Sunday, October 06, 2013

A Sunday Review

DCBS
Here are reviews of the DCBS comic books that I've gotten around to reading and reviewing, sorted by the original shipping date:
  • Sep 4th
  • Forever Evil #1 - Eh, about what I expected. Nothing really surprising, since I knew how the thing was going to start thanks to all the previews actually showing them. Maybe if I got my comics on time instead of a month later it would have had more impact.
  • Earth 2 #15.1: Desaad - Wow, a whole issue of Desaad being Desaad. How unexciting.
  • Green Lantern #23.1: Relic - And this one is an absolute explanation of the new Relic character. Nifty. I'm not disappointed so much as mystified why I bought these.
  • DC vs Masters of the Universe #1 - No Aquaman. That's really the only reason I was interested in this one. Well, that and I've always had a soft spot in my heart for Skeletor as a villain.
  • Ame Comi Girls #7 - So... Tempest... Um. Yeah. Ok. Right. I suppose it could have been worse, but I'm not sure how.
  • A Distant Soil #41 - The red button... Well, I've caught up with A Distant Soil, and purchased the remastered first volume. I've read the entire story so far online as well, and finally started ordering it now, just before the story is finished. Better late than never, I suppose. This was a bit of a clean-up issue, if you'll pardon the expression. I wonder what happens next?
  • Hoax Hunters #10 - I hate the art. There have been other sketchy issues, but this one just is annoying. As far as I can tell, the story is nicely solid, but the art is letting it down. Ug.
  • Emerald City of Oz #3 - A little of the nomes plot sneaks in, but this is mostly a journey through some of the more bizarre places in Oz. I love Toto's look at the end. Dogs always know when they've been bad.
A note on the gimmick covers. Annoying, but strangely attractive. I'm glad I got the Aquaman ones, but I would have been happy without any of the others.



My library book this week was Island of the Blue Dolphins by Scott O'Dell. I had assumed I had read this in school like everyone else in the world, but after a discussion on an online forum I realized that I probably hadn't. Sure enough, reading the book was a mostly new experience. There was a single section (the tsunami) that was familiar, the rest was all new to me. I enjoyed it quite a bit, especially since it was a fast read after some of the heavier books I've been trying to tackle recently. Definitely a children's book, but certainly a piece of history as well (I admit I went to look up the real story to see how it really ended, and was very disappointed).



My mystery book this week was The Alpine Icon by Mary Daheim. When a former resident returns to Alpine having done well for herself, lives are disrupted in the town. The "icon" of the title was pretty obvious in this one and the subplot involving it felt like part of the overall arc of the series that could be important in later books, but is only character building at this point. The murder mystery was harder, and I didn't find it obvious. Defintely convoluted, but I thought it worked in the end. I'm still enjoying this series, even the soap opera aspects of it. If you want to start the Alpine series, I strongly recommend starting at the first book, The Alpine Advocate.



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