More books

9-11 The World's Finest Comic Book Writers and Artists Tell Stories to Remember (volume two), in addition to having a very long title, has a mixed bag of stuff. I need to get my hands on volume one and look at it as well. There's a mix of very serious stuff, slightly less serious bits, some politically charged stuff and some interesting (in retrospect) misplace optimism. I'm not sure if this is something to adopt, but if there were some way to bring it into the class it might be worth doing. Certainly it'd be interesting to contrast this with Spiegelman's In the Shadow of No Towers, which is (on the whole) much more conflicted and explicitly political.

100 Bullets First Shot, Last Call is a compilation of 5 issues (two story arcs) and one short story by Brian Azzarello and Eduardo Risso. The premise is that a mysterious "Agent Grant" turns up to give people who are victims of unpunished crimes the info on the guilty party an untraceable gun with 100 bullets. In a very dark way this explores the morality of vengeance and justice. The art does interesting things with shading and a few interesting page designs. The dialogue is sharp, as many critics have pointed out, and the opening story is very "gangsta." But it's fairly bleak, and very graphic. Probably on a list of additional things to look at.

Megan Kelso's The Squirrel Mother is a collection of short stories. The stories don't tend to have traditional strong story arcs and work more like poetry in just showing interesting juxtapositions. Three pieces on Hamilton are more like essays or historical reports than anything. The art is compelling, generally simple but with a few interesting surprises. There are some sudden and startling "adult" moments that will throw some students, especially given how they seem to come out of nowhere, like the sudden panel in which her report on Hamilton and Madison turns into slash fiction. But there's rich and deceptively complex stuff here. Worth serious consideration.

Isaac the Pirate, part 1

Isaac the Pirate 1. To Exotic Lands by Christophe Blain

This is a beautiful book. The subtle colors are especially impressive, and the page where the sailors encounter aurora australis is amazing, both beautiful to look at and very carefully (and effectively) designed. It's an interesting mix of styles especially in the faces: some are very cartoony, but a few give a more realistic impression.

The more accurate title would be Isaac the Jewish Painter who Joins Some Sailors Who Turn Out To Be Pirates Turned Explorers. I suppose that gets to be a bit of a mouthful. But there isn't much piracy and limited fighting. But there's a lot of interesting stuff about how lives go and what people think and how the act and how they justify their actions.

What there isn't is completeness. This is a multi-volume work, and I don't think this volume can be studied alone except as a source of examples of certain things, but I should keep my eyes open for it in case I can get it cheap, and I need to see how long the whole series is--if it's just two books, it could go on the list of options for individual projects.

another batch

Lady Snow Blood: The Deep-Seated Grudge Pt. 1 is very manga, and that's about all I can say for it. It would be a good example of many things manga / Japanese, but there's not much to it other than "violent naked chick--cool!" It's by Kazuo Koike and Kazuo Kamimura.

Dark Water by Koji Suzuki and Meimu is a collection of water-themed horror stories. Again, it makes a good example of manga and the Japanese approach, but I'm not sure it's rich enough in a thematic sense, and I get confused about what's the source of what. The cover claims it is "The book that inspired the major motion picture," but inside it seems to be being based on something else--the original Japanese film? Probably not, although it could show up on a list of options for solo projects or something.

Johnny Jihad by Ryan Inzana is an interesting and very timely piece that's worth further consideration. Very interesting black and white work throughout, and there's a lot of current political stuff to talk about. I was personally disappointed in it. I expected a story of a fanatic, but really the title character seems to accept Islam and radical Islam only on a very superficial level. It's really more about someone being the pawn of powerful forces. That's probably how the author sees a lot of these people, but I think it passes up something powerful in the source material. I think doing it in first person tied his hands. But all of that would be worth discussing.

I laughed a few times at Street Angel Volume One: The Princess of Poverty, and I can see some interesting things in the style. There's not much depth here though. It's outlandish, and you can read it as a parody of mindless adventure stories. It has some things going for it, but it's not that special.

Black Tide: Awakening of the Key by Debbie Bishop and Mike S. Miller has absolutely nothing going for it. It is so far from special that I need a new word for it that combines "mundane" "run-of-the-mill" and "boring" with a hint of "sad." This is a fifteen-year-old's power fantasy story done with big-budget art. It's trying so hard to be cool that it's unbelievable. The lead character isn't just a secret agent, he's a secret agent who's actually an immortal Atlantean with forgotten super powers! And there are flying cars! And his mom is totally hot and shows off her cleavage all the time! Only she's a bitch! None of the characters are consistent, nothing in it is believable, and it certainly doesn't have anything very important to say.

Tom Beland's True Story Swear to God is much more compelling. Done in a simple but effective style, it tells the (apparently autobiographical) story of how a cartoonist met a woman from San Juan by chance (or fate) and they began to fall in love. This is a strong comic in many ways. It's very "analyzable" in a McCloudian sense, as Beland uses many of the techniques McCloud discusses in Understanding Comics. And the story is compelling as the lead character struggles with whether to plunge ahead or be more cautious. It's straightforward enough that I could also use it in some other class, like English 0090. Some readers may be offput by its open-ended nature: the love affair isn't brought to a close either way, and we're left hanging. But this is definitely on a short list for future use. It's published by Ait/Planet Lar, a company I've never heard of, so I need to learn more about them.

Let's get started

This blog is a place for me to plan for my new course Graphic Narratives: Comics as Literature which will be offered beginning in Fall 2007 at Century College. I'm through all the formal curriculum process, so now I just need to put the actual details of the course together: what texts to use, what assignments, the calendar, all of that.

So primarily here, at least at first, I'll be recording mini-reviews/comments on comics I read or reread so I can start sorting out the good, the bad, the ugly, the necessary, whatever. And along the way I'll probably get into other stuff: comics theory, pedagogy and course design, etc.

Today I have three books I found at the St. Paul Public Library, which I believe had characterized them all as "young adult." (That children / young adult / adult division in comics is definitely worth exploring in class.)

First up is Emily the Strange "Boring Issue" by Rob Reger, Brian Brooks, Jessica Gruner, and Buzz Parker (Dark Horse). This is a visually interesting put somewhat flat collection of stories that are more gags or vignettes than anything about anti-hero Emily as she celebrates/ complains about boredom and seeks red, grotesque, nightmarish imagery. Some of the page layout is interesting, especially with plots that don't have much drive, but on the whole it feels like rebellion without direction. I think the point is to shock people with championing darkness, like when she climbs to heaven to complain to God about the clouds only showing "nice" images. Not sure there's enough depth here to explore.

Much more promising is The Lost Colony: Book #1 The Snodgrass Conspiracy by Grady Klein. The colors and drawings of this book are very appealing, although at times the transitions are non-conventional enough to slow my reading or leave me confused. While the basic plot is clear enough, its meanings are much more cryptic. The setting is an island that some people don't want discovered, although there is a ferry that runs between it and somewhere else. And some people are trying to get involved in literal slave trade of blacks on the island. And then there's an Asian alchemist/inventor figure who seems at different times to be a good guy and a bad guy. It seems, both from the book jacket and my initial reading, like there's something here about America, but it's not immediately clear what that is. Is this about the historical slave trade, or does that stand in for something else, like the way the typical black person's limited economic opportunity is both the product of and a reflection of the slave trade? Is this supposed to be read in some allegorical or symbolic way? But discussion of this could be very lively, and it's certainly worth another look.

Spiral-Bound (Top Secret Summer) by Aaron Renier is more what I would consider to be children's lit. The black and white drawings tell the story of an anthopomorphic animal city with some secrets and danger in its past--that get nicely revealed and resolved by an intrepid kid reporter and a talented but shy sculptor kid. Pretty far-fetched in many ways, and it to does some unusual transitions that left me puzzled at times, but I'd love to see what someone with an interest in children's lit would do with this book.