Hello, welcomes to my weekly look at the books that I’ll be picking up come Wednesday. I try to keep these lists to about twenty books and look at books that are a bit firther afield then the usual. Beyound the usual suspects on Pull lists this week Dark Nights Metal 6, Saga 50, and The Terrifics 2 which my end up in my buying pile.
Abbott #3 ($3.99) Since discovering Saladin Ahmed’s amazing short fiction a couple years ago, I’m honestly there to support whatever he writes and he has yet to disappoint me. Abbott mixes a solid personal drama story about an investigative reporter in seventies Detroit with occult style urban fantasy. It’s realistically illustrated by Sami Kivela’s vision of seventies Detroit with some wonderful quiet intesopective scenes . The tale has real hints of David Milch’s The Wire in its presentation of character, place and story. It’s as complex and conflicted as it’s strong protagonists writing voice.
Highest House #2 ($4.99) Mike Carey and Peter Gross’s “Highest House” is one of those books that I totally missed in looking through previews. It is although one that fully grabbed my attention in my local comic shop and because of its creative team and a brief flip through got added to my pile on a whim. As a fan of epic fantasy the story of the consumptive child sold into slavery by his desperate mother hooked me pretty hard after the opening pages. Carey and Gross crafted a compelling fantasy world that seems to be steeped in mystery and secrets. Highest House has a real Mervyn Peake, Gormenghast, gothic dark fantasy sort of sensibility to it and I quite like that.
Kid Lobotomy #6 ($3.99) Tess Fowler is one of my favorite visual storytellers and pairing her with the literary psychological horror drama writer peter Milligan was genius. Shelly Bond has created an interesting shared universe in the Black Crown Imprint and its a worthy inheritor of the Vertigo legacy she brings with her. Kid Lobotomy lans somewhere between psychological body horror, rock and roll/art documentary and twisted romantic mystery. There us simply too much going on to really pigeonhole. Issue six brings the first arc to an end so perhaps if you have missed it thus far it’s time to hop on this crazy train mashup of literary references and body horror drama.
Mother Panic Gotham AD #1 ($3.99) In the wake of the ‘Milk Wars’ crossover Violet Page finds herself in an unfamiliar Gotham City ten years on, a Gotham without a Batman. Jody Houser won me over with her writing on the initial Mother Panic series, one which I was initially unsure of. The violent punk sensibilities of Violet Page appeal to me, she’s a take no s#it kind of hero. I’m exited to see how she faces this new challenge and hames the city her own. Ibrahim Moustafa joins Houser as the artist for this new series. He’s got a history with crime and noir storytelling and his style seems to fit the legacy of Tommy Lee Edwards, Shawn Crystal and John Paul Leon.
Motherlands #3 ($3.99) Ever since reading the murder mystery love story “Spire” I’ve been willing to give pretty much anything by Si Spurrier a shot and “Motherlands” has been a hit so far. Rachel Stott has done a brilliant job of creating the bizarre multiversal vistas and technologies that abound in the comic. There is a lot to visually peruse in the panels. The story is rich with world-building details, the amount of thought behind the mini-series is much deeper then you’d expect for a one off short story. The dysfunction relationship between former media sexpot darling mother and workday bounty hunting daughter is what drives the hear of this storytokd through both script and visual expressions, the fantastical multidimensional setting is just icing on a good storytelling cake. Likely to click with fans of the marvelously fun similarly dimensional hopping friendship drama Kim & Kim.
Hack/Slash Resurrection #6 ($3.99) Tini Howard is another name of my ever growing list of creators I’ll pretty much buy anything from. Hack/Slash is just conscious enough of its exploitative grind house fiction nature that it overcomes the salacious impression the art alone might give. Slasher horror and comedy have a good storytelling synergy and Tini to my taste writes it near as well as Alex De Campi. (The art in this series by Celor and K. Michael Russel is nothing to scoff at either. )
In addition I’m likley picking up Hungry Ghosts 3(depending on artists) and Cyberforce 1( I do love Bryan Edward Hills writing)....and I nearly missed mentioning Goosebumps Download and Die 1 that I’ll at least look at.
