Short, Short Entry

517. Q-Ko-Chan: The Earth Invader Girl, vol. 1 by Ueda Hajime. Strange manga from the creator of FLCL.

And that's the only book I finished in the past week. That's because we spent the week visiting Teena's parents for Christmas. We had a great time, especially the trip to Disneyland. More later.

Bare-Bones Entry

508. John Woo's 7 Brothers, vol. 1: Sons of Heaven, Son of Hell by John Woo, Garth Ennis, & Keevan Kang. (Checked out of the library.)
     
509. Jingle Belle: Dash Away All by Paul Dini & Jose Garibaldi.
     
510. Criminal, vol. 2: Lawless by Ed Brubaker & Sean Phillips
     
511. Starchild: Mythopolis II, vol. 1 by James A. Owen.
     
512. Unique by Dean Motter & Dennis Calero.
     
513. Batman: Year 100 by Paul Pope.
     
514. Space Usagi by Stan Sakai.
     
515. Narbonic, vol. 5 by Shaenon Garrity.
     
516. Showcase Presents: Legion of Super Heroes, vol. 1 by various.

I don't have a clever title for this entry (not that I ever do)

501. Warren Ellis' Blackgas by Warren Ellis, Max Fiumara, & Ryan Waterhouse. Zombies.
     
502. Baltimore, or, The Steadfast Tin Soldier and the Vampire by Mike Mignola & Christopher Golden. It took me a little while to get into this horror novel, but once I did, I enjoyed it quite a bit. (Checked out of the library.)
     
503. Megatokyo, vol. 3 by Fred Gallagher. Can't think of anything to say about this series that I haven't said before.
     
504. Scott Pilgrim, vol. 4: Scott Pilgrim Gets It Together by Bryan Lee O'Malley. More game-logic and slacker adventures. Fun stuff.
     
505. Bow Wow Bugs a Bug by Mark Newgarden & Megan Montague Cash. Kid's book. (Library.)
     
506. The Escapists by Brian K. Vaughan, Steve Rolston, Jason Shawn Alexander, Philip Bond, & Eduardo Barreto. I never did really warm up to Michael Chabon Presents the Amazing Adventures of the Escapist, the anthology that pretended to reprint stories from the long & varied publishing history of the Escapist, the comic book character from The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay. The conceit just never worked. The stories just couldn't live up to the descriptions from the novel. However this story, about three friends who try to make a go of publishing new Escapist comics, works wonderfully. I loved this. Highly recommended.
     
507. Knights of the Dinner Table Bundle of Trouble, vol. 23 by Jolly Blackburn, et al.

Short Week

Didn't get many books read this week. Unfortunately that does not mean you'll be getting my review of LoEG: Black Dossier yet. Sorry. Too lazy.

495. Girl Genius, Book 6: Agatha Heterodyne and the Golden Trilobite by Phil & Kaja Foglio. This came out months ago, and I honestly don't know if the delay stems from Diamond or my regular comic shop. Given that once I requested the book from a different comic shop, they got it within a week from Diamond, I suspect that the problem lies with my regular comic shop. Since the incident isn't exactly isolated, in a few months, they will NOT be my regular comic shop anymore. I will stay there long enough to buy all the graphic novels I ordered through them (assuming they show up), but when that's taken care of, I'm done.
     
496. Give Our Regards to the Atomsmashers!: Writers on Comics edited by Sean Howe. Fairly interesting, but this didn't really grab me. (Checked out of the library.)
     
497. Megatokyo, vol. 2 by Fred Gallagher, with Rodney Caston. This was a purchase from that comic sale a few months back. Megatokyo is good, but I find it frustrating. It's so slow. Every action & motivation has to be examined & reexamined. And as the strip progresses, it gets slower & slower. It's like time is stretching out, and someday it's going to freeze completely, and no further progress will ever be made.
     
498. Alan Moore's Hypothetical Lizard adapted by Antony Johnston, Sebasian Fiumara, & Lorenzo Lorente. Comic adaptation of a prose store Moore wrote for a shared world anthology.
     
499. 52, vol. 4 by various. I have to say I'm impressed by the achievement of publishing a weekly comic book for a year & maintaining the quality seen here. That's not to say this is great, but it's pretty good, and the main stories were well handled.
     
500. Owly, vol. 4: A Time to Be Brave by Andy Runton. Adorably cute, silent comics. (Borrowed from Teena.)

And I'm Back

475. Marvel Adventures Fantastic Four: v. 2: Fantastic Voyages by Jeff Parker & Manuel Garcia. One of the things I like about the Marvel Adventures books is that, because they are aimed at kids, the characters are allowed to be heroic.
     
476. Firestorm the Nuclear Man: Reborn by Stuart Moore & Jamal Igle. (Checked out of the library.)
     
477. Marvel Adventures Avengers, vol. 4: The Dream Team by Jeff Parker, Leonard Kirk, & Cafu.
     
478. Sluggy Freelance Magatome 2: Little Evils by Pete Abrams. More web-comic silliness.
     
479. Moomin: The Complete Tove Jansson Comic Strip, Book 2. Sweet, adorable comics. Cute and lots of fun. Highly recommended.
     
480. Blade, vol. 1: Undead Again by Marc Guggenheim & Howard Chaykin. Pretty good writing, and some great artwork. (Library.)
     
481. Marvel Adventures Iron Man, vol. 1: Heart of Steel by Fred Van Lente, James Cordiero & Ronan Cliquet. Cool, a version of Tony Stark that hasn't become a fascist.
     
482. The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: The Black Dossier by Alan Moore & Kevin O'Neill. I think I've got a fair amount to say about this book. More than I want to type now in a catch-up post. I'll make an effort to do a separate post about it later this week. Short take: Easter eggs overwhelmed the story, but given that this started as (and still serves as) a handbook to the world of the league, that's not surprising.
     
483. The Drifting Classroom, vol. 8 by Kazuo Umezu. More horror & histrionics. (Library.)
     
484. JLA: Ultramarine Corps by Grant Morrison, Ed McGuinness, & Val Semeiks. A.K.A. Seven Soldiers of Victory, vol. 0 (plus a random cross-over written by Morrison thrown in to pad out the page-count).
     
485. Jim Henson's Legends of the Dark Crystal, vol. 1: The Garthim Wars by Barbara Randall Kesel, Heidi Arnhold, & Max Kim. A prequel to the movie. Pretty good, but kind of depressing since the reader knows how it's all going to end up.
     
486. Darkman vs. Army of Darkness by Kurt Busiek, Roger Stern, & James Fry. I bought this because I like Busiek & Stern's work, but I wasn't impressed.
     
487. Brian Jacques' Redwall: The Graphic Novel adapted by Stuart Moore & Bret Blevins. Adaptation of the first novel in the series of children's books. I haven't read the original, but I enjoyed this.
     
488. Ex Machina, vol 6: Power Down by Brian K. Vaughan & Toby Harris. Politics & superpowers; this time with some hints as to where the main character's superpowers came from.
     
489. The Spirit, Book 1 by Darwyn Cooke, with Jeph Loeb. I have this book thanks to Michael's generosity. When I heard that DC would be publishing a new comic using Will Eisner's classic character, I had my doubts, but Cooke pulls it off beautifully. A worthy tribute to a master in the field.
     
490. Kurosagi Corpse Delivery Service, vol. 4 by Eiji Otsuka & Housui Yamazaki. (Library.)
     
491. Knights of the Dinner Table Bundle of Trouble, vol. 22 by Jolly Blackburn, et al.
     
492. Monster, vol. 11: Blind Spot by Naoki Urasawa. The tension builds.
     
493. Tupelo: The World's Forgotten Boy by Matt DeGeennaro & Phil Elliott. The reviews at Amazon seem to indicate that the punk band written about here, The Famous Monsters, was real. However, I can find no other indication that that is true. The CD is pretty cool, though.
     
494. Stagger Lee by Derek McCulloch & Shepherd Hendrix. I was very impressed with this book when I checked it out of the library a while back. So impressed that I bought a copy. It holds up on a second reading too. History of the song and a story about the people & events that inspired the song.