Mini Reviews

 

 I didn't know much about this going in. I'm a fan of Joelle Jones, one of my favorite comic series is Lady Killer, which was reason enough to pick it up. The story takes place in a dystopian world where a virus had "dusted" all the adults. No one above the age of twelve is still alive, and the story starts off with our main character, Lisa, hunting down food on local farms. You learn about the virus through a letter a father left for his son, and you sort of piece the rest together. I have a few questions that I wished would have been addressed. Mostly how Logan survived his burns and if anyone recently had survived the age of thirteen. There is a mention of antidote, but nothing more is brought up about it. The plot was easy to follow and flowed pretty well, Joelle Jones artwork was vibrant and brought the story to life. It reminds me of the show I use to watch with my little brother, The Tribe. 3 Stars!

What a weird and creepy little book of nursery rhymes. It's definitely in the vein of Edward Gorey with a dash of Addams family here and there. Each story has a "moral" to it, though I wouldn't really recommend this to kids. As an adult though it was a fun way to get into Spooky Season. Some twisted nursery rhymes before bed. The stories are small and the entire book is a quick and fun read. The artwork is a great addition to each story. I only ran into a couple of issues, both might be because I read this in ebook form through my Libby app. So they aren't really worth mentioning since neither really pulled away from my overall enjoyment. 3 Stars!

HAPPY READING!!

Favorite Graphic Novels

While my love of reading came from my Mom and my Mim, my love for comics came from my Dad. He's the one who first introduced me to Batman, and the rest just sort of evolved from there. These days I read fewer superhero comics and graphic novels, I still read a wide variety of other genres. I have always found that a well done graphic novel can pull me out of a reading slump, help me get over a bad book hangover, or help if I've just hit a burnt-out stage in my reading. I also really like to use the nonfiction ones as a starting point for learning something new. Over the last few years of blogging, I've discovered a lot of graphic novels that I've enjoyed. With a couple, I've been lucky enough to meet the creators, but most were just brilliant on their own.

Below are a few series, a stand-alone, and one comic that I've come to love since I started blogging. They are all ones I've recommended to friends and other readers. All of them are authors I jump to read what they create next, and all our series I'd read again and again.

Anyone else a fan of graphic novels, any good recommendations? I'm always looking for another series to fall in love with!

HAPPY READING!!

The Incredible Nellie Bly - Review

 

Author: Luciana Cimino

Genre: Graphic Novel

Format: NetGalley

Pages: 144

Huge thanks to the Publisher and NetGalley for an advance copy of this book for my honest review!

Before starting The Incredible Nellie Bly I only knew three things about Nellie Bly: her trip around the world in 72 days, her undercover story at the asylum, and she was one of the first women journalists. I love using graphic novels as a way to open the door on historic subjects I know little about. A jumping-off point, if you will.

And, that is exactly what The Incredible Nellie Bly is. I had no idea the amazing life this woman had, even really by today's standards she did some amazing things. The fact that she did it all during the Nineteenth century is even more impressive. She was a woman who didn't know when to quit, and she paved the way for women, not only in journalism, for years to come. I definitely need to read more about Nellie Bly's life, and thanks to the bibliography page at the I end I have a place start.

It also means that this book is very well researched. Not just about Nellie Bly's most famous achievements, but about the ones the footnotes of our history books don't talk about. Luciana Cimino does a wonderful of touching base on those moments but leaving you hanging a little bit. Enough information to make hungry for more and occasionally leaving you with questions. All the while not leaving too many holes in Bly's history. I want to know more about Bly's marriage and her life after returning to journalism. I want to know read the book she wrote, and I want to know more about what happened in that asylum.

I think Luciana Cimino chose a wonderful way to tell Bly's story. Not only she helping another female journalist, but the facts of Bly's life are being presented in a dry academic fashion. Bly is telling her own story, and choosing what she thinks are the most important things she did. Smaller things that lead to bigger things. 

Since my copy is an early edition the panels hadn't yet been colored, but the artwork was amazing even in black and white. I didn't struggle to tell the characters apart and they added lovely detail to the story being told. There were little details like newspaper clippings that added to the dialog being told. I honestly can't wait to see the book completely done in full color. I think it's going to be absolutely amazing! Just from the cover alone, I feel like it great visual addition to the story.

My biggest worry about this book was that it is a translated text. The Incredible Nellie Bly was originally written in Italian, and I've run into some disappointments with translations before. Luckily that wasn't a problem with this book and it followed wonderfully. My only real issue was the copy I received from Netgalley was so hard to read. The dialog was blurry and there was no way to zoom in and out to try and fix it. Luckily I'm used to deciphering questionable handwriting so I was able to stumble through it. 

But, all that means is I cannot wait to get a finished copy of this next year and re-read it. Because there were details I missed in the edition I received.

Buy, Borrow, or Skip: I say buy or borrow, whichever way you fit into your budget to read this book. It's definitely a graphic novel I'd love to add to my collection!

The Incredible Nellie Bly comes out on March 2, 2021!

  

HAPPY READING!!

Waiting on Wednesday

 

Can't-Wait Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted by Wishful Endings to spotlight and talk about the books we're excited about what we have yet to read. Generally, they are books that have yet to be released but don't have to be. It is based on Waiting on Wednesday, hosted by the fabulous at Breaking the Spine.

It's 1942 and Willowjean "Will" Parker is a scrappy circus runaway whose knife-throwing skills have just saved the life of New York's best, and most unorthodox, private investigator, Lillian Pentecost. When the dapper detective summons Will a few days later, she doesn't expect to be offered a life-changing proposition: Lillian's multiple sclerosis means she can't keep up with her old caseload alone, so she wants to hire Will to be her right-hand woman. In return, Will will receive a salary, room and board, and training in Lillian's very particular art of investigation.

Three years later, Will and Lillian are on the Collins case: Abigail Collins was found bludgeoned to death with a crystal ball following a big, boozy Halloween party at her home--her body slumped in the same chair where her steel magnate husband shot himself the year before. With rumors flying that Abigail was bumped off by the vengeful spirit of her husband (who else could have gotten inside the locked room?), the family has tasked the detectives with finding answers where the police have failed. But that's easier said than done in a case that involves messages from the dead, a seductive spiritualist, and Becca Collins--the beautiful daughter of the deceased, who Will quickly starts falling for. When Will and Becca's relationship dances beyond the professional, Will finds herself in dangerous territory and discovers she may have become the murderer's next target.

A wildly charming and fast-paced mystery written with all the panache of 1940s New York, Fortune Favors the Dead is a fresh homage to Holmes and Watson reads like the best of Dashiell Hammett and introduces an audacious detective duo for the ages.

Why I'm Waiting: I'm always game for a period murder mystery!

HAPPY READING!!

New Release Tuesday

Maybe a killer only looks like a killer in the moment just before, during, or after.

Maybe a liar, a good one, never shows it.

Kayla is still holding on to Lainie’s secrets.

After all, Lainie is Kayla’s best friend. And despite Lainie’s painful obsession with her on-again, off-again boyfriend, and the ways he has tried to come between them, friends don’t spill each other’s secrets. They don’t betray each other’s trust.

The murder at the end of the summer doesn’t change all that.

Besides—Kayla knows that the truth is not the whole story.

HAPPY READING!!

 

Cover Runway Sunday

 

They say don't judge a book by its cover, but we all know we do it. Sometimes it's the cover that originally catches our eye, drawing us to give a book a closer look. It's the first thing we see, our first impression. Every Sunday I'm going to post some of my favorite covers of books coming soon! Some are by authors I already enjoy, some are the reason I gave the book a longer look. Either way, they're all going to find their way here!

I am not welcome. Somehow I know that. Something doesn’t want me here.

Daffodil Franklin has plans for a quiet summer before her freshman year at college, and luckily, she’s found the job that can give her just that: housesitting a mansion for a wealthy couple.

But as the summer progresses and shadows lengthen, Daffodil comes to realize the house is more than it appears. The spacious home seems to close in on her, and as she takes the long road into town, she feels eyes on her the entire way, and something tugging her back.

What Daffodil doesn’t yet realize is that her job comes with a steep price. The house has a long-ago grudge it needs to settle . . . and Daffodil is the key to settling it.

HAPPY READING!!

Mini Reviews

It's been a few years since I've read Sandman. Long enough that I had forgotten half of what happened, but not so long that I didn't love this audio version! The cast was so well done and the story adapted just as well. I had to force myself to only to listen to a couple of chapters at a time in order to spread it out. Otherwise, I might have listened to over the course of my "weekend". It's definitely not something to listen to before bed but was wonderful to listen in the car to and while I was at work. I don't honestly think I have one bad thing to say about it. This audio evoked all sorts of emotions out of me, and I hope there is more to come! 5 Stars!

Oh my gosh! This was a lot of fun! I love these cartoons when they pop on randomly on my social media. So I was more than excited to snag a whole book of them from my library. Each section of the book is about a different part of life, and I adore how literal these beings talk to each other. It was all the things I love from Nathan Pyle but in comic book form! The same fun artwork and just a fun way to look at the strange things we do and take pride in! 5 Stars!

HAPPY READING!!

August Book Haul

August was a strange month. I had a lot of anxiety about my jury summons, and then I got offered an amazing job closer to home. And, while usually, I usually counter all the stress and anxiety into book buying, I honestly didn't have a lot of time with pulling double duty from one job to the next. However, I had two credits on audible that I finally had an excuse to use. My new job is not customer-facing. My first stop was Sandman and it was everything I wanted it to be! I have also heard nothing but great things about the audio of Warlock Holmes so I downloaded the first in the series of that one as well. So far I am loving it! Speaking of Warlock I also got the next book in the series as well which is what put me in the mind to download the audiobook. For emotionally painful reasons I've been putting off picking up the latest installment...

With the new job, I see many more audiobooks in my future. Any recommendations on what I should download next?

HAPPY READING!!

September Spotlight

Every month I chose a book, or two, to feature on my sidebar for the entire month. These can range from the one book I really wanted to read this month, or in the rarer cases, a book I managed to snag a little early and fell in love with. This month just happens to fall into the latter category! In fact, Hench by Natalie Zina Walschots, is one of my favorite reads of 2020. It absolutely blew me away and I devoured the book in basically a day. I've already passed my copy on to my roommate, and I've been raving about to my friends who read for the last few weeks! It's beautifully written and the story is as heartbreaking as it is powerful. You don't even have to like superhero movies and comics to enjoy Hench because it is so much more! So seriously, pre-ordered if you can and snag it from your library if you can't!  

Anna does boring things for terrible people because even criminals need office help and she needs a job. Working for a monster lurking beneath the surface of the world isn’t glamorous. But is it really worse than working for an oil conglomerate or an insurance company? In this economy? As a temp, she’s just a cog in the machine. But when she finally gets a promising assignment, everything goes very wrong, and an encounter with the so-called “hero” leaves her badly injured.  And, to her horror, compared to the other bodies strewn about, she’s the lucky one.

So, of course, then she gets laid off.

With no money and no mobility, with only her anger and internet research acumen, she discovers her suffering at the hands of a hero is far from unique. When people start listening to the story that her data tells, she realizes she might not be as powerless as she thinks.

Because the key to everything is data: knowing how to collate it, how to manipulate it, and how to weaponize it. By tallying up the human cost these caped forces of nature wreak upon the world, she discovers that the line between good and evil is mostly marketing.  And with social media and viral videos, she can control that appearance.

It’s not too long before she’s employed once more, this time by one of the worst villains on earth. As she becomes an increasingly valuable lieutenant, she might just save the world.

Hench comes out on September 22, 2020! 

And, my review can be found here!

HAPPY READING!!

Waiting on Wednesday

 

Can't-Wait Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted by Wishful Endings to spotlight and talk about the books we're excited about what we have yet to read. Generally, they are books that have yet to be released but don't have to be. It is based on Waiting on Wednesday, hosted by the fabulous at Breaking the Spine.

Illumen Hall is an elite boarding school. Tragedy strikes when the body of a student is discovered at their exclusive summer party - on her back is an elaborate tattoo of a magpie.

When new girl Audrey arrives the following term, running from her own secrets back home in America, she is thrown into solving the case. Despite her best efforts to avoid any drama, her new roommate Ivy was close to the murdered girl, and the two of them can't help but get pulled in.

The two can't stand each other, but as they are drawn deeper into the mystery of this strange and terrible murder, they will discover that something dangerous is at the heart of their superficially perfect school.

Welcome to The Magpie Society.

Why I'm Waiting: I'm a sucker Boarding School mysteries and add-in a dash of a secret society, just take all my money!

HAPPY READING!!

New Release Tuesday

 

Yadriel has summoned a ghost, and now he can’t get rid of him.

When his traditional Latinx family has problems accepting his gender, Yadriel becomes determined to prove himself a real brujo. With the help of his cousin and best friend Maritza, he performs the ritual himself, and then sets out to find the ghost of his murdered cousin and set it free.

However, the ghost he summons is actually Julian Diaz, the school’s resident bad boy, and Julian is not about to go quietly into death. He’s determined to find out what happened and tie up some loose ends before he leaves. Left with no choice, Yadriel agrees to help Julian, so that they can both get what they want. But the longer Yadriel spends with Julian, the less he wants to let him leave. 

HAPPY READING!!