The artwork was good, but I wasn’t blown away by the story this time. Didn’t love it; didn’t hate it. ( )

My opinions of these comics fluctuate wildly between really enjoying one volume and being kind of lukewarm about the next. This is, unfortunately, one of the lukewarm ones for me.

I liked Peter’s narration and revisiting some of the secondary characters, and it’s another interesting use of the world-building, but the plot seemed a bit thin to me, and a bit convoluted. I found the villainess especially over-complicated, like there was an extra twist or two to her scheme and personality to fill out space or make it trickier for Peter and Nightingale to track her down. Or maybe, on a reread where I force myself to read slower, I’d “get” her. I dunno.

There are elements I hope come back, though, either in the comics or crossing back into the novels. A witness, for one thing. The henchmen, for another. The story-specific magic, for a third. (That was cool and begs some questions I want answered.) But overall, this felt like a pretty standard case for Peter: identify a crime, ask questions till you have a suspect, run into a few obstacles, solve the thing. There’s nothing that really mixes things up, in terms of world or narration, and that kind of disappointed me. I like when that happens, y’know?

5/10

To bear in mind: Canon-typical violence. May contain drugs. 🙂 ( )

Magical Marijuana that involves a complex method of growth. River smuggling that ends up involving Peter through his girlfriend and a culprit who will probably come back to haunt everyone. The shorts were also excellent. ( )

This mystery centers around some magical marijuana. The most interesting part of the story was how it was made. Some of the demi monde make an appearance as well as the rivers but Peter solves the case in the end but the story lacks some of the charm from earlier stories. As usual the one page short stories in each issue are great. ( )

Good fun, as always, though I was a bit nonplussed by the unnecessary nudity. ( )