Pam's Book Log

14 June, 2004

Good thing about comics: I can read them quickly, and get a decent dose of entertaining narrative in the scant time I have these days to read. Bad thing: I end up with a ton of backlog on the book log. Anyway, I want to get caught up before I finish my current non-graphic book.

The first story in this volume is pretty silly: Count D. gets kidnapped by some FARC-type South American revolutionaries, Detective Leon tries to rescue him, and they both get lugged off to South America to search for the treasure of El Dorado. The story's not entirely useless, though, because it gives us some more clues about what, exactly, D's deal is. For one thing, he's big into the blood-magic (his own blood, at least thus far). The second is about little brother Chris and his family situation, and a three-headed dragon that constantly argues with itself. It's both funny and touching. Third is a story about a family where the parents' ambition for their kid (to be a musical prodigy) is making the kid unhappy, and how a fuzzy little dog helps solve the problem. The last story is a very odd one--I'm not sure what exactly was going on there, but I did learn an interesting factoid: the ancient Japanese used to make a brilliant red dye out of dead bugs!

(Previous Pet Shop of Horrors volumes)

This one (naturally) picks up where Vol. 1 left off. The protagonists continue their westward journey, and we learn some stuff about their pasts--Sanzo's unusual path to priesthood, Gojyo's childhood trauma, and something in Hakkai's past about a woman who killed herself. We also see something of their chief antagonist, who is actually a pretty decent fellow. So why is he working with the evil chick who's causing all the problems?

This book ends on a massive cliff-hanger! I hate it when that happens, 'cause then I have to run out and buy the next volume as soon as it comes out.

This is last book in the series, and it doesn't disappoint. The inimitable Special Agent Diana Spacey's back in town, and she does something which has needed doing for quite some time: she tells poor conflicted Ryo to get over himself, and to stop being afraid of his feelings. The plot revolves around a big Mafia case Diana's working on, which Dee and Ryo get recruited to help out on. In particular, it's centered on Leo Grant--the crime boss who killed Ryo's parents, back in the day--and his wife Alicia. There's lots of double-crossing an triple-crossing, and the cops and feds struggle just to keep from falling too far behind. Several of the plot twists sure took me by surprise.

Alicia and Leo's fractured marriage provides a counterpoint to the heroes' bond. The Grants' relationship was doomed from the beginning, because they were both too selfish--neither of them was willing to put the other's needs before their own. On the other hand, over the course of the series, it's been shown that Dee and Ryo are always there for each other, and neither would demand something the other's unwilling to give.

And no commentary on this book would be complete without mentioning the fact that it came wrapped in plastic, presumably to protect the casual reader from the dirty, dirty man-sex contained within.

Action, romance, and smut: what more could one possibly want?

(Previous volumes of FAKE

I want to call this book a "romantic comedy," but that conjures up schmoopy images of Meg Ryan, and that would be totally inappropriate. Maybe "comic romance" is a better description. At any rate, Scooter Girl is about one Aston Archer, an obnoxious, self-centered young man whose life is thrown into a tailspin by one Margaret Sheldon. She takes an immediate dislike to Ashton (with good reason--he's an ass), and sets out to teach him a lesson. Which she does. His life in shambles, he runs off to San Diego, only to have her show up four years later. How can he escape the curse? Of course it's not really a curse--he's in love.

This book is loads of fun, Clugston-Major's art is sharp and attractive, and Ashton is a great character. Compared to Blue Monday, I think it's actually a better work--the plot is tighter, the characters undergo personal growth, and there's an edge of seriousness which the teen comedy lacks. (This is only to be expected, I think, since I'm comparing a self-contained graphic novel to an ongoing series.)