Keep on Reading........

Powers Bureau Series by Bendis and Oeming
Powers Bureau, Vol 1:Undercover
Powers Bureau, Vol 2:Icons

This graphic novel/comic series is the sequel to the Powers series which I have not read. Christian Walker and Deena Pilgrim are federal agents and after Chicago was nearly destroyed in an incident, anyone with super powers has to be registered (think Tony Stark!) And now all superpower crime is a federal crime so thats where our heroes investigate.

This is kind of a mixed genre where there are a few laughs and some action too. They are drawn in a minimalistic style as you may see from the front covers.There are a load of fun stuff in this as they battle people with powers and crime families. Women getting pregnant just by touching a hand also!

This is definitely recommended if you like some good laughs as well as a story with action.I think it was made into a recent TV series that was just cancelled. Never saw it but did anyone else watch it or read the first Powers series?!

Brian Boru: Ireland's Warrior King by Damien Goodfellow

This is an Irish graphic novel/comic about Brian Boru and as I like history it has been on my to be read list for ages. I'm not sure what it is about this and the Cu Chulainn comic but they both have the same thing in common. Not much is explained and the story flies along too quick.

I really wanted to like this and to some extent I did but there are a lot of issues with this comic. The reader is just thrown into things without an introduction and things fly along. Then the biggest problem is that everything seems very dark. Panels are drawn with loads of brown,black and dark colours. I didn't particularly like the artwork in this one so it was a lot more difficult to read than it could have been.

The way the story flies along is a problem as it all seems too congested. We know these tales are very long but it feels like things are too condensed.It reminds me of when I was a kid and there used to be a short comic strip in the paper. Such as The story of U2. 1 panel shows them meeting. next panel singing in a small club. then a panel with them praticing. Finally a panel with them singing in a stadium. A whole story shortened to a few panels!! Loads of stuff missed out. This is the same here. Its just too short and you are only getting a brief overview.

For all these faults, I still liked Brian Boru as I like Irish myths and history. Its just too brief but as Its Irish I will recommend it!

Civil War by Mark Millar

Another superb graphic novel by Mark Millar. I think I love everything he does! This is about a registration act that comes in for all Superheroes. Some don't agree to it while others do. Iron Man/Tony Stark is all for it whereas Captain America is all against it.

This story was done in a Captain America movie but this is far superior.The story is great with some for and some against but others torn about what to do. People switching sides and loads of action.

This comic goes straight up there with the best I have ever read. I loved the realism of the story as it starts off with superheroes doing their job on a reality show. Which I think is what would happen if they really existed!! Then they are all blown up and killed by the bad guy. They were minor league superheroes going against a powerful villain so this leads to calls for regulation. Some of the public blame them for causing casualties so they want a register as who are these masked men that are vigilantes?!!

This means people having to give their real names and not hiding behind masks. Of course some do not agree with this! And then here we have our Civil War!!

So this is highly recommended. Full of action and the story is really good. A must read if you like Comics!!

2001: A Space Odyssey by Arthur C. Clarke

This is a Sci Fi classic written the same time as the classic movie. It differs a little bit from the novie as Clarke could not wait until the movie was finished.

In case you have no idea about this, then what rock have you been under?!! No, this came out when Stanley Kubrick, the movie director approached Clarke about writing the seminal sci Fi movie. Clake was a great sci fi writer so he offered his short story called The Sentinel. They expanded on its themes for the movie and this book. Clarke wrote this while the movie was being made.

Its about an object being found on the moon called a Monolith in the book. Scientists are sent to investigate it and find it laying dormant. Its like a black Rectangle that is solid. No one knows what it means or why it is there. As it is fully uncovered, sunlight falls on it for the first time and there is a piercing sound.They realise that is is some kind of transmission that was sent to one of Saturns moons.

A mission is put together to go to Saturn to investigate further. The spaceship Discovery One, is sent there and on it there are 2 crew members and 3 in suspended animation. They are to be wakened when the spaceship is at Saturn. In control of the ship, is an artificially intelligent computer called HAL 9000. The 2 crew members called David Bowman and Frank Poole settle into their routine of tasks with HALs help. HAL can speak to them as they go about their business. Then they begin to notice HAL acting strangely.........

I read this when I was younger many years ago so it was great to go back to it again. The movie is a classic also and you should see that too if you have not.There are a few small differences from the book and the movie. One of the main ones is that the planet they are going to is Jupiter in the movie. The rings of Saturn were too hard to do at the time to make them realistic on screen so it was switched to Jupiter in the movie!

Its crazy to think that this was written when man had not got to the moon yet and a lot of Clarkes thoughts on how things would be done were proven to be true.There are a load of themes in this book. It covers a lot of them. Themes like Technology and its evolution as well as the human races evolution. Space exploration and Artificial Intelligence are 2 more. Lots packed into this.

If you like Sci Fi then this is a must read. You will probably have read it already but it deserves a load of rereads.The copy I had, included the short story The Sentinel too as well as a foreword from Clarke himself giving the backstory of how this came into existence A true classic novel as well as the movie.This fleshes out some things that were in the movie so its very helpful if you like the movie too.

2061: Odyssey Three by Arthur C. Clarke

This is the third Odyssey in the series and is set in 2061. If you have read the previous 2 novels then you know that the Aliens who built the Monolith have turned Jupiter into a mini sun and issued instructions for the moon of Jupiter called Europa. Do not land there and we can do what we want with the other worlds. Why can't we land there? Because new creatures are evolving on it and the Aliens do not want us interfering in it.

Dr Heywood Floyd from 2010 is back again. He is now 103 and living in a space hospital so he has lived longer.Travelling in space is now easier and happens often. Halleys Comet is coming back now and Floyd is chosen as he is a celebrity to go on a spaceship called Universe that lands on the comet to see what it is like.

Anything that tries to land on Europa such as probes are destroyed so we don't land on it but we observe what is going on from afar. A spaceship called Galaxy is doing a flyby of it and has Heywoods Grandson Chris on it. The ship ends up crash landing on Europa and the survivors are stranded. Galaxy is sent over to Europa but will it be allowed to land? Heywood Floyd decides to call David Bowman over the radio to be allowed to land.......

If you have not read the other previous books then this might not make sense but if you have, then everything makes perfect sense so don't worry! The start of the book recaps events anyway so you could jump in here if you wanted to but I suggest just reading the first 2 books first.

What happens on Europa will have profound effects for humanity's survival so this is a great read. What's interesting is that 2 real scientific articles are cited by a character in the book. They concern how it is theorised that we could use diamonds for building a Space Elevator and an Orbital ring which would make travelling much faster. The only thing is that we need a lot of diamonds and in the book they are found when Jupiter is changed into a mini sun. So as always Clarke writes about things that he thinks we could do in the near future.

Hal and David Bowman from the first book come back into the story but you will have to read to find out how and why!! I loved this book too as progressing the story was great and it really does feel like an Odyssey! It really felt like these things could happen in the future and this is a great read. This Odyssey series is fantastic. Gripping Sci Fi at its best.

Gwendy's Button Box by Stephen King and Richard Chizmar

After all that Sci Fi, I am back again to Stephen King. This time he co-authors with Richard Chizmar. This is only a novella but the premise seems very interesting.It is set in Kings usual place of Castle Rock. The amount of things that happen in this little town........ :pac:

It is set in 1974 and Gwendy is a 12 year old girl who likes to go up to her favourite place near cliffs called Castle View. To get there, she climbs up stairs called the Suicide Stairs as there have been suicides from there. No wonder health and safety became a thing!

One day she meets a man who gives her a box with buttons and levers on it.She has to promise to keep it safe and when buttons are pressed or levers pulled, they give out chocolate and silver coins. But they can come at a cost......

Like all these kind of books, the man speaks in riddles and doesn't tell her everything but what follows is a story that ends up going nowhere. King has a big problem with endings and here we are again.

To get out of a situation, a woman flashes her chest which seems so silly.At the end, I was left wondering what was the point of the novella. It literally goes nowhere and just ends. This like Elevation, is very short and they are meant to have written this back and forth within a month.If these stories were all together then I would understand but they shouldn't be sold as a standalone book.

After the high of the reading The Institute this is really poor. I would avoid this as you are not missing anything.Go read The Institute instead!

Alone by Christophe Chaboute

Another graphic novel/comic and this one I remember first picking it up and almost not getting it. It seemed to be just full of pictures and hardly any words. I thought it was too arty and almost put it back. Then I said I would try it and got it anyway.It was first published in France in 2008 and only translated into English in 2017.It isn't a superhero story but a very unique tale.

On a tiny little island that really is just a rock in the ocean is a lighthouse. Every week, a supply boat arrives and just leaves a box of food. They don't get out and never see who lives there on the lighthouse. Its part of a deal done with the previous lighthouse keeper. He left all his money to the boatman and all he is told is bring food every week to the lighthouse.

This has been going on for years and the captain doesn't ask questions.Then the captain gets a new helper on his boat who starts asking questions.The captain says never mind and just leave the box of supplies on the pier. When they leave the helper sees the silhouette of the figure living there. He wonders about this mysterious man who lives there........

The story is told in black and white with very few words at all. That's part of the uniqueness of this comic. We see how the hermit lives and why he is left there. He is disfigured so presumably his family were ashamed and kept him there. All he has is a dictionary and things he finds from the ocean. He uses these and imagines what they are like as he doesn't know the real world because he has never left the lighthouse.

This is truly a haunting and captivating tale. You might think it sounds weird but this is excellent. It really is a must read for everyone. The ending was amazing and it is very emotional. This will stay with me for a long time, maybe forever. It was that good and thats the great thing about reading. When something created can effect you after reading it then it really is powerful. This is why I love reading and this shows the power of graphic novels/ comics also.

Needless to say, this is highly recommended for everyone.It is a masterpiece.

Well, I hope everyone had a great New Years!

In 2019. I read 68 books. Now a good few were Graphic Novels/Comics but this has been a great year for me. Usually want to read at least 50 so I was well over that bar.

Even with reading that many, I still had a good bit of time where I didn't read anything. I'm hoping to shore that up this year and like the log says....keep on reading.

I am aiming high this year, I want to read 100 books or get over 25000 pages read.My record is 22500 pages for the year. This way I won't be too concerned with picking off small books just to get to 100!!

The good news is that I am now reading at a pace that I used to read when I was a kid. As a kid I read everything in my local library. By that I mean I read everything that interested me and there was nothing left that I wanted to read in there.Then I read out the Cork City library childrens section! I remember asking the librarian when could I join the adult library and she laughed at me and said I was way too young. Then I got my mother to join the library and I would get the books and she would check them out! That was frustrating too as I could not reach the shelves to get books I wanted! :pac:

As reading is a habit, I was very quick. Sometimes I would get the books out, go home and read them and go back again. Then the librarians were p*ssed at me! Since then I really slowed down. Now I am back up to very quick. I don't speed read like some people advise as we could all fly through books but are we really reading them and understanding them? I am just reading it normally but quicker if that makes any sense!!

So this year I am hoping to knock down a load of books. I have a spare room full of stuff I want to read. Some are very rare so I hoover them up if I see them in a shop.The main thing that I realise is that you must enjoy the book. Otherwise it is just a job. I have to give up on books if I am not liking them, Motherless Brooklyn and Mispent Youth are two books from this log that I should have just given up on. i hate to do this though! At the very least, i will skip a few pages here and there if I am not liking a book because I have loads in my house to be read!

So here we go for another year and I started reading this morning and nearly finished one already!!

Happy reading everyone!

Montague Terrace by Warren Pleece

I thought this comic looked interesting so I took a chance on it. It is about an array of different people who live in this building called Montague Terrace. They are all kind of strange and have only the building in common.

We have an ageing pop star whose best years are behind him, a former agent who is now elderly, a talking bunny who appears to a magician and a man who calls himself The Puppeteer plotting chaos in his room.

This is meant to be a comedy about quirky characters and seemed like it was going to be good before I read it.The drawing is okay but unfortunately the stories end up not really going anywhere.The final story is the only one that has any kind of resolution but I was left with a feeling of "Is that it?"

The stories all felt like they were just drawn as they were thought up and not thought about again. They needed more work as this may have been something very great. As they stand, they are just forgettable as nothing much happens other than strange characters.

So avoid this one as its not worth reading at all.

Burma Chronicles by Guy Delisle

This is by the same author of Hostage that I reviewed here so as I enjoyed that, I picked up this.

This is a comic about the authors own experiences in Burma for a year.His wife is an administrator for MSF- Medecin Sans Frontier (Medicine without borders) and they both go with their young son Louis for a year to Burma.Burma is ruled by a military junta so people live in poverty but the country is highly religious and is mostly Buddhist.

I love the drawings in this as they are very nice and not overly complicated to look at and read. I knew absolutely nothing about Burma so it was good to learn a good few things. I wouldn't read this if you wanted to know everything about Burma as its more like a snapshot in time of his experiences.

Burma is now called Myanmar by the junta and is a highly repressive regime. They are very paranoid and continually change laws. While Delisle's wife is off with the MSF he goes around the local area pushing a stroller with his son in it. At the start he is almost passing out from the heat so I know if I was there I would be dead!

Each story can be long and short and just depends on what happened to him. From trying to get inks to draw with and bootleg hollywood movies, there are some great tales in here.Some are very funny such as at Christmas there were carol singers outside his door and he gave money to them. Then he learned that they are Buddhists but they learn the songs to trick people/tourists into giving them money!

There are some very interesting things told such as the junta decided in 2006 to change the capital of the country. They went to an area with nothing there and just started building and then called it the capitial. It used to be Yangon but is now Naypyidaw. (yes that is the way it is spelled!)

Delisle has to deal with not speaking the language, the heat and monsoons. I liked this as it went through the whole year about what happened to him and I really enjoyed it. I like his simple style of drawing and the facts of surviving everyday life there.Just like the earlier Hostage this is highly recommended.

Journaled to Death by Heather Redmond

Continuing on my theme of new female authors, I tried this book. It looked like a murder mystery and seemed interesting although as you can see, it looks like a kids book with that cover. I said I would give it a try as I am trying to read new books that I don't normally read.

Divorced single mother Mandy works in a shop that's in a hospital. She lives with her daughter while her cousin rents out her basement. He is suddenly found dead and she is a suspect.She has to find out what happened to him so she can be cleared.....

From the sounds of that premise it sounds quite good and I didn't think anything when I saw this was a "cozy mystery" on the cover. I have only found out what that means after I finished the book. I thought it meant it was a cozy read and that its good for the reader.

This book is like a Scooby Doo mystery in book form. It is so obvious what happened that the whole thing is laughable. There isn't hardly anything about the mystery itself, more about soap opera stuff and Mandy's life. Her daughters name is Vellum! That made me laugh out loud but nowadays there are people with stupid names like that so on I went reading.Then at the end, the killer comes after Mandy and the person is so inept that it is unintentionally funny!

This book was very boring and yes, I should have stopped reading it but like a glutton for punishment, I kept reading it.There is one good thing though. The actual writing is of a very high standard. It is the story and not much other than family stuff that makes this dull.

I have since found out that a "Cozy mystery" is a sub genre where it is exactly like this book. A simple mystery usually solved by a woman and there is no blood and guts or violence. So to me, its like Scooby Doo! If you dont like violence, realism and love family soap opera stuff, then this book is for you. If you like a proper mystery like me then stay away from this book. I don't know how I finished it!!

The Night of the Hunter by Davis Grubb

I think we all know this from the famous movie starring Robert Mitchum and directed by the actor Charles Laughton. If you don't know the movie then check it out. I have had this book in my collection for ages and have wanted to read it for a very long time.

This is a Southern Gothic type novel set in the Great Depression era of America.A man has committed a robbery and has been caught. He is executed but the money he took has never been found. Before he is executed, he shares a cell with a man called Harry Powell also known as The Preacher. He is a nasty individual quoting bible scriptures and he has the words Love and Hate tattooed on his fingers. The preacher is about to be released but cant get the man to say where the hidden money is located but he knows that his family must know.

The Preacher heads off to find the mans widow and her 2 children. He begins to con her to marrying him in the hopes of finding the money. The 2 kids are John and Pearl and whereas Pearl is very young and likes the Preacher, John knows something is not right with him......

This story is based on the Lonely Hearts Killer Harry Powers who was hanged in 1932 after killing women he met in ads for their money.

This is a fantastic read and I am annoyed I only read this now but better late than never! Its been a good while since I have seen the movie but this is great too. The Preacher is one of the most creepiest characters ever as he goes from a nice guy to a killer in a moments notice! An interesting thing is that the speech of the characters is not in inverted commas. There is no she said or he said. It is like a flow and this ends up making everything seem even creepier!

Tension really builds until the climax of the book as The Preacher gets closer and closer to what he wants. The way he ingratiates himself into the family and the neighbours is very creepy as we know what he really is there for and its all a lie. The writing is great too as Grubb shows what life was like back then with people having nothing but becoming under the spell of the charismatic but evil Preacher.

It really is a classic thriller so this book is definitely recommended and now I must watch the movie again!!

Bloodbrothers by Richard Price

I really like reading Richard Price and I want to read all his books eventually. I reviewed Clockers here already in case you missed it. This is one he wrote in 1976 and is about an 18 year old kid called Stony De Coco who is at a bit of a crossroads in life. His dad wants him to join him in construction work and become a union man like him. Stony doesn't know if he wants to do that for the rest of his life and gets a job in a hospital.There he works with kids and finds himself a natural at it but his father thinks there is no money in that and wants him to join him in the construction work.

Meanwhile at home, his mother is a bit mentally unbalanced and Stony wants to protect his little brother from her.His Uncle called Chubby is in the union also and violence is a way of life in the family and neighbourhood as its in the 70s.

This book contains violence, profanity and sex scenes so go read it! :pac: No, I just say this in case that is not your kind of thing. Price is great at dialogue and this is no exception. I really enjoyed this book except the ending is a let down. This is a pity as the book would have been a classic with a good ending. As the way it is, it is still a good read but could have been better. If you like Price's work then you will like this also. This book was made into a movie starring Richard Gere and I must try to get to see that now.

Blockade Billy by Stephen King

I watch Baseball sometimes and like it so combining Stephen King and Baseball seemed great so here we are. This is a short book/novella about one of Kings loves, Baseball.It also has a short story in it called Morality.Blockade Billy is about a player in a 50s era team that transforms the fortunes of a baseball team and is told by an old timer as the narrator. Billy comes out of nowhere but no one knows much about him. What is his story and why does it have a tragic end?

The second story Morality is about a struggling young couple that can barely pay their bills getting offered 200,000 to make their life better. Things go great for a while until it all starts to unravel.......

These 2 stories are really just regular fiction without the suspense or horror that King usually has and as such, they are both really tame and dull. If you don't like baseball you will definitely hate Blockade Billy and probably even if you do! I like baseball but I found the story very dull. Morality is a story that goes nowhere at all so that was disappointing too.

So this is another very poor King book. He lurches from the great (Cujo, The Institute) to the really poor such as this. Don't waste your time with this one.

Entanglement by Zygmunt Miloszewski

This is a polish crime novel that has been translated (obviously!) and is about a group therapy session in a secluded place. The next morning one of the group is found with a meat skewer through the eye ( That's gotta hurt!) so who did it? Why?

We have a polish prosecutor investigating the case and he is world weary. His mane is Teodor Szacki and he has only a short time to investigate it due to his work load. He has a boring marriage and meets a journalist asking about the case. She is very nice looking and while this is all going on he is under pressure from his superiors.

This is a book where I feel like I learned loads especially about Poland. The prosecutor investigates the cases and they still use their own currency the Zloty. I assumed they used the euro as the were in the EU but they don't! They still have a legacy from communism with all the red tape etc

The most weirdest part of all is the form of therapy used in this book. I thought it was made up but it is a real thing called Family Constellation Therapy. Entanglement is a term used within this hence the name of the book. People stand around the one person and take on roles of people within his/her life. Strangers can do it as they pick up on the "field" generated about the person. It sounds complete quackery to me but it makes for a good setting for a murder!

This book is part of a series and is really good. It sounds bonkers but it really is a good crime novel. The main character is very good and I enjoyed the translated writing. It feels really polish with a lot of local references to areas and its history having been part of the USSR. The investigation ends up going a lot deeper than a simple murder and Teodor's life gets complex with temptations and conspiracies around him.

If you like crime novels then give this one a chance. It really was worth it and was a very good read. Definitely recommended!!