YALSA top ten GNs 2009: Pitch Black

 
Pitch Black 
Written and illustrated by Youme Landowne and Anthony Horton.
Published by Cinco Puntos Press (2008).

If most people were approached by a large, black, homeless man on the New York subway they'd probably attempt to avoid any sort of conversation and possible even just get off the train entirely. But for whatever reason Youme Landowne didn't. Instead she met Anthony Horton, and spent a lot of time talking to him about art, life, and homelessness.

Vancouver (where I live) is like many cities in that it has a large homeless population. And while the Downtown Eastside might seem pretty terrible, it really can't compare to some of the places around the world. However, even when I see and am aware of homeless people in the city, it can be really easy to ignore them, or forget that they are humans with feelings, emotions, and pasts. (Though to be fair, I can forget about that for pretty much any human, homeless or not.)

Compared to many Horton seems to have had a pretty terrible life in a lot of ways, and the cards were clearly stacked against him from the start. He bounced around foster homes after his parents gave him up, and never learned to read or write or any other real skills.  He spent some time living in shelters, but found them worse than living outside. Eventually he found his way down to the subway tunnels, where he encountered other people, and made various homes for himself over the years.

In Pitch Black he shows Landowne where he lived, talks about his rules for survival ("Remember, anything you need can be found in the garbage"), and tells her about his friends who had helped him survive. In it's attempt to humanize Horton it manages to be sad, terrifying, and touching in equal parts.

The art by Landowne is not something that would work with a lot of stories. It seems to be lacking a lot of the detail and consistency that I associate with "good" comic book art. But somehow the thick, wavy panel borders and lines, the grey smudgy colour, and the art that sometimes feels as though it were cut off by the edge of the page does a good job of capturing what the underground tunnel system is like: grimy, claustrophobic, and dangerous. It doesn't look clean and it doesn't look safe, and thankfully due to this Landowne manages to avoid making living in subway tunnels seem appealing. (I mean, doesn't everyone want to do that?)

At about 60 pages this book is not that long, and the art is not the best by most standards, but as a whole the comic does manage to capture some of what it feels like to be homeless. Reading Pitch Black can help you understand how difficult life can be for some people, but also that no matter who they are people are still people and still have wants, needs, and rights.

After reading this comic I'd hoped that Horton had managed to improve his life to some extent, but  it seems as though up until his death in a fire in 2012 he continued to be homeless. Not exactly the uplifting note you want a story like this to end on, but sadly, real life doesn't work that way.

YALSA top ten 2008: Blue Beetle

 

Blue Beetle (Volumes 1-2)
Written by Keith Giffen and John Rogers. Illustrated by Cully Hamner, Rafael Albuquerque, and others.
Published by DC Comics (2006-2007)

So ages and ages ago I was originally going to read and review these graphic novels in something more like chronological order, and I read (or attempted) to read books from the first few years of these awards. (This plan didn't last long.) In the case of Blue Beetle my local library system didn't have the first two volumes of Blue Beetle, so I read every other Blue Beetle thing they had at the time. Since lots of copies of books had gone missing, this amounted to two books, a later volume of this series (Vol. 4: End Game), and the Blue Beetle Companion, which tracked the history of the character from the 1930s up to around 2008 and educated me about the Blue Beetle radio show from 1940 (it is terrible).

There's really no reason to mention this, because now I've actually read the first two volumes, but I figured I needed to link to those radio shows _somehow_. Anyway, reading the first volume of Blue Beetle nine years after it came out is somewhat confusing. Now, this is because Blue Beetle is a shared universe superhero title, and like many of them it refers to other superhero comics that were coming out at the time. I didn't realize/remember this (despite the fact that I think I've read this volume before), and really it's not that big of a deal, but there's some amount of story that's happening in the Infinite Crisis event crossover that isn't really explained that well/at all until the second volume.

Okay! So what is Blue Beetle about? It's about a kid who finds a magic (or alien?) scarab beetle thing  that gives him crazy cool armour and he (of course) becomes a superhero. Of course, there are some fun bits that do make it different from Spider-Man or other teenage heroes. First, it's set in El Paso, which actually has way more superpowered people than you would expect, but also doesn't exactly have Superman hanging out. Second, Jaime's parents know he's the Blue Beetle, this leads to some pretty fun interactions between them when they're asking if he has his homework done before he can head out to save the world.

The design for this Blue Beetle is still pretty cool looking, and I think it's kind of impressive how this version of Blue Beetle has actually become the one that is shown in other media. The Jaime Reyes Blue Beetle appeared in Smallville, Batman: The Brave and the Bold, Young Justice, a number of video games, and even a live action test trailer for a TV show.. That probably makes him one of the more successful non-white superhero characters ever, let alone one that was created less than a decade ago.

While these two volumes do feature six pencillers over twelve issues, the art manages to stay fairly consistent. There's also some pretty nice colouring in there that I wasn't expecting. (There's also some fairly terrible colouring that makes it seem as though Jaime has horrible growths on his face instead of facial hair, but you can't win them all.)

So the art's generally well done, the supporting cast (and their relationships with each other) is pretty good, the mystery about the scarab is decent, Jaime is a likeable character, and the book overall is fun. (This is what people have been saying for about a decade now...) If you gave me more issues I'd read them. Mostly though, I think I'm just glad that Jaime has proven popular enough to still be around, and not be killed off in some crossover or other like so many other characters.

YALSA top ten GNs 2008: King of Thorn

King of Thorn (Volumes 1-2)

Written and illustrated by Yuji Iwahara.

Published by Tokyopop (2007)

Sometimes a book can deliver everything you want, despite what the author's original intents were. But more on that later. I'm trying to get into the habit of reading books and comics without knowing anything about them. I don't read the blurb on the back (spoilers!), and it's often so long since I added the book to my "to read" list that I don't even remember why I wanted to read it in the first place. So I go in with no knowledge of what's going to happen at all except for whatever's on the cover. This means that early twists and surprises actually surprise me!

The cover of King of Thorn doesn't really reveal anything about the story at all (there are humans and monsters?), but I remember years ago thinking about reading this book because I really enjoyed the way the cover was designed. The use of blank white space within the "thorns" seeming to "eat" into the rest of the image, while the soft purple-y colour of the cover made it stand out to me for some reason. Maybe it's just that the colour purple being used on the cover is supposed to sell more comics.

Inside the story starts by revealing that a terrible disease, the Medusa virus, is turning people into stone and killing them and...hold on, isn't this the plot at the beginning of Eden: It's an Endless World? Kasumi is one of a pair of twins who have contracted the virus, but she alone has been chosen as one of 160 people to be placed into suspended animation in hopes that a cure will be uncovered. There's plenty of angst about leaving her sister behind as she's placed into the capsule and put to sleep.

And then...dinosaur attack! Okay, the dinosaur attack doesn't happen _yet_. First we jump forward some unknown amount of time into the future. The lab which holds the cryo-capsules has been completely overgrown with huge vines covered in thorns. Some of the capsules seem to be completely destroyed, but a number are still intact and people start to wake up and wonder what on Earth is going on. Then the dinosaur, or at least a giant lizard creature, attacks. In the ensuing fear, panic, and stampedes most of the survivors end up dead, leaving only seven people alive. The rest of the book follows their attempt to escape from the building, but floating over their heads is the dark realization that the virus which caused them to be placed into cryogenic sleep in the first place hasn't been cured, and the longest any of them has to live is six weeks. Gripping stuff!

So what was the thing I disliked about this book? The main character. The girl on the cover with huge glasses and who, as you can probably guess if you've ever read any manga, is a shy and awkward teenage schoolgirl who is also nice and kind and maybe brave. She has seemingly no characteristics beyond that, practically sleepwalks through the plot, getting rescued multiple times, and could, in my opinion, just not have been included at all. I feel like I've seen this character in numerous manga before (though, I could not actually tell you which ones), and they're not a character type that I really care for. A character can have self doubt over their actions, but Kasumi's self doubt (at least in this volume) is whether she should even bother continuing to live. It's survivor's guilt that starts before she even enters the capsule. I'm assuming that Iwahara wants us to identify with, or at least care about, Kasumi, but it wouldn't bother me if she died in volume two. Actually, that'd be pretty gutsy so I'd be impressed, but I'm doubting that'll happen.

The other characters aren't that much better: there's a kid, a woman (who of course ends up looking after the kid), an older rich business man guy, another guy (who apparently has less of a personality than Kasumi), a black guy (who is of course big and strong), and a super 1337 hacker criminal (the big muscley guy with the tattoos on the cover). The hacker is, at least so far, the real protagonist insofar as he has driven pretty much every element of the plot: leading the characters, suggesting plans, coming up with ideas, saving people, thinking about what's going on. He's a stereotype too, but one I'm more interested in reading about.

Still the entire plot and situation of the comic really grabbed me, even if the characters themselves didn't seem like anything particularly special. I'm totally ready to read more of this series (especially since, as it's only six volumes long, it will actually end), but unfortunately the VPL only has volume 1 and every volume is out of print since Tokyopop, its original publisher, has basically not existed as a company in several years. Thankfully it doesn't look like prices on the secondary market are that high, so hopefully I can pick them up somewhere. I'm also interested in checking out some of Iwahara's other series, two of which, I've just discovered, have been translated into English.

YALSA top ten 2008: After School Nightmare

After School Nightmare (Volumes 1-5)
Written and illustrated by Setona Mizushiro.
Published by Go! Comi (Volume 1, 2006; Volumes 2-5, 2007)

When I read a comic (or a book, or watch a TV show, etc.) and I really have problems with it I tend to go and read reviews to see if other people had similar problems or if they could justify their experience in a way that made sense to me. (I also do this with media I really enjoy, except then I read reviews of people who hated whatever I liked.) However, when the opinion I have is not only not reflected in any other review I can find, but not even mentioned, I guess I feel as though I'm not reading the comic "right". That's really the case with After School Nightmare: I have multiple problems with it, but nobody else even talks about what I think are sorta serious issues. Now, this is a ten volume series, and the first five were all listed (as one item) on the top ten list, but I only read the first book. (The copy I borrowed was also missing a page at the beginning, that was actually kind of important, but I read it online.)

First of all I admit, and this is going to come up multiple times as I read the comics on these YALSA lists, that I am not a teenage girl and, in fact, have never been one. Thus, shojo comics (Japanese comics aimed at teenage girls) are not something I enjoy very often. I haven't read that much, but other than like Sailor Moon and Magic Knight Rayearth (both of which I read back in the '90s), I'm not sure if I've actually enjoyed any shojo comics at all. So why is this? I mean, I've read and enjoyed the Baby-sitters Club graphic novel that Raina Telegemeier did, so I'm clearly not _that_ averse to comics aimed at young females (though there are lots of western ones that I also don't care for), but clearly something about these titles hasn't clicked with me. However, even saying something like that is unfair, as shojo isn't a genre, and the titles published under that title can be anything from sports to science fiction. But of the ones I've read, the overly dramatic characters and focus on absurd "romances" have left me cold.

After School Nightmare is set in a bizarre school where students have to attend a "class" where they are put to sleep and must reveal their true selves/darkest secrets to other students. In order to graduate they have to find a "key" which is hidden inside the body of another student. This is kind of weird, though I'd be more okay with it if there wasn't so much non-consent involved. The mysterious "nurse" who tells the main character that they have to do this doesn't tell them what it is they have to do or what's going to happen beforehand (or even afterwards!), instead they just drug them with some weird type of tea, and another student eventually explains what this "class" is about. After the main character has unwillingly entered a dream world where students get to repeatedly relive horrible experiences like sexual and physical assault.

But that's not even my real problem with this comic, and we'll get to that in a second after I give a brief plot overview. The main character Ichijo Mashiro's "upper half is male" and their "lower half is female", and a major element of the plot is them trying to come to terms with their own gender identity. This is fine, good even! Teenagers frequently struggle with elements of sexual orientation and gender identity (amongst other aspects of their personal identities), and providing media about that probably helps them understand that they're not alone in how they feel.

However, my problem with this comic is the way the nurse, who is basically the only adult/person in a position of power/supposed role model in the entire comic, acts. Upon meeting Ichijo this character says "I know everything about you. After all, I am your teacher". When Ichijo says "I'm a guy" the nurse says "No, you're merely wear a man's clothing and hope to be believed". Similarly, other characters repeatedly say that Ichijo's "true self" is female, because that's how they show up in the dreams (whereas other students appear as a suit of armour, a person with huge holes were their face and chests are, a disembodied arm, and so forth). It just seems super transphobic to me to have almost everyone refuse to accept this character as the gender they identify as, but nobody else discussing the comic seems to have ever mentioned this, so maybe I'm just reading it wrong.

Thankfully, it isn't all like that. One of the characters (a love interest) actually says "I prefer you being a boy". There's a reasonable story to be told in characters trying to figure out if they're gay or not when they don't identify with their physical gender, and it seems as though later volumes of the series discuss that more. But those aspects didn't really click with me until I read reviews of the series, and then reread this volume (and geeze guys, I just reread a comic I disliked in order to properly say why I disliked it.).

Ignoring any positive or negative thoughts regarding the plot of the book, I found the romance aspects of this incredibly boring. Like there are pages of dialogue that I cannot believe I read as they are just so banal. This is clearly my personal opinion and I'm not saying that _this_ part of the comic is bad, just that it's not something that I generally enjoy, and based solely on that (but also for other reasons) I won't be seeking out any more of this title.

YALSA 2008 Top Ten Great Graphic Novels for Teens

Every year since 2007 Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA) section of the American Library Association (ALA) has created both a long list and a top ten list of "great graphic novels for teens". You can see all the lists here. Previously they had included some graphic novels on their "best books for young adults" lists.

I was recently invited to give a guest lecture on the history of comics and graphic novels for children and young adults, and upon looking at these lists realized that I had read less than half of the book on the top ten lists (and hadn't even heard of others!). As a so called "expert" on graphic novels in libraries I didn't really think that this was appropriate, and decided to read as many of the volumes that I hadn't read as possible.

I'll be reviewing them as I read (or reread) them, and this page will eventually contain links to all the books from 2008. Here's the full list of nominations from 2008, and the top ten list. They occasionally have weird formatting or credits.

Laika by Nick Abadzis.

Re-Gifters by Mike Carey, Marc Hempel, and Sonny Liew.

The Magical Life of Long Tack Sam by Ann Marie Fleming.

Blue Beetle (Volumes 1-2) by Keith Giffen, John Rogers, Cully Hamner, Rafael Albuquerque, and others.

King of Thorn (Volumes 1-2) by Yuji Iwahara.

Sidescrollers by Matthew Loux.

After School Nightmare (Volumes 1-5) by Setona Mizushiro.

Emma (Volumes 1-5) by Kaoru Mori.

The Wall: Growing Up Behind the Iron Curtain by Peter Sis.

The Arrival by Shaun Tan.