Jamie S. Rich

Meh. But then, it wasn't written for me. I spent a lot of time being annoyed by Mason's unexamined straight-boy hangups. Because man, there's nothing that makes me sympathize with a character like cave-man jealousy over a girl who "belongs" to him. Or threatening his mother with disturbingly sexual violence. You know. The closest Mason ever came to forging his own version of masculinity was when he refrained from beating up a skater with an actual, literal baseball bat. Props? I guess?

Although this was on the graphic novel shelf of my library (??), it's not really a graphic novel---it's a book written by a comic artist with illustrations by two different people (?!?). One of the artists was pretty good, but the one who is heavily influenced by manga... the results are really unfortunate. Even more unfortunately, the manga-artist illustrates the majority of the book.

It mostly gets two stars because I liked some bits, including the last few pages and the last illustration, which reminded me strongly of King Cat Comics zine. And I enjoy the thought of Mason growing up to be someone a lot like the guy who writes King Cat.… (meer)

* I would like to thank NetGalley and the publisher for the opportunity to review this book. *

Hypnotist Archer Coe is approached by Jonathan Midland, a wealthy banker, to find out why his wife resists his advances. Hope, the wife, says that she has met Coe before, but he has no memory of this. Before long, Coe is caught in the eye of a whirlwind: there is a gruesome murder in his apartment block, and then Midland himself turns up dead. The police suspect Coe of both murders and he quickly finds himself behind bars.

This is a classic noir story, appropriately illustrated in stark black and white. Rich's characters are well-realised by Christensen, and the plot has a good number of twists.… (meer)