Charlie Thorne and the Lost City by Stuart Gibbs

Rating: WARTY!

Not being a big fan of series, I don't normally ever get to volume two even if I started volume one. In this case, I skipped the first in the series because I was unaware of it until I saw this one and was attracted by the fact that it involved Charles Darwin. You don't usually see his name in this kind of a story. It would have been nice to have seen a little bit of education slipped in here and there regarding his scientific Theory of Evolution, which is the bedrock of modern biology, but there really was none of that, and worse, there was some seriously misleading science. So while I initially began reading this favorably, I can't commend it after finishing it and realizing there were far too many problems with it to overlook them.

I wasn't expecting much from this middle grade novel, but it proved to be an engaging read to begin with, if annoying at times. The story is very much of the Dan Brown category: someone who is speedily following a series of clues to solve a mystery, while being chased by evil-doers. I don't use that comparison as a compliment since I'm not a Dan Brown fan, but it will give you a broad idea of what's going on here.

After her adventures in Charlie Thorne and the Last Equation, Charlie has evidently been hiding out in the Galápagos islands seeking anonymity. She's surfing and otherwise generally doing nothing save read a book here and there. She has money, presumably somehow obtained during the first novel, so working isn't a necessity, and it's just as well since she's only twelve - but apparently looks older. That was the first slippery slope proposition in my view, since it's often used as a lousy non-excuse when a guy is charged with statutory rape ("Well she looked eighteen"), so while I let that slide for the sake of reading on, it's nevertheless a problem for me.

The main problem with Charlie though, is that she was much more of a Mary Sue than a Charlie. She never got into any real difficulties, and effortlessly effected escapes worthy of an animated series. On top of that, she was constantly reminding us, that is, when the author wasn't, that she was a genius - probably the smartest person on Earth. That was irritating as hell. For example at one point I read,

"Of course I’m right," Charlie told him. "I’m me."

Seriously? Even if it were true about her being so smart, it's a stupid mistake for an author to keep slapping his readers in the face with it, but the fact is that it's not true.

The confusion is a common one. The author conflates knowing a lot of trivia with being smart. The two aren't equivalent and the sad thing is that though we're reminded of how smart she supposedly is with metronomic tedium, the truth is that Charlie's actions prove her to be other than a genius. She wouldn't do dumb things that make little sense if she were indeed as smart as she's so often claimed to be.

Maybe she's hiding her light under a bushel, you think? Bushel is an archaic term for a bowl, hence its more modern use as a measure as opposed to the use back there as a shade. But knowing that trivial item doesn't make me super-smart. The thing is that we really don't get a lot of Charlie as an actual person. She's more like a place-holder for a real character, or more like an android (or given her gender, I guess a 'gynoid'!). We never see her around kids her own age in this story, so she's constantly dealing with adults who never seem to like her at best and at worst, want to kill or to capture her, so maybe this influences how she presents. Or maybe they just knew her better than we readers ever will?!

The thing is that if Charlie truly wanted to stay off the radar as we're told she did, she would have kept a much lower profile than she had been doing where she was hiding. Instead of being a star of the surfing circuit, she might have found a quiet cove to read or to snorkel? And making her brilliance known by volunteering at the tortoise rehab centers was a poor choice. This is what I mean about her not being as smart as she claims, because she ought to have known better, and she doesn't. Better yet, why not move her idle carcass to a large city where it would be a lot easier to hide? And where she could actually do some good helping other people instead of indulging her every whim? She doesn't seem like a nice or a thoughtful person to me.

But her dwelling on that island and volunteering is how she comes to the attention of Esmerelda, who seeks her out for help deciphering a code that was, we're told, etched onto the shell of a tortoise by Darwin himself, the better part of two centuries prior to Charlie finding out about it. In an era where we've discovered a certain ex-president's name scratched onto the back of a manatee, this sounds a bit inappropriate to say the least, but I'll let that slide. Tortoises in the Galápagos islands are very long-lived unless the animal has been hunted for meat or died from some other cause and rotted away prematurely. So Darwin etching the underside of the tortoise is problematic with a message for the ages. It seems like he would have been smarter than that.

Darwin was studying change both in the planet's crust, and in the lives of plants and animals and it seems very doubtful to me that knowing how impermanent things are, and how living things can also change so readily, he would have recorded the various clues he left in a form where such inevitable changes could easily erase or destroy them, and in only that one way given that he lived a long life after his voyage and had ample opportunities to record it elsewhere or share it with people he trusted. For the undiscerning middle-grader, these things might seem convincing, but if subject to any thought at all, they're so far-fetched.

That same rule applies across multiple clues, others of which I'm not about to reveal in any great detail here, but I have to say that in one case, a stone used to build something tends to be a rectangular block, and if something were etched on it and later that same stone was carved into a different shape to be used for another purpose, any original etching would be long gone! And if you're trying to hide a clue in a natural setting by using fire to mask it, you'd think a genius would make it look like a natural forest fire rather than a deliberate attempt burn off a clue! This is what I meant about Charlie's actions not really mirroring her billing as a genius.

There were some writing issues which I shall mention because there were so many of them. One or two here and there are not an issue, but so many do tend to distract from enjoyment of the story. At one point, for example, I read how a stick of dynamite behaved when kicked off a boat: "It sailed off the boat and exploded a second later, close enough to knock her and Dante off their feet. A piece of red-hot shrapnel nicked her arm, while others whistled past her head." Shrapnel is named after a British army general and initially referred to what in modern times might be a pipe bomb or something similar. Dynamite itself contains no shrapnel - typically metal fragments, or ball bearings or something like that. The way dynamite would hurt would be from a compression wave, especially if experienced underwater, and would result in a concussion and ear-bleeding, so this rang hollow, but again, maybe middle graders won't think twice about it.

After a certain person (name redacted) had literally tried to kill Charlie, and she makes this observation about that person's mood: "XXXXXXX sounded as though they really wanted to kill her." That's a bit much given that the person really was trying to kill her! At another point I read, "...it would swallow up any evidence of the cities within decades, if not sooner." Well, the 'within decades' covers 'if not sooner' so it seemed a bit superfluous. At another point in the story Charlie and another person were searching for some food in the jungle, and I read this: "They had tracked down a moriche palm full of aguaje fruit within only a few minutes-and then spent another two hours trying to retrace their steps." This suggests again that Charlie isn't so smart. Had she not thought of calling out to the person they'd left back at the boat, in order to follow their voice back? If they were only a couple of minutes' walk away they could surely have heard each other. It felt like it betrayed the girl's smarts.

At one point I read, “The most famous spot was Yellowstone National Park, which was located in the largest volcano caldera on earth,” which simply isn't true. The largest (as of this writing!) is the Apolaki Caldera in the Philippine Sea. If you're talking 'on dry land' and 'square area', then Yellowstone caldera gets it, but it's actually four overlapping calderas, and the park isn't in the caldera, it's the other way around. By the same token, the Amazon basin isn't quite the same size as the entire United States, but once you start seeing errors of fact, it's hard to stop! I don't agree with those people who claim it's just as easy to get it right as get it wrong. It's much easer to get it wrong, but I think we owe children a better education than this, so when they call out a 'fact' from your novel in an argument or worse, in school, they get it right, not wrong, and they trust you as a writer.

One of the annoying and anti-scientific facets of this novel, and which does Darwin a grave disservice is talk of 'proof' of evolution and of 'missing links'. First of all, science doesn't talk about proof, it talks about the preponderance of evidence and that's a bit stodgy for young children, but not asking too much for them to understand if a bit of foundation had been sown through the writing. But to talk of a definitive 'missing link' in hominid evolution is pure bullshit.

Human evolution is complex and it's replete with links, so there's nothing critical that's still missing. In Darwin's time there was, but he barely mentioned humans (in terms of evolution) in "On the Origin..." brushing it safely under the carpet with a "light will be thrown on the origin of man and his history." It wasn't until over a decade later in The Descent of Man that Darwin tied humans into the mix. If he'd found anything concrete he would have mentioned it there, and he would not have spent the time he did studying an orangutan named Jenny at the London zoo. The fact that he had the chance to mention this fictional 'discovery' without giving anything concrete away about it in 'Descent' yet did not undermines this whole story's premise. The fact is that finding a fossil, or for example, something like chimpanzees in South America wouldn't 'prove' anything. And there is no way he could find any such thing there because it South America never has had apes and no evidence of there ever being any such thing has turned up there.

One last problem was this animal that Charlie befriended. It had earlier been terrified of this helicopter, yet later it's depicted sleeping soundly onboard while the chopper is flying, and while you can argue it was sedated, when it awoke it showed no sign of fear or panic whatsoever. It wasn't realistic. Again most kids who read this might not think about these things, but that doesn't mean an author ought not to be aware of them and get them right - or re-write! We all screw up; there's no escaping it, but a little more attention can reduce these incidents to a negligible level.

The only other issues I ran into were the usual Kindle formatting ones. I detest Kindle because it slices, dices, and juliennes everything that's not plain vanilla and pure text, so I wasn't surprised to see a numbered list appear like this:

There were three reasons that might be true:
1) Darwin had traveled faster than she had calculated, so they had not reached the right spot yet.
2) She had misinterpreted what Darwin meant. 3) The river no longer turned to blood.

Note the third item is on the same line as the second instead of on a line of its own. This is one of many reasons why I will do not business with Amazon. But that's just me, and it doesn't reflect on the content of the novel itself - just on the editing and checking. Clearly this is another novel written as a print novel with little to no thought given to the ebook version.

Another such issue was where the page headers got tied right into the text because of the incompetence of the Kindle process, predictably turning everything into kindling, so I read:

“...archaeolog CHARLIE THORNE AND THE LOST CITY • 263 ical sites”

That happened in more than one place.

But I'm judging on content, not on kindling, and by that measure alone I can't commend this as a worthy read. The main character was at times obnoxious and her situation was just too Mary Sue and simultaneously too improbable. As a Saturday morning TV cartoon, this might have sufficed, but as a middle-grade novel it needed more. I can't see any promise in a series that pretends on the surface to honor great scientists, but in practice does them such a disservice by making up improbable stuff and treating real science so cavalierly.

Artemis by Andy Weir

Rating: WORTHY!

This audiobook, written by the author of The Martian and of a short story called The Egg that I read and enjoyed back in March of 2015, turned out to be quite entertaining, but I still feel no compulsion to read The Martian especially not after having seen the movie.

This story, read beautifully by Rosario Dawson, and written quite well until the ending which sort of fizzled a bit for me, still managed to squeak in as a worthy read. It's about Jasmine "Jazz" Bashara who is a smuggler on the eponymous Moon colony. She's hired by billionaire Trond Landvik, who lives on the Moon with his crippled daughter because it's the only place she can be mobile on crutches. Given his billions, this made no sense to me but I let it slide. Landvik, wants Jazz to destroy beyond repair the four moon harvesters used by the corrupt Sanchez Corporation to mine aluminum, the processing of which creates oxygen which is consumed in the city. This will allow him to take over the mining operation.

Why the four huge harvesters are all conveniently in exactly the same place goes unexplained, as does why it is that a constant resupply of O₂ is needed. They don't recycle the CO₂? Anyway, Jazz manages to cripple only three of them and now she's being hunted by a hitman from O Palacio, the Brazilian crime syndicate which runs Sanchez, and by Rudy, the Artemis 'police chief'. She discovers there's something else going on here and as body count rises, she sets out to solve it, almost wiping out Artemis as she does so.

Throughout this story I had mixed feelings about Jazz who alternately annoyed and amused me. She managed to avoid pissing me off so much that I wanted to ditch the story, although the ending was far too convenient given the major crime that Jazz is responsible for. I can't imagine the movie company that is supposedly turning this book into a movie will actually let the plot stand as is, but I guess we'll see if it ever comes to fruition.

That said I did enjoy this for the most part, so I recommend it as a worthy read, although you are advised that it's best to check parts of your brain at the door before going into it. I think a better story would have been about Landvik's daughter taking over his company when he dies, but that's just me not wanting always to go for the lowest common denominator as too many authors seem to do these days.

Ghost Money Death in Dubai by Thierry Smolderen, Dominique Bertail

Rating: WARTY!

This is from an advance review copy for which I thank the publisher.

When you find something listed on Net Galley's 'Read Now' section, you never know if it's there because it's a gem that's been overlooked, or if it's just a bad book that no one is interested in. I like to read 'em because of the gems I find. Unfortunately, this was not such a gem. I had initially thought it might be, because when I started reading it, I was drawn in by the two female characters: Lindsey, a college student in London, and Chamza, a mysterious, exotic, rich girl who charms Lindsey right from the start.

I have to say I thought Lindsey was extraordinarily gullible and Chamza rather suspicious. I let that slide, and started to enjoy the story, but it got ever more confusing and ridiculous whenever the military tough guys joined the story. They were so over the top that they were caricatures and I could not take them seriously. From that point on, it started to go downhill and it became ever more confusing about what was going on.

I could have read 290 pages about Lindsey and Chamza because they were so fascinating, but I could barely stand to read about the back ops guys, they were such a joke. The story went on way too long - perhaps fifty percent too long as it was. I can't stand The Three Stooges either, but I'd rather have read about them than these guys, because these guys, whom I shall refer to as The Three Stogies, were far worse, chewing up the scenery and trying to out-tough each other. After I had read three-quarters of it, skimming the last 25 percent, I gave up on it, because I had no idea what was going on and at the point I could not have cared less.

Dominique Bertail's artwork was really good and I enjoyed it, but when the story went downhill, the art got to the point where it was one violent episode after another, which did not appeal to me. Worse, from my perspective, was the 180° about-turn by Lindsey, who began as a slightly shy, nervous, somewhat passive and retiring girl, and then inexplicably transmogrified into this cigarette-smoking, cocaine snorting, military knit-cap-wearing bad girl which made no sense. Not only was it thoroughly unrealistic, it made me dislike her intensely. It was around then that I quit reading the story because it had gone from a slightly outrageous, but largely believable, and intriguing adventure to a Warner Brothers cartoon. I cannot recommend this at all.

Hot and Badgered by Shelly Laurenston

Rating: WORTHY!

Errata:
"Max opened ajar of honey-covered peanuts" should be "a jar"
"I don't have a million pounds just lying around to fix my father's fuckup." - The amount is a hundred million pounds, so I don't know if this is in error or just a character misspeaking.
"she wouldn't upset Stevie by killing him." - the phrase should, I believe, be precisely the opposite: she would upset Stevie by killing him.
"I'm going to crack his jackal bones like kindle." should read " I'm going to crack his jackal bones like kindling." Let's not give Amazon's crappy app any more due than it's worth, which isn't much! Now if it had read "I'm going to crack his jackal bones like a Kindle device," I would have found that funny!
There was a section that read (in part) "...last few months, but they’re already booked through the first of the year.” that was all in Italics. I think the first word of that section, 'is', was intended to be in italics, but the rest of it was not.
There was a merged paragraph where the second person's speech ran into the first person's without having a paragraph break between them so it read, “Out.” “Fine.”
There was also a sentence which began with Or, and which should have had a question mark after it but didn't. I was too tired to copy & paste it at the time and when I tried to find that in Amazon's crappy Kindle app, I discovered that their crappy search engine isn't case specific so when I searched for "Or" it found a bizillion of them including examples such as 'door', 'before', 'woodworking', 'disorder, and on and on. It should be easy to find it in a word processor.
One last one I noticed which may or may not be a mistake. At one point there was mentioned a "duffel Dbag." I have no idea what this is. I've never heard of a duffel Dbag before, so I wonder if it might be a mistake?

This is from an advance review copy for which I thank the publisher.

So this hilarious story is about the MacKilligan sisters: Charlie, Max, and Stevie. They all have the same father, but each a different mother. They're all honey badger hybrid shifters, and all are dangerous and violent, or at least paranoid when off their meds - which at least two of them are taking. I had the opportunity to read a sneak preview back in September 2017, which turned out to be the prologue of this book. Normally I don't read prologues because they're useless and antiquated, but that was all I got back then, so I read it and I really liked the idea and the story.

I'm not a fan of urban fantasy stories or of series and this was both - at least I assume it's volume one in a series - and this is the first such volume I've read in a long time where I'd actually welcome a volume two. That's very high praise from me! For me in general, it's tedious to read stories of endless werewolves and vampires all looking the same, behaving the same, doing the same things over and over. It goes completely against my grain to read a paranormal romance - which are beyond tedious and well into laughable. This book skillfully avoided that trap and instead went for the humor and the action, and especially for the out-of-left-field off-the-wall situations and it was right up my alley. I would love to see a movie of this.

The market is glutted with bad paranormal and urban fantasy stores, most of which are boring cookie-cutter vomit, and few writers seem to have the smarts or the ability to move on and write something different. This author is definitely not in that category. I don't usually have much interest in shifter stories, but the idea of reading about honey badgers was very appealing to me. I was thrilled to get a chance to read the whole novel (minus the prologue!) and I enjoyed this one thoroughly because it was so different from the run of the mill uninventive werewolf and vampire romances. This one actually had a story! it also had a romance but thankfully that was not the point of the story and it was well written.

I have to say I am not a fan of prologues or epilogues and this book had both. I honestly do not get why authors don't simply label them chapter one and Chapter whatever-the-last-chapter-number-is. The very word 'epilogue' puts me to sleep. But I read this one and it was, in effect, the prologue to volume two. Please no more epilogues and prologues! But please, volume two!

Anyway...the MacKilligan trio's father is a shiftless shifter, a worthless piece of non-human trash, and no one knows it better than the MacKilligans themselves. When they learn that he's dead, they're thrilled by the prospect of identifying the body, but you know how this is going to turn out, right? He's alive, he has absconded with a hundred millions pounds from his Scots relatives, and they are after him, and after the MacKilligan sisters to find their father. Other people are also after them, either to recruit them because they're so violent and deadly, or to kill them because...they're so violent and deadly.

This is the world we're in and oh my, there are lions, and tigers, and bears! The MacKilligans are semi-adopted by the bears who provide some protection, but this doesn't protect them from the machinations of their father, who is as sneaky as he is dishonest, and the kind of man who would be willing even to sell his children if he thought he could come out ahead on the deal. But to put that in perspective, the MacKilligan family is widespread and not altogether properly hinged. And that's the nicest thing you can say about many of them; then there's the wedding...and cousin Dutch.

Fortunately, theres also Charlie Taylor-MacKilligan, who is equal to any challenge. And her half-sister Max, who is barely shy of psychotic, and who regularly has knock-down-drag-out fights with kid half-sister Stevie, a bona-fide genius who is completely paranoid. Especially of bears. But they're sisters, and no one better try to mess with them.

This was a really beautifully-realized world, populated with interesting individuals. Even the bad guys were fascinating and nuanced. If I had any complaints, I have to say the story was a little bit on the long side and I was somewhat disappointed it wasn't nicely wrapped-up after this volume. Also there seemed to be far too many shifters for the human population not to be completely aware of them. And I won't get into the biological issues of inter-species mating (if two animals - or plants! - can successfully mate, they're the same species!). The definition of a species is that it can't mate outside it's own species. Since this is paranormal, pretty much anything goes, but I always think it would be nice to have some sort of rationale behind it, no matter how hazy!

Like I said, not a fan of series, but I'd read volume two and follow this series if it maintained (as opposed to tainted) the high standards set in this novel. I'd even buy this volume in hardback just to have it on my shelf, so hopefully I don't have to spell out that I fully recommend this. It's one of the best books I've ever read and unquestionably the best novel I've read this year.

Secret Weapons by Eric Heisserer, Raul Allen

Rating: WORTHY!

This is from an advance review copy for which I thank the publisher.

From the guy who wrote the screenplay to the Amy Adams/Jeremy Renner movie Arrival, this was a story along the lines of Marvel's Inhumans or X-Men. People have intriguing super-abilities, but there are really amazing powers and rather oddball powers. The ones we get to meet are the ones with the oddball powers, who have been neglected, if not rejected, by those who might be interested in this kind of thing, because they're considered unimportant. One of them, for example, can talk with and understand birds; another can magically pull an object out of thin air, but he can't really control what it is he pulls; a third can turn to stone at will.

It's only as the story progresses that we can see that these powers might be of more utility than they initially appear to hold, and that they can be especially good when several such empowered people, known in this story as psiots, work together. The guy who can magically make things appear only learns later where they're coming from, and it's actually quite interesting, but not everyone is neglectful of these people. A government employee, Amanda McKee, is a technopath who can communicate with electronic systems even when she has no device in her hands.

Known by the inevitable code name of Livewire, she is investigating what's left of a facility run by Toyo Harada, who is the most powerful telepath there is. He's Amanda's former mentor and he's responsible for discovering and 'activating' these psiots. Many did not survive activation, but those who did were secreted in Harada's facility, and now they've been cast loose, abandoned to fend for themselves, which would have been fine except for the fact that a machine named Rex-O, which can absorb the powers of psiots, is hunting them down apparently intent upon wiping them out. If it absorbs Amanda's power, it can find all of them. And it's just captured her.

Although this is far from 'off-the-beaten-track' - in fact, it's on a track which has been pretty much beaten to death by now - the story was nevertheless engaging and intriguing. The characters were interesting and relatable, and they certainly made me want to follow them and see what they get up to. It helped that the artwork was good: well-drawn and nicely-colored. I liked this graphic novel, and I recommend it as a worthy read.

Hot and Badgered by Shelly Laurenston

Rating: WORTHY!

This is from an advance review copy for which I thank the publisher.

I can't honestly review this novel because all we were allowed was the first chapter! Due to a small oversight on my part I did not realize this, but based on that sole chapter, I was interested in reading more. The blurb was misleading though. The interaction between the shape-shifters: a bear (a guy of course) and a honey badger (a girl of course) bore only passing resemblance to what was described in that blurb.

I am not a fan of the vampire/werewolf stories so I normally would not have read this, but the fact that this was expressly not about wolves (which is a genre way-the-hell overdone these days), but about a bear and a badger made it more interesting to me. I'm a big advocate of authors taking that road less-traveled rather than trying to clone some other writer's work, and it pleased me that this author appears to be, too.

I have to say that the idea that a bullet hitting someone in the shoulder or arm could propel them over a balcony is preposterous! If you understand a little physics you know that those absurd gunfights in the movies and on TV, featuring grown men flying backwards after being hit is nonsensical. A bullet is so small and so fast that it will tear right through you barely if at all affecting your stance or your motion. Depending on the circumstances, you might not even notice you've been hit at first.

To paraphrase Golden Earring in their song Twilight Zone, you are likely going to know if the bullet hits a bone. It may break it, and that will cause you problems, but it still won't throw you dramatically backwards or toss you over a balcony, unless you happen to be precariously balancing on the balcony in the first place, in which case you might drop off it.

If you've seen the North Hollywood Bank of America robbery shootout from February 1997, which is admittedly grisly, you can see from it that when shot, the suspects do not go flying anywhere, and when killed, they simply drop to the ground. If you do not want to see that, it's perfectly understandable, in which case, I'd recommend watching the twelfth episode of Ray Donovan in the third season, where Ray has a shoot-out and is hit more than once. His reaction seems far more realistic than ninety percent of actors in standard TV or movie gunfights.

One thing which was a little confusing to me was the time of day that this opening chapter took place. I'd got the impression, rightly or wrongly, that it was very early morning - as in very late at night, but then we find there are school-children on the street, so I was confused, because we'd been told the streets were quiet, so I'd been thinking it was about three AM. Clearly it was not, but if it was late enough in the morning for school-kids to be out and about, how was it that the streets were so quiet, and how come a team of mercenaries could invade a hotel and not be seen and reported? And if the hit squad was specifically after Charlie (the honey-badger) then what were they doing at the grizzly's hotel room? he had no connection with her at that point. The author might want to rethink her setting and action a bit, or explain it better!

That and the irritating shortness of the sample aside, I have to admit the idea of three sisters in serious trouble and trying to figure out what's going on, sounds like a great idea for a story. As long as we don't get the grizzly bear always riding to the rescue of the poor helpless maidens in distress, like these girls can't handle themselves and need a man to validate them, which would simply ruin the story, I'd recommend it, based on the admittedly inadequate portion I had access to.

Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins

Rating: WORTHY!

In this closing volume of the trilogy, Katniss is prevailed upon to be the propaganda queen of the rebellion, which irks her. The by now rather bloodthirsty Katniss wants to fight, but she agrees to be a figurehead on condition that all the surviving Hunger Games victors are granted immunity and she herself is granted the sole right to kill President Snow.

She's relegated to the task of being a pretty face in films, but what she did not count on is Peeta appearing as the propaganda king for President Snow, even though it's obvious he has been brainwashed. He compatriots realize that this burden of what has happened to Peeta is hampering her effectiveness, so they organize a rescue upon which she is not allowed to go. The rescue is successful, but the brainwashing is deeper than anyone imagined. Peeta really does believe the propaganda he was spewing, and he tries to kill Katniss when they meet. This part was included as the finale to the second volume in the movie series.

They set Peeta on a long, slow, painful road to recovery, and in time, he becomes well enough to join them in the fight against the capital. Eventually, Katniss also takes up a weapon and begins to fight, becoming one of the important assault teams on the capital after a propaganda shoot in what was supposed to be a safe part of the capital goes completely south.

They set themselves the mission of hunting down and killing the president. Katniss's team is heavily mauled, losing soldier after soldier. Katniss becomes separated and finds herself on her own as she closes in on the president's residence, which is now housing children in the hope that it will prevent the rebels from bombing it. She espies a hover plane with capital markings dropping supplies to the children, but the parachutes explode, killing scores of them, including Katniss's young sister Prim.

This is more than Katniss's over-stressed and weakening psyche can take. The victorious President Coin, of the rebel army, orders a Hunger games using the capital's children. While waiting to take up her role of executioner in the public display of President Snow's capital punishment, Katniss encounters Snow by accident awaiting her killing him. He informs her that he did not order the parachute bombing of the children. He reminds her that he and she agreed some time ago never to lie to one another, and his explanation that if he'd had access to a hover plane he would have used it to escape (but we’re never told to where!), and that he had no reason to assassinate children and turn everyone against him rings true to Katniss. Snow indicates that the bombing was Coin's idea.

Katniss remembers that her longtime friend Gale had once arranged a trap which is disturbingly reminiscent of the attack on the children but when she confronts him, he denies responsibility. At the execution, Katniss spares Snow and shoots her arrow into Coin, instead, killing her. There is chaos after this, during which Snow himself is killed. Katniss is tried for the murder of president Coin but is acquitted by reason of insanity and is sent home to district 12 where she eventually takes up residence with Peeta, not too far away from Abernathy's home. The three of them write a book honoring the combatants in the Hunger games and the ensuing war.

As time passes and the raw edges ease, Katniss and Peeta have children and life assumes a vague semblance of normality, but Katniss dreads the day when she will have to tell her children the truth about what she did in the games and in the war.

Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins

Rating: WORTHY!

After their victory in the 74th Hunger Games, Katniss and Peeta are sent on a 'victory tour' which is nothing but propaganda. Before they depart, President Snow himself visits Katniss for a threatening heart-to-heart. Snow is concerned that her actions in the games have inspired the districts to rebel, and it is now all on her to quell that rebellion by her behavior on the tour. Unfortunately for Snow, the first stop on their tour is District 11, the same district from which young Rue hailed, and to which Katniss sent a signal of solidarity upon Rue's death, a fate which she both witnessed and avenged.

After Katniss's speech, the crowd responds, starting with someone whistling the mockingjay riff, and everyone salutes Katniss. After the tour, they visit the capital and are again featured on Caesar Flickerman's show, where Peeta publically proposes to Katniss on air in an attempt to placate President Snow. But none of this prevents unrest in the districts which become more and more agitated, bordering on open rebellion.

Back in District 12, glad to be home and out of the limelight, Katniss takes time to herself in the woods around her home and encounters two people who are fleeing the authorities from District 8. They tell her that they believe that District 13 was not wiped out, and that people still live there - indeed, that it’s a clandestine sanctuary from the influence of the capital.

The next bombshell to drop is that the 75th Hunger games is a Quarter Quell - where something special happens: on this occasion, the contestants will not be selected by lottery, but will be the winners from all of the previous Hunger games. This means, of course, that both Katniss and Peeta will be competing for the second successive year! Katniss determines that she will do whatever it takes to insure that Peeta wins. Peeta determines that he will do whatever it takes to insure that Katniss wins.

The competition is set in a jungle environment this time, not in a forest, and it has been much more manipulated than it was previous year, and much more dangerous. As the games begins, Katniss and Peeta find themselves in an uneasy alliance with another victor, Finnick, and with his aging mentor, Mags. Mags dies, but their party is bolstered with the addition of Johanna, one of those competitors who was especially trained for the games by her district. They also link up with an old couple from District 3 Beetee and Wiress. The latter soon informs them that the arena is a circular, like a clock, and it's divided into sectors, each of which is triggered in succession once every hour, to provide obstacles and dangerous events for them to overcome.

These events soon rob them of Wiress, and Beetee reveals that the electrical discharges they've been experiencing can be harnessed and employed to destroy the encompassing fence, allowing them to escape the arena. Beetee fails to accomplish this, but Katniss manages it, although she's knocked out by the discharge, and she wakes to find herself being flown to freedom in District 13 along with Finnick and Abernathy. Peeta and Johanna were captured, she learns. Later, her friend gale joins her to let her know that he got her family out, but district 12 was bombed into ruins by the capital in retaliation for Katniss's continued flouting of the capital's rules.

The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

Rating: WORTHY!

I'm in process of moving titles from my 'Novel series' page, which will be retired eventually, to the regular blog page. Here's another trilogy. I'm not normally a fan of YA trilogies, but this one was one of the rare and delightful exceptions I've encountered.

This novel - indeed this entire phenomenon - really needs no introduction, since it's been so immensely successful. The only reason I have it here is that I wanted my own review where I can reference it and know it's here and know what it contains!

Thirteen colonies surround the nation's capital in the country of Panem (read: USA). At some point in the past there was a disaster of some sort, which remains unexplained and somehow these colonies (harking back to the original 13 US colonies) were the result of it. At a point after that, some three-quarters of a century ago, the colonies rebelled against the capital, and were brutally put down, one of them (District 13) being destroyed completely, so we're told.

As a punishment for this rebellion, every year since that war, each district has been required to send two young people between the ages of 12 and 18, as a 'tribute' to the capital, where they compete against each other in a vicious survival game, the last one remaining alive being declared victor and being showered with fame and honors, except of course the 'honor' of remaining in the capital where citizens are spoiled rotten, leading lives of frivolity, extravagance, and hedonism.

If you really look at it, none of this makes any real sense, but if you’re willing to put that behind you then the story gets better! The only thing you can really blame this for is that it lamentably spawned a shit-ton of clones, none of which have ever come close to the standing this one has, and some of which (Veronica Roth I'm looking at you) are closer to a joke than to an intelligent and thoughtful adventure.

Our interest in this story begins in District 12, a coal mining district, where Katniss Everdeen, a 16-year-old girl who illegally hunts for food with a bow (why is it illegal?), and lives in squalor, poverty and endless hunger with her mother and younger sister Primrose. Her father died in a mining explosion. She often hunts with her close friend Gale, a slightly older guy. This year is the 74th Hunger Games, and each young person is required to put their name in either the boy box or the girl box, so that one of each gender will be selected. At least it’s an equal opportunity system, right? No glass ceilings here!

Candidates can put in extra copies of their name; this garners extra food for their family, but also a greater chance of being selected. A representative from the capital arrives to draw the names, and Katniss is horrified when Primrose's name is pulled out. Katniss, knowing that Prim wouldn’t survive the first five minutes of the contest quickly volunteers in place of her sister. She expects to die, and before she leaves, she begs Gale to take care of her mom and Prim. Given how close Gale and Katniss are supposed to be, and given that Gale has been putting his name into the draw extra times, you would think that he'd immediately volunteer to be her partner, but he does not. I found this rather revealing about what would happen later.

However, we also learn that Peeta Mellark, a baker's son, who tossed some bread to a starving Katniss some time before, is all but in love with her, yet he doesn't volunteer either; however, he does get picked as the male candidate, which is an amazing coincidence. Given the potential result of the games that year, it’s also amazing that there never has been a year when all candidates died!

After an all-too-brief goodbye, Katniss and Peeta are forced to board the express train to the capital. Before then, Katniss rails on her mother, who went into shock when her husband died, forcing mothering duties onto Katniss. Now her daughter gets in her face and yells at her, ordering her not to tune out if Katniss dies, because Prim needs her. On the train, the tributes meet Haymitch Abernathy, the victor of the 50th Hunger Games, who is now a professional layabout and a drunk, but he's supposed to be their coach! Katniss is still in a state of shock, but Peeta seems to be 'getting it' and playing the part of a candidate, trying to ingratiate himself with Abernathy and then with the capital populace.

They arrive in the city, overwhelmed by it all. They have a 'style' team assigned individually to each of them, and Katniss bonds quite closely with her team. Her style coach is Cinna who takes her under his wing and tries a very daring approach to their appearance at the opening night - a public exhibition of the twelve teams, viewed by a massive audience, not only in the capital, but also in the districts via public TV screens set up especially for the event.

On a show devoted to the games, each candidate is interviewed by popular TV personality Caesar Flickerman. This is their one big chance to win over the public in the hope of garnering sponsors who can help them during the games by sending in helpful gifts to aid their chosen tribute. These gifts can be food, medicine, or anything else the tribute might need to help them survive and win. The gifts are sent floating down to the tribute on a parachute. Katniss has a hard time adapting to this showmanship, but when Peeta is interviewed, last of all the tributes, he confesses his love for Katniss, and this immediately sets them apart and makes them memorable and popular, as "star-crossed" (and yes that is so overused in novels these days it's nauseating) tragic lovers, one of whom must die, although Katniss thinks he simply said it as a ploy to win sponsors.

Eventually, the games begin. The twelve candidates are arrayed around a giant cornucopia containing supplies and weapons to help the tributes in their respective killing sprees Abernathy has advised Katniss and Peeta to get away from the initial carnage - to not even try to grab anything, but to flee from it and hide. He advised Katniss to play to her strengths, living off the land, staying out of the way as the other tributes whittle each other down. The slaughter is horrific, with almost fifty percent of the tributes dying right there at the start.

Katniss follows Abernathy's advice, but she manages to snag a backpack with some useful things in it, and she gets away and hides out in trees. She uses her hunting skills, and desperately tries to find water to slake her terrible thirst in the hot and dry forest in those first few days. After a day or two, she runs into Rue, a diminutive tribute from District 11, who reminds Katniss of Prim. She takes Rue under her wing, forming an alliance, which would seem to be of benefit only to Rue, yet Katniss learns some useful things from her little partner.

She's disturbed to find that Peeta appears to have formed his own alliance, with a group of tributes from the richer districts, which can afford to specially train their best people for the games, and whose tributes frequently win. But Peeta is playing on Katniss's team, and he gives Katniss and desperately needed break when he actually does have a chance to kill her.

To Katniss's horror, despair, and anger, her little friend Rue is killed with a spear, a death for which Katniss immediately exacts revenge with a knee-jerk loosing of an arrow at Rue's attacker. Things really start to get out of hand as Katniss sings an old nursery rhyme to Rue as she dies, before collecting flowers, and placing them on her chest, laying Rue's hands gently over them. She raises her hand in a signal of respect to District 11, and this signal becomes a rallying call.

As Katniss is beginning to fall into despair over Rue's death, an announcement comes over the speakers which are all over the artificial games arena: there has been a change of rules which now permits any two tributes from the same district to win as a pair. This fires Katniss up to seek out Peeta, and she eventually discovers him badly wounded, and hiding beneath one of his amazingly-painted disguises.

Katniss nurses him back to health, playing the part a girl in love to curry favor with sponsors, and it works. Peeta recovers and they manage to kill the last tribute, remaining as the sole two game winners, but the organizers cruelly change the rule again, trying to force the two of them to battle it out to the bitter end. Katniss rebels against this and she and Peeta agree to swallow the poisonous berries, but the organizers chicken out at this, not daring to have a game with no winner. Katniss and Peeta are declared to be the first joint winners of the games.

Abernathy warns Katniss that she has now painted a target on her back by defying the game organizers in front of the entire Hunger Games audience. So the author achieved a satisfying ending to the first volume, without leaving an unnatural cliff-hanger, and without making the first volume nothing more than a prologue. YA authors could learn a lot from Suzanne_Collins, but she's also now in the unenviable 'Rowling' position of having reached her peak with her first real effort, and seemingly having nowhere to go, but downhill from here! You can't win in this game, can you?!

James Bond Hammerhead by Andy Diggle, Luca Casalanguida

Rating: WORTHY!

This is from an advance review copy for which I thank the publisher!

This is the second of three graphic novels I'm reviewing this weekend, and I started out thinking I wasn't going to like this, but it won me over as I read on! It's not your movie James Bond. Luca Casalanguida's illustrations bear no relation to any Bond from the silver screen. This Bond harks back much more to the traditional Ian Fleming Bond (there's even a cover shown towards the back which pays homage to the paperback Bond novels of the fifties and early sixties). It's not exactly Ian Fleming's conception of the character (who Fleming believed should look like a cross between Hoagy Carmichael and himself!), but it admirably fits the bill. That said, it's a very modern story in a modern world, so while it felt like a clean break from the movies in some regards, Andy Diggle tells a story worthy of any screenplay.

There's everything here you've come to expect from Bond: a big plot, continual action, a terrorist on the loose with a cool code-name, subterfuge, assassination attempts, double-cross, daring Bond exploits, and the inevitable cool Bond girl. Bond begins the story in the doghouse. M, in this story not a woman but an Anglo-African, kicks him out to an arms convention in Dubai where he meets Lord Hunt - Britain's biggest arms dealer, and his sophisticated and charming daughter, Victoria, who knows her way around weapons of any calibre!

Unfortunately, Lord Hunt is assassinated, and Bond and the young Lady Hunt are thrown together in pursuit of the villains, so once again, Bond is back in business looking for super villain Kraken, who seems to be targeting the very thing the Hunt weapons manufacturing concern is charged with renewing: Britain's aging nuclear deterrent. Bond is of course led astray, but in the end gets back on track, and saves the day.

Note that this Bond is a violent one, and the artist shows no fear of illustrating that violence. This might have been rather shocking before Bond was rebooted with Daniel Craig stepping into the role and making it more gritty and brutal, but still, there's rather more gore and red ink here than you see in the movies, so be warned of that. Overall, I really liked it, and I recommend this as a worthy read.

Lady Mechanika Vol. 2: The Tablet of Destinies by Joe Benítez, MM Chen, Martin Montiel, Mike Garcia

Rating: WARTY!

This combines volumes one through six of the original comic books and was an advance review copy for which I thank the publisher.

In a beautifully wrought steam-punk world, the young daughter of a friend of Lady Mechanika's is in need of assistance, and the Lady responds. Her father has disappeared on a quest in Africa, and Mechanika sets out to find out what happened. Her quest is lent added urgency when the young girl is kidnapped. Mechanika meets a mysterious guy in London, who offers air transportation to Germany, where the kidnap victim is, and where lies another clue pointing to a specific site in Africa, so they set off there, only to crash in the desert and be taken prisoner by slavers!

Meanwhile in interleaved portions, we get the view from the other end of this quest, where the professor and his assistant are under pressure to decipher ancient scripts and uncover what the villains believe is an unprecedentedly powerful weapon.

The adventure was well-written, fast-moving, and full of action and feisty characters, including the distressed young girl at the start. The artwork was beautifully done and colored. That alone would have been sufficient for me to rate this graphic novel as a worthy read, but what bothered me too much here was what I let slip by in volume one, and it was the sexualization of all the female characters. When the blurb says, "Lady Mechanika immediately drops everything" it really means her clothes, and for me, this is what brought this particular volume down.

I found it disturbing, because Mechanika is fine regardless of her physical appeal or lack of same! She doesn't need to be rendered in endlessly sexual ways to be an impressive character. It's sad that graphic novel creators seem so completely ignorant of this fact. It's like they have this phobia that their female characters are going to be useless and entirely unappealing unless their sexuality is exploited. I'm not sure if this failing says more about the creators or about their readership, but either way it's obnoxious and I sincerely wish they had more faith in women than they evidently do. Do we really want to be writing comics which only appeal to people who see women as sex objects and very little else? Do we really want to be perpetuating a message as clueless as it is antiquated, and which offers only the sleazy equation that girls = sex = girls? I hope not.

This abuse was bordering on being abused in the first volume, but it was nowhere near as rife as it was here, so why they went full metal lack-it in this one is a mystery. Unlike in the first volume, it was all-pervasive here, with full-page in-your-face images of scantily clad adventurers bursting at what few seams they had, entirely impractically dressed for their quest.

I guess I should be grateful that the African woman who joined Lady Mechanika wasn't bare-breasted, but what I most noticed about Akina (other than the fact that she at least had a Congolese name) was that she looked like your typically white-washed model from Ebony magazine, not like the Congolese woman she supposedly was, whose skin would have been darker, and her face broader and less Nordic-nosed-white-westerner than this woman's was.

Why are comic book artists so afraid of showing the real world? Do they think real Congolese women are unappealing? Or is it that they feel they cannot sell the sexuality of a black woman (as opposed to a pale brown one)? If this medium is to grow-up and maintain relevance and meaning, then this kind of bias needs to be dispensed with urgently, because it's bone-headed at best, and racist at worst.

So, despite the appeal of the art in general, and the entertainment value of the story, I can't condone these practices, and I cannot rate positively a graphic novel which is so brazenly perpetrating abuses like this one did.

Lady Mechanika, Vol.1: the Mystery of Mechanical Corpse by Joe Benítez, Peter Steigerwald

Rating: WORTHY!

This gathers volumes 1 through five of the single comic books and was an advance review copy for which I thank the publisher.

I had a better experience with this one than I did with the second volume of the series, which I requested at the same time as this. The steam-punk world is rendered and colored beautifully, and the story was an intriguing and entertaining one, well told. Lady Mechanika is a cyborg - inasmuch as such things went in Edwardian times. I am by no means a fashion expert, not even in modern times, so I may have this wrong, but the styles didn't look Victorian to me, notwithstanding what the blurb says. That's not a problem, just an observation. I rather liked them as it happens. Joe Benítez and Peter Steigerwald could probably make a living as fashion designers if they ever tire of comic books!

Lady Mechanika is quite evidently someone's creation, but her memory is impaired, so her origins are as much of a mystery to her as they are to us. I am wondering if the guy she meets in volume two (reviewed separately) might have some knowledge of that, but it remains a mystery in that volume, too! Her mechanical parts are her limbs, and her 'title' was given to her by the tabloids. Her backstory isn't delivered here or in volume two, so we don't know how she came to be a private investigator and adventurer. I was interested in this story because of the upcoming (as of this writing) live-action remake of the Ghost in the Shell movie, which is a favorite of mine. I'm looking forward to the new one.

When the story opens, the Lady meets the 'Demon of Satan's Alley' which appears to be some sort of a human animal hybrid and which isn't a demon but which has been demonized by the public. Some crazy guys blunder in and kill it before Lady Mechanika can talk to it enough to maybe find out what it knows of its past - and maybe of hers, too. She's not best pleased by that. Soon she's off adventuring and trying to track down this creator of mechanical melanges. In this regard, the story has some resemblances to Ghost in the Shell, including the overt and unnecessary sexuality.

There were some technical issues with this as there are with all graphic novels which have not yet clued themselves in to the electronic age. In BlueFire Reader, which is what I use on the iPad, the pages are frequently enlarging themselves to fill the screen which means a portion of the page is curt off, since the iPad screen and the comic book page size are out of whack compared with each other, the comic book being a little too 'tall and slim' for the 'stouter' table format.

This is something I can work with, but whenever there's a double-page spread, it means turning the tablet from portrait view to landscape and back again for the next page. This isn't such a hassle except that the tablet is self-orienting, so the page is constantly swinging around like a loose yard-arm on a boat at sea.

One image was a portrait-oriented double-page spread, and it was so set-up that I could not orient this to view it since the image always swung to the wrong orientation no matter what i did! The only way to actually see it as intended by the creators was to orient it as a landscape, then carefully lay the pad flat and rotate it while it stayed flat; then the image was view-able in all its glory, but this only served to highlight one other problem - the minuscule text. It's far too small for comfortable reading. I know comics are all about imagery, but for me, unless there's also a decent story, all you really have, is a pretty coffee-table art book. It seems to me that artists and writers might consider collaborating a bit more closely on legibility!

This is going to become increasingly a problem as the old school comic fraternity struggles to repel all technology boarders. Personally, I prefer e-format to print format as a general rule, if only because it's kinder to trees, which are precious. The sentiment is especially poignant when we read horror stories to the effect that 80,000 copies of Jonathan Franzen's novel Freedom had to be pulped because of typos. At 3 kg of carbon emissions per book, that's not a charmed system. You would need to read a hundred books for every one print book to balance the manufacturing pollution of an e-reader against that of the print version, but then your ebook comes over the wire at very little cost to the environment, whereas the print book has to be transported to you, even if only home from the store in your car.

But you can also argue the other side, which is that reading devices employ petrochemical products, and precious and toxic metals, and probably contains 'conflict' minerals which were mined in the Congo (curious given the location for volume two in this series!); however, you can argue that a multi-use device, such as a tablet or a smart phone, can be employed as an ebook reader without contributing to even more environmental carnage than it might already have caused. On the other page, you can also argue that a book never needs upgrading (as countless young-adult Jane Austen rip-offs have conclusively proven), will last for years, and can be recycled when done with. So you pays your greenbacks and you hopes you get the green back.

For this volume, I think it worth reading in any format, and I recommend it if you can overlook the sexploitation which is relatively restrained in this volume.

Caribbean's Keeper by Brian Boland

Rating: WORTHY!

Errata:
"began to peal the skin back" 'peal' should be 'peel' unless the skin is ringing like a bell!
"from where the helo had come from" - too many 'from's! The last one needs deleting.
"Cole treaded in place and watched it" The past tense of 'tread' is 'trod'. Don't you love English?!
"Cole bid his time and made idle chatter with Tony." The past tense of bide is bided, bit bid (and apparently even Google doesn't know this!).

I was invited by Open Road Media to read this advance review copy, and I was glad I got the chance!

The author was actually in the Coastguard, so he knows what he's talking about, which always helps! I have a brother-in-law who is in the Coastguard and have nothing but respect for the job he does - so yeah, call me biased! This novel felt real, and the descriptions were very evocative. The story unfolded naturally. It was credible. It felt like being there in many ways, which makes for a really nice read! Of course, the plot counts too, more-so than the descriptions for me, but that was also appealing and felt authentic. I haven't been to any of the places the author mentions: Curaçao, Martinique, Nicaragua, Panama, and so on, and my experience in Florida is very limited, but there was nothing here that struck me as implausible or dumb.

The story is of Cole (yeah, I know. Hardly my favorite character name, but at least it wasn't 'Jack', in which case I would have flatly refused to read the novel at all!). Cole is a Coastguard operative who gets kicked out for his rather unruly behavior and his disregard for the rules on occasion. Out of work, he drifts a little in Florida and eventually, to make ends meet, starts working on a tour boat. It's hardly his style, but it pays and he gets to room with one of the guys he works with, someone he likes and gets along with.

Over time he notices that this guy Kevin, has something going on on the side and as the two grow to trust each other, Cole finds himself involved in the smuggling of Cubans into Florida. So far so good, but Cole is not only a functional alcoholic (at least that's how he came off to me) he's also an Adrenalin junkie, and the kick he gets from outrunning and outfoxing his old colleagues in the Coastguard starts to be insufficient for him. Like every addict, Cole wants more. That's how he gets into drug-running, but there's no loyalty in that world. You upset the cartel kingpins and they're going to come gunning for you - literally. This is the story of how Cole survived and who he met along the way.

It was gripping and engaging, and just as importantly, it was realistic. It really felt like any and all of this could have happened. It was like reading a good James Bond thriller, and I kept wanting to turn the next page to find out what happens. The book is not too long, not too short, and makes for really easy reading. The ending felt a little bit abrupt, but it was right, and I'd rather have it come to a halt like that, than have the author just write on and on not knowing quite where to stop. Plus it's a single volume as far as I know, so not being a fan of series, this worked well for me. I recommend it for anyone who wants an adventure with a likable rogue (despite his faults) who is in it for the thrills, only to discover that underneath it all, he actually has a conscience. Great story.

Velvet Before the Secret Lives of Dead Men vol 2 by Ed Brubaker, Steve Epting, Elizabeth Breitweiser

Rating: WORTHY!

This is the second collected volume of one of the best graphic novels I've read in a long time. Unfortunately it's the start of a series, so I have to pick up more volumes. Had it been a novel, it would have been self-contained in one volume. I'm not a fan of series, but this one was good enough that I am interested in reading more, despite it being a royal pain! Unfortunately, there are no more compendium volumes beyond the second one at this point, as far as I can tell, which is annoying, especially since this series began in 2013. If the author would finish one series before moving on to another, maybe he'd get the one finished in a reasonable amount of time?!

Note that I've read only the compendium issues. Volume two covers original issues six through ten. Since volume fourteen isn't due until January 2016, I'm guessing it's going to be a while before the third compendium is released. Meanwhile I'm going to be looking for individual issues!

The story is set in the past, and has flashbacks into the more distant past, which was slightly annoying, but not too bad (I'm not a fan of flashbacks). This is very much a spy thriller in the mode of James Bond. It's set in Britain, but whereas James Bond has ties, tenuous as they are, to real British intelligence services, this is a secret service with a code-name. Other than that it's very much James Bond.

There are two big differences, both of which I approve. The first of these is that the agent taking the spotlight here isn't a male, but a female, and secondly, this female isn't a 'pretty young thing', but a mature woman. It's like Moneypenny left Bond behind and went on the mission herself, except that this isn't a recent Moneypenny. This is the Lois Maxwell Moneypenny and the novel works the better for it because it focuses on her tenacity, dedication, intelligence, and skill, and not on sexuality. I really liked of all of this.

This story continues full throttle from the first one, with Velvet, retired secret agent, who was very much a Moneypenny before she was forced to take up the role of field agent after she discovered she had been set up by someone high up in her own agency. The story jets across Europe and out to the Bahamas and back (another nod to James Bond), with Velvet Templeton having to remember skills and contacts from her field days many years before, and having to tread lightly and seek to forge contacts and even alliances with people from the past - some of whom were not on the same side of the intelligence services as she was. It ends in a cliffhanger since there are more volumes to come after this open, of course. I liked this very much and recommend the series (at least this far!)

Velvet Before the Living End vol 1 by Ed Brubaker, Steve Epting, Elizabeth Breitweiser

Rating: WORTHY!

This is one of the best graphic novels I've read in a long time. Unfortunately it's the start of a series, so I have to pick up more volumes. Had it been a novel, it would have been self-contained in one volume. I'm not a fan of series, but this one was good enough that I am interested in reading more, despite it being a royal pain! Unfortunately, there are no more volumes beyond two at this point, as far as I can tell, which is annoying, especially since this series began in 2013. If the author would finish one series before moving on to another, maybe he'd get the one finished in a reasonable amount of time?! Note that I read the compendium issues. This is volume one, which covers original issues one through five.

The story is set in the past, and has flashbacks into the more distant past, which was slightly annoying, but not too bad (I'm not a fan of flashbacks). This is very much a spy thriller in the mode of James Bond. It's set in Britain, but unlike with James Bond which has ties, tenuous as they are, to real British intelligence services, this is a secret service with a code-name. Other than that it's very much James Bond, including, at one point, the iconic Aston Martin of the Goldfinger movie fame.

There are two big differences, both of which I approve. The first of these is that the agent taking the spotlight here isn't a male, but a female, and secondly, this female isn't a 'pretty young thing', but a mature woman. It's like Moneypenny left Bond behind and went on the mission herself, except that this isn't a recent Moneypenny. This is the Lois Maxwell Moneypenny and the novel works the better for it because it focuses on her tenacity, dedication, intelligence, and skill, and not on sexuality. I really liked of all of this.

Obviously, since it's espionage of this nature, there is a secret and a betrayal. I have no idea what it is, since the story is unfinished at this point! I can say that I loved the dialog, the artwork, and the story overall. It was fun, made all the right moves, was believable and enjoyable, and I definitely recommend it.

Dead Man's Party by Jeff Marsick

Rating: WORTHY!

With remarkable art work from Barnett Scott, and a great story from Jeff Marsick, this graphic novel, volume one of a series, tells an engaging tale which I enjoyed from start to finish (the finish of volume one, that is!). Yes, there is some gore and violence in it, but not over much, especially given the subject matter. I felt like I'd read this story before, but I can't actually recall one with this plot, so maybe it just reminded me of stories I've read or movies I've seen.

There are elements of the first of the Bourne movies here, but this is neither a Jason Bourne clone, nor is it a rip-off. It also has elements of the Dennis Quaid movie D.O.A.. The world's most successful assassin, known as Ghost, returns after his last successful hit, and gets his usual medical check up. He discovers he has cancer and maybe only two months to live. A second opinion confirms the diagnosis. Rather than be taken down by his own traitorous cells, he decides to throw a dead Man's Party, whereby five fellow assassins are to compete to take him down, the successful executioner to inherit all his worldly goods, and more importantly, his mantle.

The problem is, as Ghost discovers, that he's been had for a sucker. There's nothing wrong with him. Someone just wants him taken out. He can't renege on the contract now it's out there, so now he has to take down those five assassins before they take him down. How is he going to do that, when they seem to be able to find him no matter what he does? Is there anyone he can trust?

Tightly told, beautifully drawn, and excitingly laid out, I really enjoyed this novel and I recommend it.

Jim Butcher's Dresden Files: Down Town by Jim Butcher, Mark Powers

Rating: WARTY!

I've read some of the Dresden Files graphic novels before and couldn't get into them. Unlike with his Codex Alera series, which I loved, the Dresden files never got me interested. I tried watching the short-lived TV show and that was a bust, too. So why pick this one? Well, this story gave him an assistant, which I'd never encountered before in this series, so I thought that might be interesting - adding a dynamic that was never there before.

I was particularly intrigued, given what an impoverished situation he was in (your standard clichéd, struggling private dick kind of a deal), how he had even taken on an assistant, but this was adequately explained. The problem is that this is about all I remembered of this story when I came to write this review several days after reading it. That's not always a bad sign, but it's typically not a good one!

In this story, Harry Dresden, a Chicago-based wizard-for-hire, has taken on an apprentice, Molly Carpenter. The blurb describes her as a "new" apprentice", and this is actually the case, I'm informed, because he had another assistant prior to this one, so this is indeed his new assistant. He only took her on to spare her from being slaughtered by the white council. Dresden is apparently planning on bringing down a villain described as a mad sorcerer who wants to take over the city. My question is: why not just run for mayor? Or magic himself into that job?! It made no sense!

The sorcerer is in league with gangster Johnnie Marcone. Will Harry be able to hold his own or will Molly have to hold it for him? I don't know. I got to about 80% in and lost patience with this one. The story wasn't that great to begin with, and I was finding pages missing text - they had empty speech balloons throughout. This was on Bluefire reader on the iPad. Even one such page is bad for a review copy in this day and age, but many such pages? Not acceptable. I had no idea what the characters were saying or thinking, and pretty soon I realized that I really didn't care. It was time to move on to something more engaging - and wordy! I can't recommend this.

Drones by Chris Lewis

Rating: WARTY!

The test of whether a novel is a worthy read is what you recall of it afterwards. You don't need to recall it all in perfect detail, by any means, to know you liked it, but if you recall the overall plot and some fondly remembered details, it did its job. That's the problem I had with Drones - a few days after I read it and came to write this review, I discovered I couldn't remember a thing about it and I realized that I would have to leaf through it to refresh my memory. I do remember I didn't finish it because the story was nonsensical to me and uninteresting. Of course your mileage may differ. I hope it does, but this is my take on it.

This was supposed to be a satire on terrorism, but it fell flat for me. It was really hard to follow what was really going on, and since it mixed 'real life' (the main characters are drone pilots) with 'fiction' (they take a few days off in Vegas and stay at a "terrorism themed hotel"), it was also hard to grasp at first whether there was real terrorism was going on in Vegas, or whether it was just "play".

I know it was satirical, but after starting into this, I really began to find the theme abhorrent, and the action totally confusing. Half the time I had no idea what was going on or how we got to this page from the previous page, and it quickly became tedious to read, and not at all engaging to my mind. I quit reading at around the 75% mark because I had better things to do with my life than to sit through any more of this trying to figure out what was going on. I can't recommend it. If the art work had been brilliant, that might have made some difference, but it was merely workman-like, and while it wasn't bad, it had nothing special to recommend it.

Echo: Collider by Terry Moore

Rating: WORTHY!

This is not the last in the series, but it is the last which my local library has for loan. Now I have to dig up the last two volumes or preferably find the entire series, which I believe is available in a single volume now.

I recommend this whole series - at least this far, and I have to add that it's hard to believe it will fizzle when it's been so strong so far. We learn that Ivy has a young, sick daughter - to add to her many other facets. We also learn something of a bombshell about her - or at least we see it hinted at - at the end. We also get a new and deadly assassin hired to take out Julie, and the return of a character who "died" in an earlier issue - Hong. Somehow, he is resurrected, and turns into something out of a fifties B horror movie - The Mummy meets The Creature From the Black Lagoon, or something! We also learn what HeNRI's end game is - they don't want Julie dead so much as want her armor so they can put it into a collider and smash the substance at itself in order to create a black hole.

Terry Moore's understanding of how dangerous black holes are has a huge black hole in it. A black hole does not have infinite gravity. It has only a fixed amount which is, as with all gravity, proportional to its mass, so if you create a black hole the same mass as a tennis ball, it's going to have no more gravitational pull than does a tennis ball. In order to destroy Earth, you'd have to have a truly massive black hole which you can't generate in a particle collider because the masses of those particles are minuscule. And you can only collide particles - not alloys, so I have no idea where he got this physics from - or worse, where HeNRI got it from. The fact is that if their understanding is so disgracefully flawed, then they're no threat at all!

But I was willing to let that slide for the fun of the story and the excellent way it's told. I can see this making a fine movie, if it's handled right, and if so, I would definitely pay to see it.

Echo: Desert Run by Terry Moore

Rating: WORTHY!

Volume Three of this six part (30 issue) series was another winner for me. It opens in the crater blown into the desert highway by Julie in defense against the vagrant dude. Thinking he is dead, Julie also thinks Dillon is dead - or near to it, and she hauls him off in the truck, but unaccountably stops short of finding as hospital and hugs him, thereby healing him. This, she did not expect thinking of herself solely as a weapon. Ivy meanwhile visits Julie's home and finds a box with something intriguing inside, but we do not learn what it is.

It's in this volume that we learn that Julie's new suit isn't just the Plutonium alloy, but also contains some of Annie, Dillon's supposedly dead girlfriend. Now Julie starts feeling what Annie felt, and thinking what she thought. Is this the start of a meld, or a takeover? Julie doesn't know. Ivy, now embarking on a phase of this relationship that is less chasing down Julie and more getting to know Julie and becoming highly suspicious of the secret agency HeNRI. When Ivy learns that Julie healed Dillon, she realizes that she has an off-label use for Julie for herself.

The story continues to thrill and intrigue, art work continues to please - what's not to recommend?