Social Blunderer

Lerner Publishing Group

Description
Sorry friends: e-Galley not available for Kindle download.
The story of a girl and her dog—in space. Sienna Barlow loves nothing more than riding around New Kansas on top of her mega-dog, Gus. He’s one of the massive pooches protecting the human settlers of a strange planet. In fact, Sienna connects better with Gus than with other kids. So when a visiting official threatens to shut down the mega-dog program, Sienna sneaks off with her best friend. After she, Gus, and a stowaway crash their escape ship, they discover a danger to every human in their community—and launch a wild plan to save New Kansas.

REVIEW

This a superb all-ages adventure. Set in a retro-futuristic Martian colony the character designs and look of the world takes inspiration from 70’s sci-fi shows like Buck Rogers and Battlestar Galactica. The colour palette is a pleasing mix of orange/yellow/brown that harkens back to those classics while still being fresh and modern enough to appeal to younger readers. Khouri skillfully manages to capture crippling shyness that Sienna suffers from and imbues the action scenes with enough peril to keep the reader hooked. Jolley’s script moves along at a decent clip, there is enough character development to the reader invested in the fates of Sienna and Gus. The dialogue captures the awkwardness and excitement of making new friends. Being a fan of Roald Dahl, I am always up for stories that are about children showing adults what clods they are being and setting the worlds to rights. I rather enjoyed this. Jolley and Khouri have done a commendable job of creating a tale filled with derring-do, friendships, and, personal growth.

Description

2051. The world’s largest company, The Company, has seized power on a planetary scale and runs the world as if it were a business. In a plutocracy, the richer one is, the more powerful one is. In this context, an anonymous citizen becomes compelled to uncover how the world came to this situation, without paying any attention to the official version. Several members of the government end up encouraging him to carry out this investigation by giving him access to all information. He decides to discover the true history of The Company and the various interests that are trying to influence his investigation.

Review

This book is deeply flawed. There are 15 pages of exposition before we get introduced to our protagonist. There are also large parts of the book that are anti-capitalist and anti-communist rants about the dangers of monopolies and the anti-democratic steps that large multi-national corporations and banks are taking.

The art is ugly; the characters are unlikeable, and, it meanders as it puts across its thesis. The first of these two things are artistic decisions that are understandable and to a certain extent, are successful, given the nature of the story. The world of Plutocracy is not a one in which anyone would want to live in. However, the pace meant it was a slog to read.

Plutocracy does examine what is happening right now in the world and puts forward a nightmarish vision of a future dominated by a single corporate entity. It has plenty of proactive things to say about the dangers that humanity faces but does so in such a blunt, almost clumsy way that it was hard to engage with. It wants to serve as a warning of what is to come. It does so in such a way that few will heed.

I think I liked the book more than perhaps it deserves due to my agreement with some of the book’s politics, and, because when it does get going, it is both entertaining and thought-provoking. A shame then it takes too long to get to these sections and that they don’t last long enough.

ARC provided by Netgalley.

Backtrack Vol. 1 by Brian Joines

Oni Press
Pub Date 17 Nov 2020  

Description

A former criminal driver is given the chance at redemption by entering a car race but there’s just one catch: each leg covers a different period in history. 

If you had a chance to fix a mistake from your past, would you take it? Alyson Levy would.

Guilt weighs heavy on former criminal “wheelman,” Alyson, who led an illicit life that left hers shattered. Enter Casper Quellex, an eccentric businessman who offers her the break of a lifetime: a massive cross-country car race that grants the winner an opportunity to correct a single mistake in their life. But here’s the catch — each leg covers a different period in history. As if keeping the cars on the often-questionable (sometimes nonexistent) roads and staying ahead of competition wasn’t enough, the drivers will now have to contend with medieval warriors, dinosaurs, and natural disasters…it’s all a possibility. Only the one who survives it all will be proven the winner, and like that, Alyson and the rest of the drivers find themselves in a gut-wrenching race through time and quickly learn that they must band together to form any chance for survival. But for an opportunity to turn back time, Alyson will drive from the Big Bang to the death knell of the universe.

Review

Basically, this is Sliders meets Fast and Furious. If that sounds like your jam, then this comic won’t disappoint. The artwork is sumptuous, thickly inked and richly coloured it rides the line between gaudy and gorgeous. It is a beautiful book to look at. Much like a Fast Universe movie, the cast of characters includes criminals and corrupt cops. However, the competitors also include a spoiled heiress and her driver, the son of a Nascar driver, and, other assorted misfits that almost veers into Wacky Racers territory.

The action, for the most part, is riveting and well-illustrated. Certain sequences don’t work though, and I sort of think that this story would have been better served if it was either in live-action and animated. Securing the budget that would be needed to do justice to a time-travelling racing story that features dinosaurs might be why they decided to go the comic route. The characters are just well developed enough to where you are invested in their survival. Casper Quellex is a camp, devious, scenery-chewing villain that is a lot of fun to route against.

On the whole, this book is entertaining. I felt it lost steam towards the end, and the final chapters had me rolling my eyes with the silliness what was on-page. It might say more about me that I had a bigger problem suspending my disbelief with the protagonists escaping from kidnappers than I did with them outrunning a T-Rex. I also felt that the creators used most of their best ideas early on. Not sure if the concept has enough going for it to sustain an ongoing series. There are some great set-pieces and engaging character moments that are best enjoyed with your brain switched off.

I am not a fan of Micahel Bay films or The Fast & Furious movies it is not normally a comic I would seek out but I had a nice enough while I was reading it.

The Photographer of Mauthausen
by Written by Salva Rubio; Drawn by Pedro J. Colombo; Colored by Aintzane Landa

Dead Reckoning
Comics & Graphic Novels | History
Pub Date 11 Nov 2020   

Thanks to Netgally for providing the ARC.

So many terrible things happened during WW2. It is vital that as many of stories of those that experienced it are remembered. This is as much for our sakes as it is for theirs.

This was a heartbreaking read. It tells the story of Francisco Boix and his time at Mauthausen, a Nazi concentration camp. The method of death preferred at Mauthausen was to work the prisoners to death.

I was not familiar with Francisco Boix before I read this book. He went through hell. A Spanish communist he was transported to Mauthausen. Because he was a trained photographer, he was given the “privilege” of assisting SS officer Paul Ricken. Ricken’s hobby was photographing the deaths of the prisoners in the camp. An accountant and administrator at the camp Ricken’s vileness is particularly notable. Here he comes across as a serial killer gathering trophies who is demented enough to believe what he is doing is high art. Boix spurred on by the fact he faces certain death wants to save the negatives and use them as evidence of Nazi misdeeds.

His attempts at gathering evidence of Nazi crimes puts himself and the entire camp at risk. This bloody-minded determination causes him to do things that cause rifts between himself and every other prisoner in the camp. This is a book full of tragic moments. There is a courtroom scene at the end of the book that moved me to tears at the utter unfairness of it all.

It says a lot that The Photographer of Mauthausen reminded me of films like Schindler’s List and The Great Escape. It’s not entirely like either of those. Still, it manages to portray the causal workmanlike cruelty of the Nazi and the sense of danger that prisoners attempting to something daring equally well.

Rubio does a truly admirable job of keeping you at the edge of your seat, fearful at what fate beholds Boix and his allies at the turn of every page. Colombo’s and Landa’s art is impressive. So much relies on the eyes of the characters, their hopes and fears, the need to hide their true feelings. Gory scenes are placed alongside intimate conversations, and it all just works. In lesser hands such a juxtaposition might not have. The Photographer of Mauthausen is a great accomplishment. There are a lot of graphic novels about WW2 very few of them are as good as this.