The Literary Lucy

  This is the same issue I had with the New 52 Harley Quinn.  I also bought the previous run of Batgirl and read both of them back to back.  So now there are basically two competing storylines in my head. Barbara Gordon is getting back on her feet in the crimefighting business after the Joker put her in a wheelchair for three years.  She has a new apartment, new roommate, and new problems.  A man in a mirror mask is killing survivors of accidents.  And the last name on his list is Barbara Gordon. This is appropriately dark and gritty for a DC comic.  It's not a bad storyline, and I know Gail Simone is one of the best regarded comics writers in the business.  I just found it hard to be as interested or invested in the characters.  Maybe vol. 2 will be better because I'll have had some familiarity by then.  As of now, I'm struggling with this title.

  I have really enjoyed the Rivers of London book series so imagine my excitement when I saw that there are companion comic books.  I would definitely recommend reading the series first, as the comic presumes you already know a lot of the backstory, but they're phenomenal so you really should be reading them anyway. Peter Grant is a London police officer assigned to a very special branch that deals with magical crimes.  He receives a tip from Beverley, daughter of the River Thames, about a car that drove into the river the night before.  Soon, murderous cars are being reported all over the city and Peter must track down their source with the help of his superior, Inspector Nightingale, the last wizard of Great Britain, who recalls a similar case involving the Most Haunted Car in England. This is a fun, breezy read that adds to the backstory for Nightingale without really touching on any of the on-going plot points from the novels.  I don't know if other inst...

  I'll be honest, I'm not sure what to think about the New 52 run of DC comics.  I really liked Harley Quinn:  Night and Day and it seemed like a very abrupt transition to this new set.  Presumably, this is all part and parcel of reading comic books. This volume includes Harley Quinn 0-8 and sees our favorite piebald psycho coming into a huge amount of money, spending it recklessly, making new friends, becoming a landlord, and joining a roller derby team just for kicks.   Mayhem, death, and destruction follow, naturally. The opening comic is a fun little jaunt through about a dozen different art styles as Harley tries to find her voice in a bit of fourth-wall breaking that would make Deadpool proud.  I think writers Conner and Palmiotti mostly succeed in capturing the chaotic good tone of the character, never really delving too deeply into her obsession with the Joker, which could have bogged down the opening narrative.  This is a nice, light ope...

  Here we are with book five in the Symphony of Ages series.  A lot of this is predicated on having read the previous four so some spoilers may be ahead. Rhapsody is preparing to give birth under the watchful eye of the dragon Elynsynos while Achmed journeys home to discover that his mountain has exploded with a force strong enough to wake the dragon Annwyn.  Across the desert, the emperor presumptive begins enacting his plan to conquer the known world, finding allies in the misbegotten Faron and also the Ravens Guild of Yarim, still seething from the loss of their guildmistress.  War is coming, an apocalypse foreseen by the Child of Time. I feel a little bad reviewing these because they really don't make sense until you've read the previous ones.  Obviously, I'm a fan of this series but I'm finding it slower going because I've read them before so there's a little less surprise and tension, and because I've read the first four in such quick succession. ...