Review Copy Reviews

We'll start with Boom! Studios, who've been sending books my way too fast to keep up with. All three books are continuations of books I've read from them before.

Zombie Tales: Death Valley: Well. I remember why I don't much like zombie stories while reading this. Again, the Boom Zombies are more interesting than any I've seen, but they work better for me as anthologies. The full story just doesn't do anything for me. If they send me the next issue, I'll certainly read it, but I won't miss it if they don't. I'll just point out here that I really did enjoy the first two Zombie Tales books, the anthologies, contrary to my expectations. But not this one. It was just ok.

Hero Squared #3: "Zap! Pow! Bam!": I don't know, but I kind of expect resolution at the end of a mini-series, and that is not what I got. I mean, couldn't we have just a little resolution? Just some answers, instead of more questions? I mean, it's a funny book and all, but it's like the entire mini was just set-up and nothing more. I wanted more.

Giant Monster #2: This is just... funny. I mean, how do you beat a giant monster fighting a Nazi robot? It's just hilarious. Yeah, it's thin on story, but the point is not story, it's giant monsters and robots causing mayhem and destruction. And that's exactly what it delivers. Heh.

And on to one of my favorite publishers, AiT/Planet Lar. It's hard not to like a publisher who sends you free stuff to review, but the fact that they also publish collections of some of my favorite books, like True Story, Swear to God and Colonia, just makes them all the better in my book.

Demo Collection: My initial thought was "Why'd he send me this? I have all the issues." Then I cracked it open and turned to a random page. Twenty minutes later I surfaced and realized that I'd been drawn into the book just as if it was the first time, and I found myself really glad to have a copy of the whole set in one volume. I suspect I'm going to reread this a couple of times. If you didn't read these stories when they first came out, I suggest you get a copy of this collection. It's excellent, and well worth buying.

Colonia: On Into The Great Lands: Wow, another collection of a book that I have all the issues of. Of course, I can't find some of the earlier issues that were reprinted in this volume because they were published so long ago. Nicholson tackles that issue in the forward, where he explains some of the problems with self-publishing a book like this. Well, I can't really say all that much about the story. It's a great story, and I love the art style, simple yet it conveys so much. I also love the man-of-fish, Adarro. This one is great, and some of you might recall I gave away copies of the first volume in a contest... get this one too.