An island in Estonia is being ruled by children who kill everyone over 40 because “You are Obsolete.” The children’s leader, Martina, has asked Livia to tell their story to the world. Livia is horrified. Just because you call out the source material you are copying (Twilight Zone and Logan’sContinue Reading
The Face of Struggle is an excellent example of how art alone can tell a story. There are no words—only pictures explaining the tale. The pictures are drawn like woodcuts. They use only black, red and negative white space to show the plot. And what a timely storyline! Trump supportersContinue Reading
Algernon Blackwood’s The Willows is a good example of the atmospheric horror of the 1800s despite being published in 1907. Think of the books (not the movies) Dracula and Frankenstein. I thought the pen and ink drawings were effective in depicting the plot. However, a bit of color would haveContinue Reading
It takes more than DNA to make a family. See how this is purely evident in the excellent manga, Spy x Family Vol 1. “Everyone has a secret self they don’t show to other people. Not to friends…not to lovers…not even to family. They hide who they are and whatContinue Reading
Something is Killing the Children Vol 1 is an excellent start to a new horror comic series. One dark night, four boys are playing truth or dare. James tells a story about a monster in a ravine. The other boys don’t believe him and go to the ravine to proveContinue Reading
Something evil lurks inside a Long Beach warehouse in A Walk Through Hell. Two FBI agents, Goss and Hunzikker, walk into a warehouse never to return. An eight-person SWAT team is sent in to find the missing agents. Thirty seconds later, they come out talking of dread and someone comingContinue Reading
Who knew that Jackson Pollock and Abstract Expressionist was financially supported by the CIA to beat Russian Communism. Mind blown! This and more secrets are in the accurately named Pollock Confidential. The artwork is very golden-age superhero. I expected to see color pixels if I looked really close. It fitsContinue Reading
Karen is the unabashedly most famous member of Pure Club, a miniskirted all-girl pop band. After being stabbed at a fan event, she quits the group. Hikaru is a judo jock. Nina Kamiyama is the only girl in their high school who wears pants. How they relate to each otherContinue Reading
Mindy is thick, fluffy, or chubby depending on your culture. But she is definitely not feeling the motto Eat, and Love Yourself. However, when she finds a chocolate bar labeled like that, she hopefully tries it with eye-opening results. Eating disorders and bad self-esteem are serious and this book handlesContinue Reading
Okay, I can see by page 10 why this comic upset so many people—even non-Christians. The god in this comic (indicated by a lowercase g) is a dick. As are most of the humans within Second Coming: Volume One. The book’s god calls all humans “jerks” and much worse. HeContinue Reading
Extremely short and humorous comic strips of famous book plots fill Long Story Short. Books from Beowulf to The Hunger Games are sumarized here. The summaries can be direct such as “You can love someone and still be racist.” for The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. But most are also humorous.Continue Reading
Everyone wants to be a hero, or even a superhero, in Beastars Vol 1, a new high school manga for grades 4 through 7. At Cherryton Academy, carnivores and herbivores live in separate dorms. But when an alpaca is killed, the carnivores are the prime suspects especially a large wolfContinue Reading
In 1950 at age six, Marvin Hamlisch was the youngest student to be accepted to Juilliard, the famous New York City music school. He auditioned with a then-modern pop song, Goodnight Irene, instead of the usual classical music selection. Marvin was the American son of Jewish Austrian immigrants forced outContinue Reading
In Parham Itan: Tales from Beyond Volume 1, high school student boxer Yamagishi and smart nerd Sendo literally run into each other on the way back to their dorm. While walking together, they encounter a half-human half-man-eating-flower monster. But the next day, everything seems normal. “What if nobody’s seen themContinue Reading
Franck and Anjeline are The Strange Ones in any crowd. They are misfits, who seem fated to be together. After all, didn’t they keep meeting accidentally on the busy streets of Manhattan? This book tells their story from Anjeline’s point of view. However, during the introduction, the author states thatContinue Reading
Toyo Harada was nine when his world in Hiroshima Japan was blown apart by an atom bomb. His father died during the war and his mother died in the bombing. Harada was somehow saved. But he came back changed in the Life and Death of Toyo Harada. Harada has newContinue Reading