Enjoyable enough—but not universe-expanding.
Supergenius teens explore the potentials of dark energy and uncover secrets at their school.
The Prometheus Institute is a science academy for gifted students that seeks to “cultivate the greatest minds of this generation.” Here students specialize in quantum mechanics, mechanical engineering, advanced genetics, and more. Tamsin Kuhn Trackroo is no exception. The daughter of the school’s previous, deceased headmaster and a protégée of its current one, Tamsin is a theoretical and applied physicist determined to use a hologram of her father to understand and avenge his untimely death. But when the experiments her roommate (and maybe-girlfriend), Garyn, is conducting on dark energy take a dramatic and dangerous turn, Tamsin finds that everything she thought she knew about the people she cares for may not be as it seems. Dialogue is sometimes stilted and self-conscious (“If you continue with this version of your rocket boots, I believe you’ll make your twin sister, Rosie, an orphan,” Tamsin chides a classmate), and on the whole characters feel underdeveloped. The illustrations lean toward a classic superhero comic-book style, and inset panels include science facts as they pertain to the plot. This blending of fact and fiction isn’t disruptive, but neither is it as effective as other comics that blend STEM and story (Secret Coders, The Earth Before Us) or other comics with footnotes or sidebars (Unbeatable Squirrel Girl, for example). The teen students have diverse racial and ethnic identities; Tamsin is Indian American, and Garyn is a young woman of color.
Enjoyable enough—but not universe-expanding. (Graphic science fiction. 12-16)Pub Date: Dec. 3, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-988715-27-8
Page Count: 112
Publisher: Bedside Press
Review Posted Online: Sept. 28, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2019
An overstuffed patchwork.
A visual history of the game, from playfully imagined early precursors (“Overrunneth not the bag, Prudence!”) to 21st-century feats and follies.
“Everything in baseball gets mythologized,” Irvine writes, and accordingly he dishes up scornful dismissals of Abner Doubleday, Babe Ruth’s “called shot,” and even the Cubbies’ “curse of the billy goat” in this overview. Still, he sometimes succumbs to the lure himself, as when he declares Joe DiMaggio’s 56-game hitting streak “in all likelihood, the most improbable feat in the history of organized sports.” His minute tallies of the comings and goings of leagues and teams and stadiums down the years make arid reading, but even indifferent fans will find his profiles of colorful figures (particularly the “misfits and weirdos”) and their pithy comments (Mantle, on Koufax: “How the f*ck are you supposed to hit that sh*t?”) entertaining. Moreover, his frank acknowledgement of the sport’s racist past as well as worthy if sometimes tone-deaf nods to players in and from Japan and Latin American countries, to women, to Native Americans (in a box headed “Hail to the Chief”), and to select stars of the Negro Leagues add at least some depth to the historical picture. Unfortunately, the story is not shaped into a coherent narrative but presented in fragmentary bits, with many digressions and glances ahead. Shoehorning the text boxes and speech balloons into cramped black-and-white panels only adds to the general disorder.
An overstuffed patchwork. (glossary, index) (Graphic nonfiction. 12-14)Pub Date: May 8, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-399-57894-6
Page Count: 176
Publisher: Ten Speed Press
Review Posted Online: Feb. 12, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2018
Frank and sharply focused, if lacking the depth of field displayed in Marc Aronson and Marina Budhos’ Eyes of the World...
The great war photographer revisits public triumphs and private tragedies over the course of a tumultuous career.
Speaking in the first person, Capa shows how he earned his reputation on front lines from the Spanish Civil War to the French defeat in Southeast Asia and on other major assignments along the way. In between he recalls personal and professional struggles, hobnobbing with the likes of Ernest Hemingway and Pablo Picasso, and multiple affairs, most notably with fellow photographer Gerda Taro and Ingrid Bergman. His monologue is delivered in a small, faux hand-lettered typeface that captions neatly squared-off sepia panels of boudoirs and battlefronts drawn in ink with white highlights. Celebrities and associates are recognizable, but most figures are too loosely rendered to judge ethnic origins except from context. The art and spare narrative voice combine to give the memoir a somber, distant feel, but some sequences, such as the D-Day landing at Omaha Beach in which the photographer, cursing in English and his native Hungarian, struggles to get his shots as troops are dying on every side, are nightmarishly vivid. Though none of Capa’s photos are reproduced here, Silloray adds visual references to many of the more iconic ones; readers who go on to seek out the originals may be surprised at how many are part of our enduring cultural legacy.
Frank and sharply focused, if lacking the depth of field displayed in Marc Aronson and Marina Budhos’ Eyes of the World (2017). (Graphic biography. 12-14)Pub Date: Sept. 18, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-77085-928-9
Page Count: 88
Publisher: Firefly
Review Posted Online: Aug. 26, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2017
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