Drechsler's art style to consider. It resembles Julie Doucet (who Drawn & Quarterly used to publish) but going a more traditional storytelling route.

For those of you left that I haven't put off checking out The Summer of Love when you look at the actual comic book pages and get into the flow of it all this is in fact a sprightly and quite compelling read.

A family moves to a new town and the two eldest daughters begin their individual exploration of adolescence, each in their own way disturbed by the confusing signals we each send out in regards to sexual attraction. This too can be seen in the metaphor of the woodlands with worldly phrases like "Be careful you don't get lost" and "Can't see the wood for the trees" coming to mind, alongside the more primal mythological symbolism of woodlands as being fertile like women.

Ho, hum, ultimately none of that really matters. The lasting impression is that it is a moving piece of work. Whether this is more from the hindsight of my own adulthood I can't say and, I wonder, if there is a target audience for this book, who that might actually be? Predominantly females? Younger girls? Regardless, I'm content to go against any such demographics as a reader.

The Blue Notebook
By Andre Juillard (NBM Comics Lit)

Two guys when passing by on a train spot a girl in her apartment getting out of a shower. Independently they both find out who she is and date her.

Yes, this is a European album, and some come to that with preconceptions. I agree that its initial impression is that it's all a bit sad because of the voyeuristic qualities but, frankly, it does this in an understated manner and there is an effectively ambiguous twist near the end.

The Blue Notebook is totally mainstream in its appeal, rarely pampering to any pornographic whims despite nudity. While Juillard's art does not attain the standards of a Milo Manara it is good, and he obviously enjoys the female form other than for just its sexual aspects, and is able to use this to service the stories needs. His positioning of a subtle shift to the leg between panels to demonstrate movement is highly effective and lingers in this reader's mind.

Even at 62 pages this doesn't take long to read. Importantly it was a satisfying read, but I can't give anymore of the plot away than I have. You will have to read it for yourself. Mature readers should do so.

Tiny Giants
By Nate Powell (Soft Skull Press)

An interesting collection, but possibly less so for its various vignettes about growing up and more for how a collection, by a presumably small publisher and a basically unknown creator, arrives in a British public library.

Powell's art resemble early Sam Kieth (who supplies an introduction) with the odd splattering of Bill Sienkiewicz but ultimately the stories, while aiming for meaningful angst, never quite fulfil their potential for me.

Pop Gun War
By Farel Dalrymple (Dark Horse Comics)

My first impressions were that the creator has similar influences to Nate Powell, He may have, but he's more focussed in his delivery of story and art.

Pop Gun War comes on like a tale of adult surrealism, but really it's just a feel-good collection of fairy stories set in a dirty American city. It's not exactly my cup of tea (I prefer coffee) but I can see its appeal to others.

Illegal Alien
By James Robinson & Phil Elliott (Dark Horse)

Feast your eyes on a short paperback sized b/w travelogue of the paranoid 50s becoming the swinging 60s with old Ealing movie sets and mob connections moving in and out of the picture as backdrops.

An alien has landed on Earth and he's hiding in a dead gangster's body. He changes the lives of those who knew and previously despised this character, not least a nephew.

It's a coming of age book, simply told, with blanks there for the reader to fill in (possibly a little bit due to the inexperience of Robinson at the time as much as the style of the book? And if so we should all regain such innocence). There are some awkward angles that Elliott doesn't always get right in his art, and it's not his best work but he delivers the story effectively enough.

Much as I deride the idea that any half-decent comic book ought to get mutilated into a Hollywood movie, I wouldn't mind seeing Illegal Alien as a short British TV serial or even adapted into a theatrical production as we've got the character actors over here who could pull it off.