Stolen from Kat:

You Are A Walnut Tree

You are strange and full of contrasts... the oddball of your group. You are unrelenting and you have unlimited ambition. Not always liked but always admired, you are more infamous than famous. You are aggressive and spontaneous, and your reactions are often unexpected. A jealous and passionate person, you are difficult in romantic relationships.

What's Your Celtic Horoscope?

Wow. Not even close.

Less than 2 weeks between updates!

171. Self-Made Man: One Woman's Journey into Manhood and Back by Nora Vincent. The author disguised herself as a man for something like a year. I think she might have had more insights into gender if she didn't buy into stereotypes about men & women so much. (Checked out of the library.)
     
172. Ultimate Iron Man, vol. 1 by Orson Scott Card & Andy Kubert. (Library.)
     
173. Queen & Country Declassified, vol. 2 by Greg Rucka & Rick Burchett.
     
174. Robin: To Kill a Bird by Bill Willingham, Damion Scott, et al.
     
175. Michael Chabon Presents the Amazing Adventures of the Escapist, vol. 3 by various. These anthologies hold less & less interest for me as the series goes along. Not even Will Eisner's story was very good.
     
176. Death Note, vol. 5: Whiteout by Tsugumi Ohba & Takeshi Obata. More twists & turns in this story of a high-schooler who gains the ability to kill anybody whose name & face he knows.
     
177. Sandman Mystery Theatre, vol. 4: The Scorpion by Matt Wagner, Steven T. Seagle, & Guy Davis. I am so happy that this series is finally being collected. I love Davis's artwork, and the stories are great too.
     
178. Hulk Visionaries: Peter David, vol. 3 by Peter David, Jeff Purves, et al. Another series I'm happy to see collected. David's run on the Hulk may well be the best take on the character.
     
179. The Order of the Stick, vol. 0: On the Origin of PCs by Rich Burlew. After introducing Teena to these comics about a party of adventurers, I decided to reread this book. Funny stuff. (Library.)
     
180. Birds of Prey: Of Like Minds by Gail Simone & Ed Benes. (Library.)
     
181. Justice League Unlimited, vol. 1: United They Stand by Adam Beechen, et al.
     
182. War Stories, vol. 2 by Garth Ennis et al. Ennis's serious, non-fantastic stories all have a certain feel. He uses several stock character-types an awful lot. But they're still damn good stories. (Library.)
     
183. Invincible, vol. 5: The Facts of Life by Robert Kirkman & Ryan Ottley. (Library.)
     
184. Zombieworld: Winter's Dregs and Other Stories by various. (Library.)
     
185. Max Hamm: Fairy Tale Detective by Frank Cammuso. (Library.)
     
186. Birds of Prey: Sensei & Student by Gail Simone, et al. (Library.)
     
187. City of Tomorrow by Howard Chaykin. Chaykin is another creator who uses a stock of certain character types over & over. But boy-o-boy, can the man draw! (Library.)
     
188. Astonishing X-Men, vol. 1 by Joss Whedon & John Cassaday. Perhaps not as good as Whedon's TV work, but still pretty good.
     
189. Northwest Passage, vol. 2 by Scott Chantler.
     
190. Gotham Central, vol. 3: Unresolved Targets by Ed Brubaker, Greg Rucka, & Michael Lark. Another story about the cops who work in Batman's town. It's too bad the comics market doesn't support more books like this. But I guess comics fans aren't interested unless the people in spandex have the spotlight.
     
191. Shaman King, vol. 9 by Hiroyuki Takei.
     
192. Bambi & Her Pink Gun, vol. 2 by Atsushi Kaneko. More over-the-top violence. (Library.)
     
193. Negima! vol. 8 by Ken Akamatsu. (Library.)
     
194. The New Avengers, vol. 2: Sentry by Brian Michael Bendis & Steve McNiven. (Library.)
     
195. Negima! vol. 9 by Ken Akamatsu. (Library.)
     
196. Mary Jane, vol. 1: Circle of Friends by Sean McKeever & Takeshi Miyazawa. (Library.)
     
197. Dr. Slump, vol. 5 by Akira Toriyama. (Library.)
     
198. Green Arrow, vol. 6: Moving Targets by Judd Winick & Phil Hester. (Library.)
     
199. The Goon, vol. 2: My Murderous Childhood (And Other Grievous Yarns) by Eric Powell. Goofy, fun stories about a thug who rules a city's underworld through threats & intimidation. (Library.)
     
200. Mary Jane, vol. 2: Homecoming Sean McKeever & Takeshi Miyazawa. (Library.)
     
201. Star Wars: Clone Wars, vol. 2: Victories & Sacrifices by various. I finally found a used copy of this selling cheap enough that I'd be willing to pay that price to have the issue or two written by John Ostrander that are collected in this book.
     
202. Queen & Country Declassified, vol. 3: Sons & Daughters by Antony Johnston & Christopher Mitten.
     
203. Y: The Last Man, vol. 7: Paper Dolls by Brian K. Vaughan & Pia Guerra.
     
204. Tuxedo Gin, vol. 9 by Tokihiko Matsuura. (Library.)
     
205. The Punisher MAX, vol. 1 by Garth Ennis, Lewis Larosa, & Leandro Fernandez. I liked Ennis's take on the Punisher better when he didn't take the character entirely seriously. (Library.)
     
206. What's Michael? vol. 11: Planet of the Cats by Makoto Kobayashi. Goofy cat comics from Japan.
     
207. JLA: Crisis of Conscience by Geoff Johns, Allan Heinberg, & Chris Batista. Yet another attempt to make superhero comics serious & grown-up that just makes them seem grim & humorless. (Library.)
     
208. The Goon, vol. 3: Heaps of Ruination by Eric Powell. Silly absurd stuff, much more to my taste. Plus, there's a guest appearance by Hellboy! (Library.)

Quiz time!

What Teen Angst Novel are You? - funny, lots of results, with pix, from the author of The Boyfriend List

KISSING VANESSA, by Simon Cheshire.Wicked funny and heartfelt. Sweet and delightful. Go read it. It's you.
Take this quiz!








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I've never even heard of this book.

Damn. The last time I updated, I was nearly caught up. Then I procrastinated for almost 4 months, and now I'm something like 150 books behind. Well, the list won't update itself. There won't be much discussion, simply because if I try to say something about even half of the books I've read since March, it'll seem too much like work, and I'll fall even further behind.

109. Wrong About Japan: A Father's Journey with His Son by Peter Carey. (Checked out of the library.)
     
110. Fairy Tales of Oscar Wilde, vol. 4: The Devoted Friend and The Nightingale & the Rose, adapted by P. Craig Russell.
     
111. Runaways, vol. 1 by Bryan K. Vaughan & Adrian Alphona, with Takeshi Miyazawa. Oversized reprint of the entire first Runaways series, with extras and much nicer paper than the digest-sized volumes I'd read before.
     
112. Miyuki-Chan in Wonderland by CLAMP. (Library.)
     
113. Robin/Batgirl: Fresh Blood by Bill Willingham, Andersen Gabrich, et al. (Library.)
     
114. Captain America: Bicentennial Battles by Jack Kirby. (Library.)
     
115. The Flash: Ignition by Geoff Johns & Alberto Dose. (Library.)
     
116. Runaways, vol. 4: True Believers by Brian K. Vaughan & Adrian Alphona. It'll be a while before the next Runaways hardback, so it's back to the digests for now.
     
117. The Flash: Blood Will Run by Geoff Johns & Scott Kolins. (Library.)
     
118. Sky Ape: All the Heroes by Phil Amara, Tim McCarney, Mike Russo, & Richard Jenkins.
     
119. Death Note, vol. 4: Love by Tsugumi Ohba & Takeshi Obata.
     
120. Showcase Presents: The Green Arrow by various. From reading this, I think Green Arrow actually does have a superpower: precognition. Because in every story, he just happens to have exactly the right trick arrow to get him out of whatever situation he's in. (Library.)
     
121. Buddha, vol. 7: Prince Ajatasattu by Osamu Tezuka. I've said this about every previous volume in this series, but this is a remarkable work. Amazing stuff. (Library.)
     
122. Green Lantern: Rebirth by Geoff Johns & Ethan Van Scriver. (Library.)
     
123. Negima!, vol. 5 by Ken Akamatsu. Without realizing it, I stopped buying this series when Peter David stopped doing the English adaptation. And while there hasn't been a noticible drop in the writing, I think that was a good decision. The series is amusing enough, but not really worth shelling out money for. (Library.)
     
124. Runaways, vol. 5: Escape to New York by Brian K. Vaughan & Adrian Alphona, with Takeshi Miyazawa.
     
125. Identity Crisis by Brad Meltzer & Rags Morales. (Library.)
     
126. Naruto, vol. 9: Turning the Tables by Masashi Kishimoto.
     
127. Concrete, vol. 4: Killer Smile by Paul Chadwick.
     
128. Knights of the Dinner Table: Bundle of Trouble, vol. 16 by Jolly Blackburn, et al.
     
129. Superman: Sacrifice by Greg Rucka, Mark Verheiden, Gail Simone, et al. Nothing to say about the story itself, but I do have something to gripe about. This book collects several issues of a few different comics, and the credits have been stripped out of the individual issues. The creators are listed at the beginning of the book, but there's no way to tell who did which sections. This system works when the collected comics are all by the same creative team. But not here. On the other hand, I'm sure this book is not about building an audience for a particular creator but about building an audience for Superman and the continuity of his comics. (Library.)
     
130. Negima!, vol. 6 by Ken Akamatsu. (Library.)
     
131. Iron Wok Jan!, vol. 11 by Shinji Saijyo. (Library.)
     
132. Buddha, vol. 8: Jetavana by Osamu Tezuka. The final volume. And now the publisher has finally begun releasing these books in paperback. I'm picking those up, but I'm going to hold off re-reading this series until I own all 8 volumes. (Library.)
     
133. Bloody Mary by Garth Ennis & Carlos Ezquerra. (Library.)
     
134. I Want to Be Your Dog by Ho Che Anderson
     
135. Sunset City by Rob Osborne. (Library.)
     
136. Essential Godzilla by Dough Moench & Herb Trimpe. Man, this took me back to my childhood. Mid-70s monster madness from Marvel.
     
137. Negima!, vol. 7 by Ken Akamatsu. (Library.)
     
138. Real Life: The Complete Year One Collection by Greg Dean. (Library.)
     
139. Essential Doctor Strange, vol. 1 by Stan Lee, Steve Ditko, et al. Ever since Marvel started the Essentials line of cheap black & white reprints, I'd wanted a collection of early Doctor Strange stories. I love Ditko's artwork, but I don't think I'd ever seen a reprint collection of his Doctor Strange work. Finally, they put out this book. That was several years ago, and I tried to read it when it first came out, but I got bogged down early on. As fantastic as the art is, the beginning stories are all the same. This time when I read it, I plowed through. After about a third of the way through the book, there's an extended storyline that finally breaks the mold of the first stories. It's great. Unfortunately, once that story is over, other artists take over for Ditko. Sure, Marie Severin is good, but she's not Ditko.
     
140. Navigating the Golden Compass: Religion, Science and Daemonology in Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials by various. Some interesting essays & some not so interesting. (Library.)
     
141. Hellboy, vol. 6: Strange Places by Mike Mignola.
     
142. Beet the Vandel Buster, vol. 2 by Riku Sanjo & Koji Inada. (Library.)
     
143. Showcase Presents: House of Mystery, vol. 1 by various. (Library.)
     
144. Bambi & Her Pink Gun, vol. 1 by Atsushi Kaneko. Very violent. (Library.)
     
145. Smoke and Guns by Kirsten Baldock & Fabio Moon. (Library.)
     
146. Banana Sunday by Root Nibot & Colleen Doran. Amazingly cute.
     
147. Ex Machina, vol. 3: Fact v. Fiction by Brian K. Vaughan & Tony Harris.
     
148. Tuxedo Gin, vol. 6 by Tokihiko Matsuura. (Library.)
     
149. Invincible, vol. 4: Head of the Class by Robert Kirkman & Ryan Ottley. (Library.)
     
150. Demo by Brian Wood & Becky Cloonan. (Library.)
     
151. Teen Titans, vol. 4: The Future Is Now by Geoff Johns, Mike McKone, et al. (Library.)
     
152. JLA, vol. 17: Syndicate Rules by Kurt Busiek & Ron Garney. Not Busiek's strongest work. (Library.)
     
153. One Piece, vol. 10: Let's Stand Up! by Eiichiro Oda.
     
154. Girl Genius, vol. 4: Agatha Heterodyne and the Circus of Dreams by Phil & Kaja Foglio. More fantastic steampunky adventures. Great, great series.
     
155. The Suit by Mike Kazaleh.
     
156. Read or Die, vol. 1 by Hikeyuki Kirata. I thought a manga series about a librarian with the ability to transform paper into nearly anything would be great, but the storytelling was really unclear. A lot of the time I could not tell what was supposed to be happening. Just a jumbled mess.
     
157. Coyote, vol. 3 by Steve Englehart, Chaz Truog, & Steve Ditko.
     
158. Marvel Team-Up, vol. 1: The Golden Child by Robert Kirkman & Scott Kolins. (Library.)
     
159. Dragon Ball Z, vol. 25 by Akira Toriyama.
     
160. Secret War by Brian Michael Bendis & Gabrielle Dell'Otta. (Library.)
     
161. Tuxedo Gin, vol. 7 by Tokihiko Matsuura. (Library.)
     
162. Hunter X Hunter, vol. 7 by Yoshihiro Takahashi. (Library.)
     
163. Knights of the Dinner Table: Bundle of Trouble, vol. 17 by Jolly Blackburn, et al.
     
164. House of M by Brian Michael Bendis & Olivier Coipel. (Library.)
     
165. She-Hulk, vol. 2: Superhuman Law by Dan Slott, Juan Bobillo, & Paul Pelletier. (Library.)
     
166. Star Wars: Clone Wars, vol 8: The Last Siege, the Final Truth by John Ostrander & Jan Duursema. More comics that blow away anything Lucas has done in 20 years.
     
167. Ju-On: Video Side by Takashi Shimizu & Miki Rinno.
     
168. Fullmetal Alchemist, vol. 6 by Hiromu Arakawa.
     
169. Little Star by Andi Watson.
     
170. Tuxedo Gin, vol. 8 by Tokihiko Matsuura. (Library.)
     

Okay, that takes me through the end of April. That's enough for now.