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2011 Books 22-25
Apr. 20th, 2011 07:17 am22) The Ladies of Grace Adieu by Susanna Clark: a collection of short fairy stories that are ostensibly set in the world of Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, though only two of the stories contain direct links to those events or characters. The title story of the collection is, to my mind, the weakest of the works, but otherwise the collection is delightful. For those of you that couldn't get into her previous book due to reasons unrelated to her writing style I strongly recommend this as an entry into her work.
23) Alex Van Helsing: Vampire Rising by Jason Henderson: I picked this up in the library out of mild interest, pleased that at least someone was killing the bloodsucking fiends rather than sleeping with them. I actually brought it home because the flyleaf mentioned that the enemy was located at Scholomance, which means Henderson had taken the extraordinary step of reading Dracula prior to writing the novel. Unfortunately the book was uninspired. Not actively bad, mind you, but exactly what you'd expect from the pitch "the great-grandson of Van Helsing starts attending an isolated boarding school." He has a circle of socially misfit but conveniently skilled friends, an English teacher who is also part of a secret Vampire Hunting Organization and some antagonistic normal fellow students to make his school life miserable. The plot moves very quickly - the events of the novel comprise no more than a week - which makes me really appreciate how Rowling knew that she had time in the book to let the characters develop. I admit to laughing out loud upon seeing that Scholomance, the devil's dread academy of evil, was re-imagined as a college campus for vampires, complete with lush lawns for students to lounge on, a cafeteria and signs up on bulletin boards requesting non-smoking roommates. Alas, I'm not sure if that was intentional tongue in cheek humor or not....
24) Invincible volume 13: Growing Pains by Robert Kirkman and Ryan Ottley: Still good. Events are clearly moving to resolution at this point, so even though there's a decent way left to go any sense that the book was floundering has been put to rest. I was struck with how nice the creator-owned market is for telling longer stories, as Kirkman has kept the book going for 75 issues now, and the artist changes have kept the visual feel of the book intact. There's a lot to be said for that.
25) Marvel Visionaries - Daredevil Volumes 2-3 by Frank Miller and Klaus Janson: I managed to snag these this weekend, since my Miller DD collection was very spotty. These two cover all the issues where Miller was writing as well as drawing, and it's nice to have them all in one place. I remember these hitting like a bombshell in the early 80's, and rereading them nigh unto 30 years later they're still really, really good. While reading this I was reminded of the Thor Visionaries for Simonson's run and exactly how much information density comic books can pack in. There's a lot going on here.
23) Alex Van Helsing: Vampire Rising by Jason Henderson: I picked this up in the library out of mild interest, pleased that at least someone was killing the bloodsucking fiends rather than sleeping with them. I actually brought it home because the flyleaf mentioned that the enemy was located at Scholomance, which means Henderson had taken the extraordinary step of reading Dracula prior to writing the novel. Unfortunately the book was uninspired. Not actively bad, mind you, but exactly what you'd expect from the pitch "the great-grandson of Van Helsing starts attending an isolated boarding school." He has a circle of socially misfit but conveniently skilled friends, an English teacher who is also part of a secret Vampire Hunting Organization and some antagonistic normal fellow students to make his school life miserable. The plot moves very quickly - the events of the novel comprise no more than a week - which makes me really appreciate how Rowling knew that she had time in the book to let the characters develop. I admit to laughing out loud upon seeing that Scholomance, the devil's dread academy of evil, was re-imagined as a college campus for vampires, complete with lush lawns for students to lounge on, a cafeteria and signs up on bulletin boards requesting non-smoking roommates. Alas, I'm not sure if that was intentional tongue in cheek humor or not....
24) Invincible volume 13: Growing Pains by Robert Kirkman and Ryan Ottley: Still good. Events are clearly moving to resolution at this point, so even though there's a decent way left to go any sense that the book was floundering has been put to rest. I was struck with how nice the creator-owned market is for telling longer stories, as Kirkman has kept the book going for 75 issues now, and the artist changes have kept the visual feel of the book intact. There's a lot to be said for that.
25) Marvel Visionaries - Daredevil Volumes 2-3 by Frank Miller and Klaus Janson: I managed to snag these this weekend, since my Miller DD collection was very spotty. These two cover all the issues where Miller was writing as well as drawing, and it's nice to have them all in one place. I remember these hitting like a bombshell in the early 80's, and rereading them nigh unto 30 years later they're still really, really good. While reading this I was reminded of the Thor Visionaries for Simonson's run and exactly how much information density comic books can pack in. There's a lot going on here.
