mobettabooks

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Jeeves! Wooster! Scott Pilgrim! Charlie Brown! Asterios Polyp! What a collection for you today, folks!


041) Scott Pilgrim's Finest Hour by Bryan Lee O'Malley, finished May 14 while laying down trying to get the kids to nap
040) Scott Pilgrim Versus The Unverse by Bryan Lee O'Malley, finished May 14 two days
039) Scott Pilgrim Gets It Together by Bryan Lee O'Malley, finished May 13 since the last one

I'm happy to say that, in the end, the books (which really form one whole novel together COMBO POWER!) add some complexity and nuance that the movie, excellent though it was, didn't quite have. Don't get me wrong --- the movie was terrific, but compared to what the books pulled off, taken as a unit, well, here's my point: you should really read the books. They're about the most fun I've ever had reading comics and they have so much heart.

And it sells the Twentysomething Culture in a way that, for the first time, made it look good to me, and wish I'd spent a bit more time being a goof in my younger years. Not to the point of having regrets, mind you, but now I see why that life has a pull.

Anyway. They're great books. Check them out.

038) Scott Pilgrim & The Infinite Sadness by Bryan Lee O'Malley, finished May 12 end of the day

This is where the books and the movie begin to fully diverge. Still highly enjoyable and the metahumor hit harder. For more on Scott Pilgrim. see below. In the meantime, here's the song that inspired the books:




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037) The Code of the Woosters by P.G. Wodehouse, finished May 11


My second Jeeves and Wooster book (the first --- can you believe Wodehouse wrote over 100 novels?) --- and another bounty of wit. Douglas Adams considered Wodehouse one of English's great geniuses and although I'm not prepared to go that far, I'm happy to argue you won't be disappointed. Pick up one today.

a couple weeks probably



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036) Scott Pilgrim Versus The World by Bryan Lee O'Malley, finished May 4
035) Scott Pilgrim's Precious Little Life by Bryan Lee O'Malley, finished May 3

I've really come to grasp the usefulness of some manga techniques (eg, changing a characters total appearance in response to their emotional state) over the last ten years, but Scott Pilgrim really locked me in. As for the movie, which I love, what casting! (Did you know they made cartoons, too? This totally happened in volume two.)

Why oh why did I not ask the library for all six volumes at once? What a fool I was. (Requesting now.....)

about an hour each over two days, the latter while walking to and from jury duty



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034) The Complete Peanuts 1975-1976 by Charles M. Schulz, finished May 1

I'm moving at a more leisurely pace these days, but that's because I hate not having fresh Peanuts waiting for me on the nightstand. It's such a joy, owning these books. And when I've read the last I'll start again from the beginning.

This time I got to read the strip that ran on my birth day and, I'm sad to say, it wasn't killer.

Also, my reading has been changed by thinking about 3eanuts. Which is pretty great but gets in the way. (Unlike Gw/oG which actaully makes Garfield enjoyable.)

some months



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033) Asterios Polyp by David Mazzucchelli finished approximately April 27

I ended this book stunned. Unable to do anything but breathe loudly and not cry. What a beautiful book. So glad the clip in Best American Comics made me library it. But I need to get my own copy to read and read again. This is Jimmy Corrigan-good, folks. Take this one panel:

So much is conveyed here. She how calm she is, yet how much tension is revealed just in her wrist. He's being flippant but we the reader see the emotion in his wife while he flits across the surface in ignorance.

And this is a more realistic panel. What happens next in visual metaphor is just as stunning, as the characters separate into the separate identities they once had.

Mazzucchelli is the artist of the excellent City of Glass adaptation and the famed Batman: Year One (both of which, sadly, I apparently read too long ago to have reviewed; coulda sworn they were here, but I canna find them --- both worth reading and probably I should read them again).

Promise me you'll find and read this book. It's stunning. I don't want to say masterpiece until I've read it a couple more times, but I'm tempted all the same. What a piece of art.

a few days


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Previously in 2011 . . . . :

32
032) Golden Gate by Seth Vikram, finished April 20

27-31
031) Batman: Year 100 by Paul Pope, finished April 18
030) The Polysyllabic Spree by Nick Hornby, finished April 9
029) iZombie: Dead to the World by Chris Roberson and Mike Allred, finished April 2
028) A Sense of Order and Other Stories by Jack Harrell, finished April 1
027) Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead by Tom Stoppard, finished March 30

26
026) The Black Dogs by Ian McEwan, finished March 21

23-25
025) Stitches by David Small, finished March 20
024) Arkham Asylum: Madness by Sam Kieth, finished January 19 or 20
023) Hamlet by William Shakespeare, finished March 18

21-22
022) Red Rocket 7 by Mike Allred, finished March 10
021) Missile Mouse: Rescue on Tankium3 by Jake Parker, finished March 10

20
020) The Hotel Cat by Esther Averill, finished February 28

18-19
019) Wonderland by Tommy Kovac and Sonny Liew, finished February 21
018) Redcoat by Kohl Glass (MS POLICY), finished February 18

14-17
017) Best American Comics 2010 edited by Neil Gaiman, finished February 12
016) Little Bee by Chris Cleave, finished February 10
015) Travels with Charley by John Steinbeck, finished February 2
014) Cursed Pirate Girl: The Collected Edition Vol. I by Jeremy Bastian, finished January 31

13-9
013) Sweet Tooth: In Captivity by Jeff Lemire, finished January 30
012) Sweet Tooth: Out of the Woods by Jeff Lemire, finished January 30
011) Essex County: The Country Nurse by Jeff Lemire, finished January 30
010) Essex County: Ghost Stories by Jeff Lemire, finished January 29
009) Essex County: Tales from the Farm by Jeff Lemire, finished January 29

8
008) Magdalene by Morah Jovan, finished January 27

7-6
007) Knightfall Part Two: Who Rules the Night by a slew of DC folk, finished January 23
006) Bayou by Jeremy Love, finished January 17

5-1
005) Mr. Monster by Dan Wells, finished January 10
004) The Red Badge of Courage by Stephen Crane, finished January 6
003) The Mystery of the Dinosaur Graveyard by Mary Adrian, finished January 5
002) Batman - Judge Dredd: Judgment on Gotham by John Wagner and Alan Grant and Simon Bisley, with lettering by the famous Todd Klein; finished January 4
001) Batman: Venom by Dennis O'Neil et al, finished January 2