Graphic Novels Extravanganza

After today’s post and Sunday Salon, I’ll only be one review behind. :D That’s a good feeling! But today I have ten graphic books to talk about. But, I’m awful at trying to review graphic books, so this will be probably be a pretty short post.

I think I’ll talk about the standalones first. Gray Horses by Hope Larson was another book I got to during Dewey’s read-a-thon. I loved this one-the artwork was kind of dreamy and wonderful-it had a sketchbook feel to it and had lots of purple and grey and white. It’s about a girl adjusting as an exchange student, and it’s partly in French. I think Larson captured culture shock perfectly, and the main character was lovely. I think I read this in about ten minutes, so it’s a very quick read. But one you could reread several times and always find something new! I highly recommend this, and I’ll definitely be reading more of Larson.

Skim by Mariko and Jillian Tamaki was completely different from what I expected, but I really enjoyed it. It’s about a young Canadian Japanese Catholic schoolgirl, who’s a bit goth, a bit into witchcraft, and just trying to survive in the craziness that is high school. The plot meanders here and there, but I really enjoyed it. It’s a classic coming-of-age story but with a counter culture main girl. Another one I’d highly recommend.

I loved the nonfiction book Understanding Comics by Scott McCloud. In fact, if there’s one book I’d recommend to those skeptical of the graphic format, this would be it. It’s a look at the history of comics, the philosophy of comics, etc. that couldn’t be done in any other format. I loved how integral the drawings were. I loved how intelligent McCloud was, and how intelligent he made me feel. I loved that he called the Bayeux tapestry a comic strip (although I had encountered that in Alice in Sunderland too, another of my fave graphic books). I highly, highly recommend this to everyone. Seriously people: read it.

I didn’t enjoy La Perdida by Jessica Abel that much, but I think the fault is mine. You see, I’m a bit of a priss. I don’t do drugs, and while I don’t think drug-users are bad people at all (I went to a small liberal arts college. I was one of only two people I know of who graduated without trying them at least once, lol), and I’m actually pretty pro the legalisation of marijuana and all that, I think people who start dating drug dealers and going to parties with sketchy drug lords are just stupid. The narrator of La Perdida decides to move to Mexico City for no real reason, and once there she leads an aimless kind of existence. She gets really caught up in trying to have ‘authentic’ friends, etc. and while at first I was like ‘this is cool-this is what living abroad feels like,’ eventually the narrator made so many dumb decisions and was so ridiculously oblivious to what was going on around her that I stopped caring. And she’s self-righteous and whiny and made me want to slap her on a regular basis. I strongly considered abandoning the book every time I picked it up, but I told myself it might get better. Meh. Not really. But I know a lot of people are fans of Abel (and the drawing itself was nice), so if you’re more forgiving of really stupid main characters who bring disaster upon themselves, you’ll probably enjoy this one-the story itself is well paced. I just never really connected.

Now on to the series. I read Bill Willingham’s Fables Vol. 3-5 during Dewey’s read-a-thon. Officially, they’re known as Storybook Love, March of the Wooden Soldiers, and Mean Seasons. If you’ll recall, I really enjoyed the first volume of Fables, but the second was too bloody for me. Fortunately, these three were all pretty fun. I can’t be specific without giving away spoilers for earlier seasons, but Mean Seasons was my favourite because one of the storylines is all cute and domestic-y. That being said, I still don’t really like the art in the series. But the plot and characters are so awesome, I can’t wait to read more. :)

Finally, I reread the second two volumes of Neil Gaiman’s Sandman: Dream Country and Doll’s House. I had heard that the art was redone for the Absolute Sandman edition, so I got volume one from the library. It turned out to be repackaging of the original Sandman 1-3, so even though I’d read those, I decided to reread 2 and 3 (I loathed volume one so much, I never intend to even flip through it again). I didn’t notice any difference in the art for the actual stories, which disappoints me, since I don’t like the original stuff at all. It was nice to reread the stories though, since I had forgotten most of The Doll’s House and I actually loved a couple of short stories in Dream Country the first time round. It’s difficult for me to speak coherently about this series, since others have said it gets much better later, and that’s great. But I strongly dislike the art-the colours, the ridiculous bodies the women have, and the way that their clothes are always half ripped off. But then volume three gets good, and I’m hoping everyone’s right and I’ll start enjoying the later books more. I’ve put the second volume of Absolute Sandman on hold at the library, so we’ll find out. ;) (I know this isn’t super-positive, but I think the Sandman series has won so many awards and accolades it doesn’t need me, lol.) Also, I think I should warn you that one of the stories in Dream Country has a very disturbing rape scene in it. The rapist is portrayed as the horrible person that he is, but it’s still nauseating to see/read.

Do you have art preferences when you’re reading graphic books? How strongly do they affect your enjoyment of the story?