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Read in February 2015 (Catch Up Post!)

Posted on March 16, 2016 by Lorraine Posted in Read This Month .

Avengers/X-Men: Bloodties – Bob Harras, Andy Kubert et. al. Meh. I mean, honestly, why do people like the Scarlet Witch? I don’t get it at all.
Uncanny X-Men, Volume 4: vs S.H.I.E.L.D. – Brian Michael Bendis & Chris Bachalo. Solid, but not particularly memorable. Can we take a minute to talk about Magik’s costume though? Why so insanely slutty?
The Wake – Scott Snyder & Sean Gordon Murphy. A fairly decent start but then it jumped forward in time and totally lost my interest.
Pretty Deadly, Volume 1 – Kelly Sue DeConnick, Jodie Bellair & Emma Rios. I wanted to like this story about Death’s daughter, I really did, but it didn’t float my boat at all.
Amazing X-Men, Volume 2: World War Wendigo – Kathryn Immonen et. al. A surprisingly fun read.

Ferney – James Long. I picked this up after seeing it referenced in The Guardian. The claim made was that it was a more inventive (and earlier) version of The Time Traveler’s Wife. I love The Time Traveler’s Wife so Ferney sounded amazing. Imagine my disappointment when I found myself having to slog through it. The central relationship between Ferney and Gally was okay, but I never became particularly invested in it. Most unfortunately of all, I found the flashbacks to their past lives pretty dull and my heart sank every time I had to read another one. The cover was pretty blah too, which is never a good sign.
X-Men: God Loves, Man Kills – Chris Claremont & Brent Anderson. A classic X-Men title that, slightly histrionic storytelling aside, more or less holds up today.
X-Treme X-Men, Volume 2: You Can’t Go Home Again – Greg Pak, Stephen Segovia & Raul Valdes. Still not a massive fan of dimension hopping, but an okay read.
Mind the Gap, Volume 2: Wish You Were Here – Jim McCann & Rodin Esquejo. This series continues to be a great read, with twists and turns galore. Still loving it.
Mind the Gap, Volume 3: Out of Bodies – Jim McCann & Rodin Esquejo. See above.

East of West, Volume 2: We Are All One – Jonathan Hickman & Nick Dragotta. Still no. So over the western genre in comics, even if it is supposed to be happening in a post-apocalyptic world.
Trigger Warning – Neil Gaiman. Zoomed through this one. I’m never really a fan of Gaiman’s poems, but I loved a lot of the short stories. (PS I still haven’t read The Ocean at the End of the Lane. Meep!)
Love Letters to the Dead – Ava Dellaira. I picked this up from an LGBT display I’d put together at work and ended up loving it. In trying to deal with her sister’s death, Laurel writes letters to dead celebrities, and they’re beautiful, and honest, and painful. Recommended for all YA fans.
Slaine: The Brutania Chronicles, Book One: A Simple Killing – Pat Mills & Simon Davis. Slaine is a series that I’ve always wanted to enjoy but I’m not sure if I’ve ever really managed it. I love the mythology, but I’m never particularly interested in the storylines, and this volume only confirmed that.
Little Boy Lost – Marghanita Laski. It’s probably naïve of me, but I never realised that there were so many displaced and unclaimed children at the end of World War II. This is the story of Hilary who returns to France after the war in search of his lost son, which is slightly harrowing in itself, but when Hilary finds a boy that might be his son, his struggle to decide whether or not the boy is his is heart-rending. The best thing about this book is that the emotional material is dealt with in almost dispassionate way. The writing is matter of fact rather than flowery, which serves the story really well.

Moone Boy: The Blunder Years – Chris O’Dowd & Nick V. Murphy. This was a fun little read, but I wanted to love it so much more than I did. Although it maintains the humour of the TV programme, and uses the same super cute illustrations, it doesn’t quite match up to it.
X-Men, Volume 3: Bloodline – Brian Wood & Matteo Buffagni. I always approve of Jubilee taking centre stage, even if the baby daddy from the future storyline was a bit ridiculous.
Wolverine and the X-Men, Volume 1: Tomorrow Never Learns – Jason Latour & Mahmud Asrar. Not as fun as the previous Wolverine and the X-Men run, but not the worst ever. Plus, the more I see of Doop, the more I like him.
Savage Wolverine: Kill Island – Frank Cho. Dear Shanna the She-Devil, doesn’t your torso get all scratched up when you run around the Savage Land half naked?
Sheltered, Volume 2 – Ed Brisson & John Christmas. A solid continuation, but not one that inspired me to pick up the next volume.

Todd, the Ugliest Kid on Earth, Volume 1 – M.K. Perker & Ken Kristensen. I picked this up from the library pretty much just because it was there (I’ll give pretty much anything in the graphic novel section a try). Happily, it was totally worth a read. Todd has to wear a paper bag over his face because he’s no ugly. For some reason, this makes everyone act like a total bastard to him, but Todd never lets it dampen his spirits. Off-beat and enjoyable.
The Language of Dying – Sarah Pinborough. A beautiful, haunting read that adds a slight supernatural edge to an exploration of how death affects everyone differently.
Pivot Point – Kasia West. I enjoyed the premise of this novel, as well as the more sci-fi elements, but I wasn’t overly taken by the story itself.
The Silver Darlings – Will Morris. A Scottish coming-of-age story with beautiful artwork.
Morning Glories Deluxe Collection, Volume 1 – Nick Spencer, Joe Eisman & Rodin Esquejo. Morning Glory Academy is an elite boarding school, it’s also weird as fuck. The storytelling style reminded me a bit of Lost, in that you have a basic premise that’s riddled with odd, inexplicable things, and characters who are never quite what they seem. In other words, it’s interesting and generally awesome.

Ultimate Comics X-Men, Volume 3 – Brian Wood & Alvaro Martinez. I’m a fan of evil Jean Grey, she’s pretty epic. And I really like the Ultimate Comics version of Kitty Pryde, who’s conflicted but spremely confident.
All-New X-Men, Volume 2: Here to Stay – Brian Michael Bendis & Stuart Immonen. And speaking of interesting versions of Kitty Pryde, Kitty Pryde as kick-ass mentor also works really well.
All-New X-Men, Volume 4: All-Different – Brian Michael Bendis & Stuart Immonen. I have never been a fan of X-23 and I am definitely not a fan of her addition to this title. Do I want to read a Cyclops/X-23 romance? No, I really, really do not.
Daredevil, Volume 1: Devil at Bay – Mark Waid & Chris Samnee. I didn’t find much to like in this, to be honest. Totally unremarkable.

Read in January 2015 (Catch Up Post!)

Posted on March 9, 2016 by Lorraine Posted in Read This Month .

Peter West – D.E. Stevenson. D.E. Stevenson’s books are the ultimate ‘gentle’ read. There were times in this when I wanted to reach into the pages of the novel and shake the characters, but Stevenson wrote them in such a charming way that I couldn’t help but root for them. One of the strengths of this novel was the sense of place that led to the Scottish countryside acting as a third main character.
Mr Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore – Robin Sloan. A quirky read about an unusual bookshop, but I was quite disappointed at the explanation given to the central mystery of the story. The mystery had so much potential and the explanation just seemed ridiculous. Oh well!
The Sleeper and the Spindle – Neil Gaiman & Chris Riddell. A beautiful and lyrical about forging your own path and being your own hero.
John Constantine, Hellblazer: Shoot – Warren Ellis et. al. An interesting collection of one-shot issues, some better than others, but worth a look if you’re into Hellblazer (and If you’re not into Hellblazer we need to have a wee chat).
Ms Marvel, Volume 1: No Normal – G. Willow Wilson & Adrian Alphona. Loved it. Kamala is such an incredibly endearing character and her origin story was so fun, which is sadly rare in comics these days.

All New X-Men, Volume 3: Out of Their Depth – Brian Michael Bendis & Stuart Immonen. Another fun title, although with a darker edge than Ms Marvel.
X-Treme X-Men, Volume 1: Xavier Must Die! – Greg Pak & Stephen Segovia. I was never a massive fan of the dimension-hopping storyline that was at the centre of Exiles and is now being rehashed in X-Treme X-Men. Sure, it gives us fun alternate versions of familiar characters, but I find it quite gimmicky. This was decent, but it didn’t inspire me to pick up any more volumes.
Ribblestrop – Andy Mulligan. A zany take on the modern boarding school genre, but this didn’t grab me.
Shiverton Hall: The Creeper – Emerald Fennell. Just as creepy and oddly enjoyable as the first book in the series. I really can’t pinpoint what I like about these books, which I find frustrating, but whenever I finish one I check to see if another one has been published.
Mrs Tim of the Regiment – D.E. Stevenson. My favourite of Stevenson’s books so far, this is a barely fictionalised account of her time as an army wife. It’s charming as fuck, lads, and funny to boot. Recommended!

Summerhills – D.E. Stevenson. This is a sequel to a book I haven’t read, but it was pretty easy to jump into. Once again, the setting was almost a main character, and I spent a lot of time wishing good things for all the characters.
The Moth Diaries – Rachel Klein. I have a weakness for vampire books that goes back to my childhood, and this book combined the vampire genre (or did it??) with the boarding school genre, another of my favourites. Written in diary form, this is a claustrophobic novel with a narrator of questionable reliability. The general tone of unease reminded me of Picnic at Hanging Rock. Look, it’s good, okay?
The Rain – Virginia Bergin. Picked this up at random and although it has an interesting concept (rainwater becomes lethal to humans) I didn’t particularly like it. I found the main character hugely annoying and mostly unsympathetic, and although the concept was interesting, it wasn’t applied particularly logically. There’s a sequel but I have no plans to pick it up.
Can’t We Talk About Something More Pleasant? – Roz Chast. A graphic novel memoir, this book is an account of the last few years of the lives of Chast’s parents. It’s beautiful, and sad, and funny, and touching, and painful. Absolutely recommended!

035. Read in December

Posted on March 12, 2015 by Lorraine Posted in Read This Month, Uncategorized .

Chew, Volume 1: Taster’s Choice – John Layman & Rob Guillory. I hadn’t heard anything about this series before I picked it up, and I kind of can’t believe it because it was so good! Tony Chu is a cibopath – he gets psychic impressions from everything he eats. Which is both as hilarious and disgusting as it sounds, especially when he is encouraged to put his special abilities to use to solve murder cases. Recommended!
Every Seventh Wave – Daniel Glattauer. The sequel to Love Virtually and with all the same enjoyments and pitfalls of the first.
Saga, Volume 1 – Brian K. Vaughan & Fiona Staples. I can’t tell you how long I’ve been waiting to read these comics. I’ve requested that my library system buy them in since they were very first released and finally – FINALLY! – they have. And I love them just as much as I thought I would. Saga touches on so many heavy issues – race issues, sexuality, war – but it does it in a thoroughly enjoyable, space-opera-but good type of way. Recommended!
Saga, Volume 2 – Brian K. Vaughan & Fiona Staples. See above.
Saga, Volume 3 – Brian K. Vaughan & Fiona Staples. See above.

Deadpool, Volume 2: Soul Hunter – Brian Posehn, Gerry Duggan, Scott Koblish & Mike Hawthorne. Deadpool versus a shark. Need I really say anything else
The Young Visiters – Daisy Ashford. This book was so random and so cute. It’s basically Georgette Heyer or Jane Austen but written by a nine year old, with very definite ideas about romance. It’s quite a short read so it’s definitely worth a look!
The Viscount’s Christmas Temptation – Erica Ridley. This marks the point at which I travelled home for Christmas and mostly read books I’d download for free on my kindle. I think you can kind of tell that from the titles that are left for December I’ve never really considered myself to be particularly into romance novels, but I used to read so much fan-fiction, almost all of which could be considered to be a fandom version of romance, that it was kind of inevitable that I start reading them eventually. This was a surprisingly enjoyable Regency romance, mainly because the main character was feisty despite her very proper manners.
The Last Lord of the Moors – Isabella Brooke. A more modern romance, and one with some patchy areas, but an enjoyably light read overall.
The Ghost and the Graveyard – Genevieve Jack. I really enjoyed elements of this, but once it went all weird and sex-magic-y, I liked it a lot less. If the sex magic had been absent, or even toned down so as to suggest that the main character had some agency and wasn’t at the mercy of her genitals, I would probably have picked up the next in the series. As it stands, however, I’ll be giving this series a wide berth.

A Christmas Charade – Karla Hocker. Part Regency romance, part thriller, this was definitely a more complex read than your average romance and I quite enjoyed it.
Sleigh Bells in the Snow – Sarah Morgan. This forms part of a trilogy with Suddenly Last Summer and Maybe This Christmas. I’m not gonna lie, I really enjoyed these, way more than I should have considering that they’re published by Mills & Boons, but I was frustrated at how perfect and infallible the guys in Sleigh Bells in the Snow and Suddenly Last Summer were. They both had characters flaws, true, but they were just endlessly patient and sexy and amazing in every single way, to a degree that stretched the believable just a tad! The characters in Maybe This Christmas were probably my favourite, as both the guy and the woman seemed more or less like people you could know in real life.
Maybe This Christmas – Sarah Morgan. See above.
Suddenly Last Summer – Sarah Morgan. See above.

034. Read in November

Posted on February 10, 2015 by Lorraine Posted in Read This Month .

Let’s pretend that it’s not ridiculous to be posting what I read in November in February, shall we? Excellent!

The Massive, Volume 1: Black Pacific – Brian Wood, Kristian Donaldson, Garry Brown & Dave Stewart. So, these are an awesome mix of sci-fi, ecology, adventure and mystery., and the characters get better and better with each volume.
The Massive, Volume 2: Subcontinental – Brian Wood, Garry Brown, Dave Stewart & Jordie Bellaire. See above.
The Massive, Volume 3: Longship – Brian Wood, Garry Brown & Jordie Bellaire. See above.
Ten Grand – J. Michael Straczynski & Ben Templesmith. The opening of this was meh – gangsters and dead wives are more than a bit overplayed – but it turned into quite a decent supernatural tale.
East of West, Volume 1: The Promise – Jonathan Hickman & Nick Dragotta. I just couldn’t get into this at all.

Velvet, Volume 1: Before the Living Dead – Ed Brubaker, Steve Epting & Elizabeth Breitweiser. An above-average spy-thriller. The character of Velvet herself was particularly enjoyable.
Not That Kind of Girl – Lena Dunham. I wasn’t sure going in to this whether or not it would be my kind of thing but I ended up really enjoying it. It’s not a book with a tremendous amount of depth, and yet it is a page-turner. Dunham’s style was perfectly pitched for some of the intensely personal stories she shared, and I was definitely glad I picked it up.
Alice-Miranda in New York – Jacqueline Harvey. Another enjoyable romp with one of my favourite busy-bodies!
House of M: Uncanny X-Men – Chris Claremont & Mark Farmer. I found this quite hard to get through, having no interest in anything that happened in it whatsoever. I wasn’t overly surprised but it was still disappointing.
X-Men: Ghosts – Chris Claremont, John Romita Jr., Rick Leonardi, June Brigman, Barry Windsor-Smith & Arthur Adams. Some excellent stuff in this (which just highlights how uneven Chris Claremont’s writing can be) but it didn’t hang together particularly well, jumping awkwardly between story arcs.

Amazing X-Men, Volume 1: The Quest for Nightcrawler – Jason Aaron & Ed McGuinness. Quite fun but nothing that would make me want to pick up the single issues, you know? Still, hurrah for Nightcrawler, Iceman and Northstar!
The Uncanny X-Men: Beyond the Furthest Star – Chris Claremont, Dave Cockrum & Paul Smith. I highly recommend these teeny, tiny volumes if you’re looking to plug some gaps in your classic X-Men knowledge. The stories are mad, but that’s part of their charm.
X-Men: Mutant Genesis – Chris Claremont, Jim Lee, John Byrne & Scott Lobdell. I don’t even really remember what happened in this so let’s just move right on.
Chaos War: X-Men – Chris Claremont, Doug Braithwaite et al. The first two issues of this are amazing and then it all goes to shit. The reasons for us being reintroduced to some long-departed characters are far superior to the usual ‘re-animated by The Hand’ nonsense. Check it out for the beginning and then ditch it when it stops making any sense whatsover.
X-Men and Spider-Man – Christos Gage & Mario Alberti. This was quite a good read, overall. I’m not particularly a Spider-Man fan, but this made me see why people like him. Not an amazing read, but a solid one.

All-New X-Men, Volume 5: One Down – Brian Michael Bendis, Stuart Immonen & David Marquez. Not the ideal volume to start reading this series on, but I liked it. The innocence of the original X-Men next to the complexity of the present X-Men makes for a pretty brilliant scenario.
The Arrival – Shaun Tan. An absolutely brilliant and unique look at the immigrant experience. Loved it.
You Are Here: Around the World in 92 Minutes – Chris Hadfield. A gorgeous view of our world from space. If you’re in to that kind of thing, I would definitely recommend this.
Love Virtually – Daniel Glattauer. I was so frustrated with this book! Two people accidentally meet online and start a platonic relationship that seems to be developing into more. While the style of the book kept me racing through the pages, wanting to know what was going to happen next, I didn’t really like either of the characters. More annoyingly, I just didn’t believe the feelings they were professing for each other. To be fair, this could have been a side-effect from the epistolary style of the book but… I’m maybe being generous there. I don’t know, I mean, I read the sequel too so I must have liked something about it.
The Giver – Lois Lowry. Wasn’t expecting much from this but I actually really enjoyed it. Yay for teen sci-fi