Ain't No Grave by Skottie Young
"I got some news recently that didn't sit very well with me. Instead of laying down and dying I figured I'd make my way here so I could KILL DEATH."
Ryder hung up her guns when she found love, trading her violent past to become a loving housewife and doting mother. When she learns an incurable illness seeks to take her from her new life, Ryder will return to the feared outlaw to challenge Death. Unable to accept her fate, she'll cut down anyone and anything in her way, gamble her life against mysterious beings, and sink lower than she has ever felt until she finally draws her guns on Death itself.
Collecting the entire five-issue series, "Ain't No Grave" is a western-fantasy telling the tale of Ryder, a former outlaw looking to defy the inevitable. Believing she can defy death - by killing Death - Ryder sets out on a dangerous journey to the edge of the world with just her guns and lots and lots of bullets. I'd picked up the first issue way back and immediately knew I wanted to read the rest. I think it's also worth noting "Ain't No Grave" is written by Skottie Young, whose other works like "Strange Academy" and "I Hate Fairyland" and his various work on cover art I absolutely love. So I picking up the collected trade paperback was a no-brainer for me.
What is really cool about the story is that each of the 5 issues/chapters deal with the five stages of grief - Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, Acceptance - with each being a major theme of their respective chapter. Issues Four, "Depression," especially stood out for its lack of dialogue as Ryder finds herself lost and beaten. It's a pretty straight-forward read as Ryder traverses the five stages, both externally and internally, until she meets her inevitable fate.
The image of the stoic, Western cowboy or gunfighter staring down death with nothing but their pistols and walking away unscathed is such a big part of Americana. Kevin Coster in "Open Range" and famously Clint Eastwood in so, so many movies including a favorite of mine, "Pale Rider" where he may actually be Death himself, are just a couple examples. Though Ryder also fits this description, she doesn't get to walk away in the end after facing down Death. The story switches what is commonly expected in American mythos, which, if you picked up from the issue titles, you knew this was coming at the end.
Hell Bent by Leigh Bardugo
"Magic was transgression, the blurring of the line between the impossible and the possible. There was something about crossing the boundary that seemed to shake loose all the morals and taboos people took for granted. When anything was within your grasp, it got harder and harder to remember why you shouldn't take it - money, power, your dream job, your dream fuck, a life."
"Maybe that grief, that longing fostered by stories of more beautiful worlds and their infinite possibility, was what made them all such easy prey for Lethe. Maybe it made Mercy dress in velvet and tweed and put fake emeralds in her ears, driven by the dream of finding her way through the back of the wardrobe. Alex just hoped there wouldn't be something awful waiting behind the coats."
Finally understanding what became of Darlington, Galaxy "Alex" Stern knows what she needs to do next: Find a gateway to the underworld and steal back Darlington's soul. As simple as it sounds, the path to Hell isn't so easy to find. Forbidden from calling for aid from the Ninth House, Stern and Dawes will need to decipher clues hidden in old rumors and arcane texts to find the way, and put their trust in some unlikely allies. If the prospect of facing demons in Hell wasn't frightening enough, Stern finds herself tormented by demons on Earth as well, both figurative and literal. Can Stern rescue Darlington and escape her captor's grasp without jeopardizing her future in Lethe ... and her new life at Yale?
The second book in the "Alex Stern" saga (I don't know, I just feel like I have to call it something), "Hell Bent" follows the events of "Ninth House" as Alex Stern attempts to bring Darlington back from Hell. I originally tried to read this book in April, then realized I'd forgotten everything about the first book, so I had to put it down until I refamiliarized myself with Stern's world. I was hoping to pick this up in a more manageable, standard mass-market paperback size like I bought "Ninth House" but, unable to find one and too impatient to wait, I just bought this style (at least it isn't a hardcover copy).
"Hell Bent" does read a little differently than "Ninth House," but that's to be expected as the situations have certainly changed. Unlike the previous book, this one stays more in the present day with only a few jumps back to the past, you know, because we already know how we got to this point. That said, the suspense and build-up as we are led up to the start of the story is still gripping as we learn what exactly is hiding at Black Elm. Though the story sets itself at Yale University, it doesn't feel like a "Dark Academia" story as most of the story doesn't really involve the school's secret societies this time as much as "Ninth House." Now, we're seeing the consequences of the Societies' power play out in the context of the larger world: a general questions a Russian military asset from beyond the grave, a singer makes a deal to keep her voice, and a demon on Earth makes its presence known. The story also sees Stern become more of "the rattler" she has been described as, going on the offensive now that she gains supernatural strength and speed from pulling ghosts into herself. Alex still prefers to use her cunning and intellect to work her way out of the situations she finds herself, which prevents the story from going right into action-mode (though perhaps that will change in the next book.)
What I really liked about "Hell Bent" was that the story doesn't just expand the universe outward to introduce new characters and settings, but also expands downward, looking into magic itself and from where it possibly comes. The story not only delves deeper into Alex's powers and what she can do with her gifts, but also how those like her have always been drawn to New Haven and Yale itself thanks to The Crucible. A transcript of a debate delves into the magic the Societies utilize, seeing each ritual as a minor deal with a demon. Whether this makes magic ultimately good or evil is still up for debate. We also learn more about a few other side characters, adding to their depth and making them feel more real and fleshed-out rather than just flat and bland boards for the protagonist to briefly interact with before moving along with the plot. I always like when a story expands on the things we already know rather than continuously introduce newer and newer plots, concepts, and characters as it makes the world the story occupies feel realer and more thought-out.
Setting itself up for an eventual third act, I'm definitely curious and excited for the next book. With demons now introduced and about to wreck havoc on Earth thanks to a cracked gateway, it's expected that Stern, Darlington, and the rest of Lethe House will work to shut the door. What may be interesting, or jarring (depending on how it is written) to see is if the story will take a more action/adventure-style now that Alex possess new offensive supernatural gifts as a Wheelwalker and Darlington can transform into a monstrous form. Both "Ninth House" and "Hell Bent" both teasing a curious mystery in the present day before jumping to the past for the build-up, I'm curious as to what kind of mystery the next book starts with, whether it be about the Hellgate, or perhaps the vampire/demon Reiter, or something else entirely.
Helen of Wyndhorn by Tom King
After the tragic suicide of her father and famed writer, Helen is brought to Wyndhorn House to be cared for by her grandfather, Barnabas Cole. Upon her arrival to Wyndhorn, Helen proves herself her father's daughter, wrecking drunken chaos throughout the property. Taken under the wing of her grandfather, she'll discover the secret behind her father's stories as a gateway to a mythical world is opened to her, and her family's secrets are revealed.
Collecting the complete six-issue series, "Helen of Wyndhorn" is a portal-fantasy tale of generational trauma recounted through a series of interviews with Helen's governess. Yes, it is another book I got at a pre-order discount, but I also picked it up because of the great reviews the story was getting. Set in the late 1930's, Helen is brought to her grandfather's house after the suicide of her father to tame her chaotic ways developed by an alcohol-fueled life always on the move. Given a glimpse of the mythical world sitting at Wyndhorn House's border, she soon finds purpose and begins developing the skills needed to travel with her grandfather, revealed to be the renowned Othan of her father's pulp fantasy stories. During their travels, Helen learns the truth behind her family's history including her grandfather's shame raising Helen's father, C. K. Cole. This entire story is told through recordings made by a reporter writing C. K. Cole's biography as he looked for answers behind the author's suicide. The whole story is also beautifully drawn and colored to give it all an older, fantastical feel you'd probably see from works set in the time period.
The story focuses heavily on family trauma - Helen drinking herself to sleep and lashing out at everything around her following the suicide of her father, C. K. Cole's own drunken stupors and constant running, and Barnabas' avoidance of becoming close with anyone else emotionally - and how each of them push others away or, at least, keep them at a distance. Eventually, once Helen realizes the truth behind her father's stories, she and Barnabas will begin to bond, dissipating some of the tension between them. When she is injured on one of their adventures and Barnabas tosses her aside, it is obvious he did the same to C. K. when he was younger, which is what possibly estranged him from his father and left him untethered for the remainder of his life. Barnabas and Helen do manage to reconnect before she follows in C. K.'s footsteps. Though the story never does fully answer why C. K. took his own life, at least we see that Helen does not.
Batman/Elmer Fudd by Tom King
In the shadowed streets of Gotham, Elmer Fudd searches for the one who pulled the trigger on his love. In a seedy bar, he is given a name - Bruce Wayne. Armed with his trusty shotgun, he'll hunt down the playboy who stole the love of his life. When he comes face-to-face with The Batman, however, the two will realize they have more in common than they thought, teaming-up to find the truth behind Silver St. Cloud's murder.
The DC/Looney Tunes crossover you didn't know you wanted, you needed, to read! As King mentioned in the forward article, it would've been expected to see the DC characters brought in the cartoon universe of the Looney Tunes, but they decided instead to go the other way, bringing the Tunes into DC's noir-colored streets of Gotham. The story does a fantastic job of incorporating several different Looney Tunes characters in human guise with their distinctive features and unique characteristics. The premise sets up a confrontation between the shotgun-touting hunter Elmer Fudd and the night-stalker Batman which is a good bit of fun when the two characters meet. This hardcover edition also includes a nice "Batman in the Looney Tunes" story using the classic "rabbit season" gag, as well as a full black-and-white "Noir Edition" of the main story.
As much as I really liked this story, I don't want to hang on to this hardcover copy, so eventually I'll sell it off and pick-up the one-shot floppy version. Why did I buy this version if I could've gotten the floppy for less than half the price? Well, I'm an idiot and wasn't paying attention when I added this to my pre-order cart.
Know Your Station by Sarah Gailey
To escape the climate disaster on Earth, the ultra-wealthy have escaped to luxury space stations, bringing with them only those necessary to serve at their whims. It appears, though, death has still managed to follow them when one of their own is the victim of a grisly murder. Despite having no investigative training, Elise is tasked with finding the elusive killer amongst a crew with motive but lacking the ability and finesse to commit these horrible killings. As the bodies continue to pile-up and the number of suspects dwindling, can Elise find the murderer?
Finally got around to finishing another one I missed out buying issues. I originally bought individual issues of "Know Your Station," but missed out on issue four so I never got around to the ending during its original run. Found this one on sale for less than half the retail price, and immediately bought it (plus I needed it to round out my cart). Why not just buy the missing issues? Well, I also no longer have the issues I bought so I really don't remember everything - kinda important when reading a mystery story. Plus, trades are easier to off-load. The story follows Elise, an untrained and drug-addicted "security liason", as she works to figure out who is killing off the billionaires aboard the space station in such grotesque fashion - skinned, dissected, strung-up, drained of blood, etc. Though pretty simple to figure out (they don't introduce a lot of suspects in the five issue run), its still a gripping ride ... until the end.
As mentioned, it's fun, up to the end. Obviously, St Brigid is the killer - who else could it have been? But why? Well... as revenge for these billionaires using her to create "copy and paste" AI art and taking the credit. The self -aware AI is insulted by these people wasting her creativity ("she's an artist") for such menial tasks. Yeah, it's dumb, but supposed to reveal her child-like innocence being relatively new to her sentience. That out of the way, the "kill the rich"- agenda continues where Elise and her friend defend the AI's actions not because of the way their employees treat them, but because they feel a deeper connection with the AI instead. A write-up at the end about humans' ability to bond with, well, anything, even those outside their species, and a billionaires' desire to separate themselves from the masses essentially makes them inhuman and worth casting out from the tribe. While I can understand the message the story is trying to send, I just don't like that it needed to be so in-your-face about it, delivering its message through not only in pages-long dialogue but even an essay to defend their position.
Solo-Leveling #56 - 110 by Chugong
"His double awakening should've happened quite some time ago. It doesn't make sense that he's gotten even stronger. No ... maybe it's not a double awakening! Maybe ... he's a hunter that can continuously grow...?"
"What was his name again? It was Kar ... something. Sorry, I don't remember. Whatever, I'll just think of something. 'Tusk.' Let's go with Tusk."
Still "leveling-up", Sung Jinwoo enters the Demon Castle and makes his way up the castle floors, gaining experience as he goes. His new strength and current gear can only take him so far, however, and he finds he must stop before reaching the top. Returning to the world, Jinwoo decides to have his level re-tested, meeting with members of the government's Hunter's Association. With time to spare before The Association can confirm his new rank, Jinwoo takes on a job as a miner assisting high-level groups with the collection of dungeon materials and to gain knowledge and insight into what awaits him in higher-level dungeons. When one of these groups becomes trapped, tricked into entering a dungeon they were ill-prepared for, Jinwoo needs to reveal his strength and powers to save everyone from death. After his S-Rank confirmation, Jinwoo sets out to conquer the remainder of the Demon Castle, and discovering they were kidnapped themselves and sealed in the dungeon. After clearing the remaining floors and defeating the Demon King, Jinwoo collects the final ingredient needed for the Elixer of Life to revive his mother from the magical sleep she has been under since the start of the story. His family reunited, Jinwoo decides to forgo the Jeju Island raid - a combined effort by Korea and Japan's S-Rank Hunters to finally defeat the Dungeon Ants colonizing the island. When he realizes the Hunters are in danger due to a newly-evolved Black Ant. Jinwoo arrives just in time to save his comrades and defeat the monster.
Halfway through "Solo-Leveling" and I can definitely see the appeal of this power-fantasy, dungeon-crawler story. The art is excellent, and I especially love the way the action panels are brought to motion using the scrolling rather than swiping medium. Despite being a power-fantasy where a single character is gifted an ability unique and more powerful than everyone else, it does feel like Jinwoo earns the strength he obtains - training everyday, risking his life in dangerous situations - rather than it simply being something given to him for little effort.
As great as the action continues to be, what I really liked about this section of the story is that we get more world-building. Sure, the story is set in our modern world, so, of course, we're familiar with most of the setting and the world itself. This one big change - the appearance of dungeons and monsters - changes society drastically from the way people live everyday all the way up to world governments themselves. It opens new occupations for Awakened Humans who either aren't strong enough to participate in raids or do not want to for whatever their reason may be. It even negatively impacts health and lifestyle by causing new illnesses and closing off living areas due to dungeon openings. I was especially interested in the idea of S-Rank and higher Hunters viewed as a country's might, not just against fights with monsters, but also as military power. For example, an American character makes an appearance as a powerhouse, a reference is made to a Chinese Hunter on a warship, and, obviously, the Japanese government talks about it during the Jeju Island raid. I know, right, why should I care when this whole story is just a power-fantasy of a weakling becoming the world's strongest thanks to a unique ability? Look, I really like that the writer took the time to flesh out the world just to add a bit more realism to the story, drawing the reader in deeper.
As much as the Jeju Island arc serves as the climax of chapters 56-110, my favorite part of these fifty-plus chapters is the arc about Jinwoo's time as a miner and assisting in dungeon retrieval. It acts to ground the character in his need to still earn an income while he awaits the retesting of his strength because regular people should still be concerned about making money to survive in today's society. I also like that it serves to remind the reader that, as strong as Jinwoo has grown, he still started off so weak that he has never experienced an A-Rank Dungeon before. Though this isn't his first time dealing with overwhelming odds (ex: The Double-Dungeon arc, The Red Gate arc), this one just felt "bigger" to me with the desperate tone of the rest of the party and the overwhelming threat presented by the orcs. It reveals his hidden strength to the unsuspecting party members as well as several other higher-ranked characters which might seem like a threat to his secrecy except his rank is revealed to the public in the very next arc. Plus, it comes with one of my favorite scenes of Jinwoo trying to name his newest Shadow, completely forgetting the orc's name, then, simply shrugging his shoulders, goes, "whatever, I'll just call you by your face." It's a great arc, and my favorite, so far.
Of course, I can't talk about this without referencing the anime adaptation (or maybe I could, but whatever). Originally, I had meant to read the chapters before watching the episodes, but that didn't quite work out when I lost access to the chapters for over a week. They did a great job with the anime adaptation, and I can definitely see why it was ranked as one of the most watched shows. Of course, there are a few minor changes, but nothing that really changes any of the key parts or theme or tone of the story. I really liked both versions of the story so far, and I'm interested to see just where this leads into the next half. One note, I did get a spoiler from a friend confirming Jinwoo doesn't transform into a full-fledged villain as Wanted's Wesley Gibson did.
