Sloth

"Sloth" is a graphic novel by acclaimed comics writer and artist Gilbert Hernandez, most famous for working on the legendary series 'love and Rockets." "Sloth" is a slightly less ambitious story, dealing with changing perspectives, teen friendships, and the meaning of love.

the story starts out with the hero, a teenager named Miguel Serra, waking up after a year-long coma he apparently willed himself into. He has trouble moving quickly, for whatever reason, and so acquires the nickname "Sloth." Sloth is coincidentally the name of his garage band with his girlfriend Lita and best friend Romeo. Together they go to the local lemon grove one night to see about the stories that a mysterious goatman haunts it. And then the story changes completely, with characters being assigned new roles and new relationships being developed.

"Sloth" is a very odd story. It takes its time, and parts of it are very dream-like. It's very character-focused, which is interesting, as the roles of all of the characters change halfway through. There's a lot of unexplained stuff that happens in the story. If you're willing to tolerate all of that, it's really quite good. the art is also good, very clear while also allowing cartooniness to sneak in at appropriate moments. I especially like how who wears a specific beanie cap changes as who tells the story changes. All in all, a solid piece of work.

Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader?

"Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader?" is a two-issue Batman storyiline written by Neil Gaiman and drawn by Andy Kubert. It was written to be, essentially, the last Batman story, no matter how many Batman stories come after it. This is because WHTTCC is about Batman's funeral.

Batman himself incorporeally watches as his friends and enemies eulogize him with their stories of his life and his death. The thing is, no one's story of Batman is exactly alike, and the incorporeal Batman remarks in confusion that none of their stories matches his own life. But each Batman has a few things in common, even though their realities are drastically different: each one is brave, and self-sacrificing (it's remarkable how many of the stories end with Batman sacrificing homself to save someone else), and each one never gives up, ever. It's a wondrous tribute to Batman (there are references to things from throughout Batman's career peppered through the story), and I loved it. I can only imagine what Batman fanatics would think of it (new Bible, perhaps?).

After WHTTCC, there are preliminary sketches from Kubert and some other short Batman stories that Gaiman did earlier in his career. Unfortunately, although the stories are mostly good, they really suffer from the bad art and coloring standard to the late 80s and early 90s comics. My favorites were a very meta black and white story where Batman and the Joker sit around small-talking as they wait to go on the comics page (however, this had the worst art of all of the stories) and a neat little story where a recruiter for the Suicide Squad visits Poison Ivy in jail to possibly recruit her, and finds her a much trickier opponent than he was expecting. the first was funny, and I did kind of like the self-aware comic book characters (the art is even excusable as a parody of stereotypical Dark Age art), while the second really delves deeply into what drives Poison Ivy, and how she's possibly one of Batman's most deadly foes (even though the big Bat only appears in a few flashbacks).

But these are all merely extras. Why you should really look into this book is the main event: a brilliant and touching tribute to one of the most iconic superheroes ever, written by a master storyteller and drawn by a great artist.

Gifts

"Gifts" is a young adult novel by famed sci-fi and fantasy author Ursula K. LeGuin. It's the first in a loose trilogy of books called "The Annals of the Western Shore,' and if the next two are as good as this one was, I look forward to reading them.
"Gifts" takes place in the Uplands, a northern country divided into the holdings of various families. Each family has its own unique gift, everything from the ability to call fire to reading minds to causing crops to wither. The most powerful practitioner of the family is called the brantor and is considered the head of the family. The gift of the family of main character Orrec is known as "the undoing", and it consists of the ability to destroy anything the user can see and point at. Unfortunately, Orrec cannot seem to control his gift, which doesn't work when he wants it to and seems to become imcredibly destructive when he uses it involuntarily. So Orrec binds his eyes so he cannot hurt anyone.
There isn't much of a plot to "Gifts," but that's alright as it allows it to focus more on its characters: Orrec, who is disturbed and uncomfortable with his family's gift; Orrec's father Canoc, a deeply flawed but very sympathetic man; Orrec's mother Melle, a Lowlander unaccustomed to uplander ways; Gry, Orrec's childhood friend who is uncomfortable with how her gift to commune with animals is usually used to help with hunting; Ogge Drum, a dangerous brantor looking to expand his family's territory; and Emmon, a rascal from the Lowlands who inspires Orrec and Gry to look beyond their limited lives. All of these characters are complicated and three dimoensional, and all of them fit very well in the world LeGuin creates for her characters. Sometimes they work at cross purposes to one another, and their behavior always seems to fit their character and the situation at hand. Especially of interest are how Orrec's wild gift means wildly different things for him, his father. and his mother; and the subtle (but rather sweet) love story that happens over the course of the book between Orrec and Gry.

The Uplands is a wonderful location. In an early chapter we are told about the various families, their brantors and their gifts, and it all seems credible: the society described sounds very much like one that would have to exist under the circumstances. I also liked how LeGuin pulls very few punches with how hard it is living there: this is a distinctly low-tech place, with the economy based on sheep- and cow-herding, members of families with powers living little better than the serfs who serve under them, and approximately three people in the entirety of the place who can actually read. Too often in traditional fantasy, people seem to be living 20th or 21st century lives with a thin coat of medieval flavor on the outside, but not here.

The lack of a plot is the only real problem. Except for the struggle between Canoc and Ogge and Orrec's own insecurity regarding his gift, most of the rest of it is giving us backstory rather than plot. As I said, this works out nicely (we get to see Orrec grow up from a baby to a teenager in the book), but at the end of it I wasn't quite sure what the point had all been.

But LeGuin is a wonderful writer, and I highly recommend this book. Check it out if you can.

The Book of Flying

This book was a wonder to read. It's a picaresque fairy tale, as the hero goes on his quest and has many adventures. it's also a celebration for the power of storytelling and the written word, where some of the most beautiful language is reserved for describing the joy of reading.

the novel concerns a young librarian named Pico in a city by the sea. In this city, there are people with wings, and people without, and the two never mix. So when Pico, who has no wings, falls in love with a winged woman named Sisi, he is forbidden from pursuing his love. He therefore decides to set out for a legendary town called Paunpuam, where there is a book called the "The Book of Flying" that grants people wings if they read it.

All of the following chapters details Pico's adventures as he encounters many strange characters, learns their stories, writes poetry, and learns many things about life. Much of the book is taken up with the people Pico meets telling their stories, and many of them are just as fascinating as Pico's tale. It was something like getting many stories for the price of one.

Pico himself is a good character. He's likable for his unflappability and for his determination. I really wanted for him to suceed.

Aside from one part of the story where Pico encounters a cannibal, which was somewhat gut-turning, it was all a wondrous experience. Now what I want from the author, Keith Miller, is to write another book saying what happened to some of the characters Pico meets in his travels. We are told near the end that some of them have gone on to their own adventures, but they aren't detailed. I wanted more stories told in this same fairy-tale-like style.

All in all, a great book.

The Essential Bordertown

"The Essential Bordertown" is the fourth in a series of anthologies all set in the same shared world, where elves and the Realm from which they come becomes acessible to humanity. All of the stories take place in the city of Bordertown, in between the World and the Realm. Here technology works half of the time and magic the other half of the time and the city is populated by both elves and humans, who are mostly exiles, runaways, outcasts, halfbreeds, and others who don't fit in.

"The Essential Bordertown" takes the form of a guidebook for new arrivals with advice on how to live in the Soho district of Bordertown, a poor neighborhood full of the young and the energetic, the waifs and strays who make Bordertown what it is. It alternates between essays on a variety of subjects (cooking, jobs, nightlife, etiquette) and stories that complement them. The guidebook sections, written by the editor, Terri Windling, are easily the best part--funny, snarky, informative, and it cnjures up a whole world of fascinating places and people. It's a brilliant example of of worldbuilding.

The stories written to take place in the world created by the guidebook sections, however, are a very mixed bag. Some, like "Dragon Child," "Socks," and "Changeling," are very good, well-written, and live up to the potential of the setting, while others, like "Oak Hill," "When the Bow Breaks," and "Arcadia" are just confusing and don't quite work. "Hot Water" has an interesting concept (an epidemic of talking teapots) but it seems half-baked. "May This Be Your Last Sorrow" is a sad little well-written vignette, but it's also very short. "Argentine" and "Cover Up My Tracks With Rain" are both good, and I want to see more of the characters in them. "How Shannaro Tolkinson Lost and Found His Heart" had a few nice moments, but other parts didn't work, and some things (such as the two elvin families involved being named after fantasy authors) just seemed cheesy.

All in all, there were some good stories, some not-so-good, and quite a few in between. I'm glad I read it, and I might even read some more Bordertown books, but the stories were greatly outshone by the background materials. I want to explore Bordertosn some more, but this book doesn't wuite live up to its potential.

The True Meaning of Smekday

"The True Meaning of Smekday" by Adam Rex is an interesting and inventive book. It' a fun read, and I finished it in about a day. It has a very quirky sense of humor, but also manages to be dark and sometimes even scary.

The book takes the form of a series of essays that the main character, a young girl with the improbable name of Gratuity Tucchi, writes about the title subject, the meaning of the day when Earth was invaded by an alien race called the Boov, who renamed the planet Smekland and sent all the humans in America to Florida. Gratuity, along with her cat, Pig, encounters a rogue Boov mechanic on the run named J. Lo who fixes her car so it can fly. The rest of the book is the trio's many wild and crazy adventures. The plot is very unpredictable, as where the Americans must go changes just as Gratuity reaches Florida, and the invasion by the Boov is overshadowed by a subsequent invasion by a different and much more intimidating alien species. While few plot points seem contrived, the story manages to go in directions one wouldn't necessarily expect.

And it's also a very funny book. Gratuity is a very witty narrator, and is quite snarky and impatient with the BS that's thrown her way. J. Lo is a bit of a Cloudcouckoolander, and his difficulty at grasping Earthling culture is another source of comedy, but Rex doesn't use it to make J. Lo a butt of jokes, but to emphasize the alienness of his character. rex also illustrates the book, both with Gratuity's photographs of everything, which manage to both look realistic and like caricatures, and J. Lo's explanatory comics, which are easily the funniest parts of the book. Other characters, like Gratuity's not-very-smart mom, the Chief (an old Navajo man with a very fake UFO in his junkyard), and the crazy UFOlogists the main characters encounter when they pass through Roswell, add just something more that makes this such a fun book.

All in all, I really quite liked this book. It's funny, clever, and unpredictable. Read it for a good time.

Wide Awake

This was a fantastic book. It has wonderfully complex characters, an intriguing story, and a uplifting--dare I say inspirational--tone. It's a very short book, and a very fast read, as you find yourself constantly being pulled forward to find out what happens next.

Taking place several decades in the future, the US has just elected its first gay and Jewish president, a man named Abe Stein. America, having suffered through an economic collapse known as the Greater Depression and a disastrous series of wars, is seeming to be pulling out thanks to a progressive movement that has swept Stein into office. But Stein also won by a very slim margin: only a few thousand votes in Kansas finally tipped the scale in his favor.

The main character, Duncan, a high school student who like Stein is gay and Jewish, is elated that the candidate he supported has won. But things take a darker turn when the governor of Kansas declares a recount because he doesn't believe Stein won his state. Since the governor of Kansas is a dutiful member of the party that lost the presidential election, this is viewed as a political stunt by pretty much every character in the book. The uncertainty over the election is mirrored in problems in Duncan's own relationship with his boyfriend, Jimmy, and the revelation that one of his friends has been cheating on her girlfriend. When Stein calls on his supporters to come to Kansas to stop the governor from throwing the election, everything comes to a head.

As I said before, this is a fantastic book. Duncan, Jimmy, and all of their friends are all very interesting characters, and they are definitely complex ones: for instance, Duncan is a true believer in Stein but is also somewhat timid when it comes to confrontation, which causes problems with his relationship with the more confrontational Jimmy. Stein's speeches, which litter the book, are all inspirational, so much so that I kinda wish I could vote for him as president. I also liked the background details that David Levithan, the author, includes in his story, like how the progressive movement that has elected Stein was greatly supported by a progressive evangelical Christian movement known as the Jesus revolution based around Jesus's actions as a man.

However, there are a few problems with it. After a while, the dramas of Duncan and his friends are kind of pushed aside for the greater drama concerning Stein and Kansas. This kind of makes sense in context (they're all so swept up in their protest against Kansas throwing the election that they forget their petty dramas), but some of the smaller dramas, like Duncan feeling insecure about his relationship with Jimmy, feel unfinished. I also wished that there were more and less extreme characters representing the other side: those who did not support Stein seem to be made up entirely of the kind of people who think Barack Obama was born in Kenya and who think that healthcare reform will result in "death panels." Duncan mentions talking to more moderate opponents of Stein when he was canvassing, but they never actually appear in the story itself. This makes the whole political divide in the story seem a bit more than a bit one-sided.

Speaking of Obama, this book also feels a little dated now that a black semi-progressive Democrat has been elected president. Levithan was clearly expecting the US to go further into the toilet after Bush's term, and Obama's pointing us in a different direction doesn't seem now like it would lead to the future depicted in this book. A small quibble, but one I bring up nonetheless.

However, all in all I really liked this book and I found it a fantastic read, one I can truly call inspirational. I hope that one day our world can be like the one envisioned by the characters in the book, as a Great Community brought together in tolerance and equality.