Tag: graphic novel

Comic Book Review – The Crossroads at Midnight by Abby Howard

RyanLeave a comment

The Crossroads at Midnight

The Crossroads at Midnight by Abby Howard is a graphic novel collection of short horror stories. The five tales within explore the lives of everyday people who have become entwined in some way with beings beyond natural understanding. Some are dangerous and not to be trifled with, best left alone, some will seek you out unbidden, and some can be a surprising source of comfort and companionship. There’s no way to know until you’ve cross the precipice, however, and by then it is already too late.Read More »

Advertisement

Comic Book Review – My Last Summer with Cass by Mark Crilley

RyanLeave a comment

My Last Summer with Cass

My Last Summer with Cass is the newest graphic novel by author and illustrator Mark Crilley. The story follows two young artists, Megan and Cassandra, who are on the cusp of adulthood. Though they’ve been friends since they were young children, their time together was limited to the summers their families shared with each other at a cottage in Michigan, where the girls created all sorts of art together, nurturing each other’s talents. This summer tradition came to a sudden end, however, with Cass and her mother moving to New York.

Three years later, Megan convinces her parents to let her stay with Cass in Brooklyn while they are on a business trip. Reunited after so long, Megan is introduced to a world of art like she’s never experienced before—and a friend who has changed a lot in three years. The big city offers big opportunities, both exciting and scary, but as their personalities begin to clash, putting their art at risk, can their friendship survive?Read More »

Comic Book Review – Tremor Dose by Michael Conrad & Noah Bailey

Ryan1 Comment

Tremor Dose

Tremor Dose is a horror graphic novel written by Michael Conrad and illustrated by Noah Bailey, and my second Frighteningly Good Read for this year. Ginn Morris is a young college student who has been suffering from bizarre and disturbing nightmares. Each is different, with one strange thing in common: a man she does not know keeps appearing in all of them. Having spotted a flier on campus with the man’s face on it that asks “Have You Dreamed This Man?” she contacts the number attached. What begins as an interview dissecting her dreams and her experiences with the man therein eventually spirals down a rabbit hole that leads her to question her very understanding of reality.Read More »

Comic Book Review – Through the Woods by Emily Carroll

RyanLeave a comment

Through the Woods

Through the Woods is a comic book collection of short horror stories written and illustrated by Emily Carroll. Each of the five tales touches upon death, transformation, and brushes with the forces of the abyss that are the unknown in our world. Three girls receive strange visitations after their father fails to return from a hunt, a young man is troubled by the return of his brother, whom he killed, a young woman learns the value of telling stories about monsters, and more. Each bears with it the motif of the woods, an enchanting yet dangerous place where such strange things can come from.Read More »

Comic Book Review – Age of Reptiles: Ancient Egyptians by Ricardo Delgado

RyanLeave a comment

Age of Reptiles Ancient Egyptians

Age of Reptiles: Ancient Egyptians by Ricardo Delgado is the fourth book in the author’s graphic novel series fictionalizing the lives of the great behemoths that once dominated our world: the dinosaurs. Set in the swamps of Cretaceous Africa, a region that would become Egypt millions of years later, the story follows a lone Spinosaurus (Spinosaurus Aegypticus) who wanders into a territory teeming with hungry scavengers, vicious predators, and vindictive herbivores who don’t take being prey without a fight. Serving as a sort of prehistoric anti-hero, the Spinosaurus is a force to be reckoned with and his arrival in the environment brings the conflict between these feuding parties violently to a head.Read More »

Comic Book Review – Bloodborne: The Veil, Torn Asunder by Aleš Kot, Piotr Kowalski, & Brad Simpson

Ryan1 Comment

Bloodborne The Veil, Torn Asunder

Bloodborne: The Veil, Torn Asunder by Aleš Kot, Piotr Kowalski, & Brad Simpson is the fourth volume in the comic book series based on the Bloodborne action role-playing game developed by FromSoftware. Like its predecessors by the same creative team, this book is largely a standalone story. It follows Yarem, a self-styled adventurer, who has traveled to the city of Yharnam to uncover something he believes to be truth; that the nightmarish visions he occasionally suffers from are not the product of his sick mind, but rather glimpses into a reality overlapping with the human world. Reading an overlooked page in an old tome, which he understands while reading but can never recall the words of, he embarks upon a strange journey that throws all of reality into question.

I do get into some of my own interpretations here, which some may consider spoilers. If you care about that, you have been warned.

Read More »

Comic Book Review – The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: Black Dossier by Alan Moore & Kevin O’Neill

RyanLeave a comment

Black Dossier

The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: Black Dossier by Alan Moore and Kevin O’Neill is a unique volume in the series, serving as a bridge between volumes two and three. Far removed from the late Victorian era of the previous volumes, this book takes place in England in the 1950s. The government of Big Brother had been in control of the country following the Second World War, but has since been ousted and the country is in a state of transition. Mina Murray and Allan Quatermain, inexplicably young after all the years since we last saw them, sneak into their old headquarters to steal the titular Black Dossier in order to discern what military intelligence knows about their activities. With it secured they must flee the country, MI6 agents in hot pursuit.Read More »

Comic Book Review – Bloodborne: A Song of Crows by Aleš Kot, Piotr Kowalski, & Brad Simpson

Ryan1 Comment

A Song of Crows

A Song of Crows by Aleš Kot (writer), Piotr Kowalski (artist), and Brad Simpson (colourist) is the third graphic novel adapting the world of the video game Bloodborne, a horror action-RPG developed by FromSoftware. This is the first book in the series to feature a character from the video game as the main character. Eileen the Crow is a Hunter in Yharnam with a unique duty: hunting down other Hunters who have succumbed to the blood they imbibe and lost their minds. During the course of her duties she comes across a butchered Hunter whose remains are arranged to reflect a ritual she finds disturbingly reflective of a practice from her home in foreign parts. In search of the perpetrator, she embarks upon a mind-bending journey that has her confront the ghosts that haunt her past.Read More »

Comic Book Review – Sabrina by Nick Drnaso

RyanLeave a comment

Sabrina

Sabrina is a 2018 fiction graphic novel by Nick Drnaso, and the first ever graphic novel to make it to the longlist for the Man Booker prize. A young woman named Sabrina Gallo goes missing in Chicago, leaving her family and boyfriend, Teddy, distraught. After a month with no sign of Sabrina, her sister Sandra struggles to cope, while a grieving Teddy goes to stay with his friend Calvin in Colorado. Not long after this, VHS tapes are released to the media depicting Sabrina’s murder. The killer is identified as Timmy Yancey, who is found to have killed himself in his home after sending out the tapes. As the atrocity goes through the 24-hour news cycle and the video surfaces online the situation devolves into rampant speculation about what really happened and harassment of those associated with the victim.Read More »

Comic Book Review – The Healing Thirst by Aleš Kot, Piotr Kowalski, & Brad Simpson

Ryan1 Comment

The Healing Thirst

The Healing Thirst by Aleš Kot (writer), Piotr Kowalski (artist), and Brad Simpson (colourist) is the second graphic novel adapting the world of the video game Bloodborne, a horror action-RPG developed by FromSoftware. This volume tells a story that stands alone from its predecessor, about a healer and scientist named Alfredius and a priest of the Healing Church named Clement who form an unlikely friendship while Yharnam slowly succumbs to plague all around them. The beastly scourge—an illness that turns humans into beasts akin to werewolves—is becoming more and more prominent. Meanwhile, another mysterious sickness known as Ashen Blood is laying waste to the population as well. The two pool their resources together to uncover the source of these ailments in hopes of discovering a cure.Read More »