An unusually affecting tale of a man and his dog, complemented by frequently strong artwork.
A man and his faithful canine wander through the aftermath of the zombie apocalypse in this debut graphic novel.
With the zombie catastrophe banging at their door, Alex Kelly and his dog, Boots, are about to have a very bad day. Their escape plan has been stymied by Alex’s dog-averse friends and so he and Boots prepare to brave the no man’s land without help. But when Alex succumbs to a nasty neck bite courtesy of one of the walking dead, he is left as glassy-eyed and shambling as the hordes outside. This will cause Boots to answer the age-old question: What if the owner of Greyfriars Bobby—the famous Skye terrier who spent 14 years guarding his caretaker’s grave in 19th-century Scotland—had risen from the dead? At first, Boots is confused by her owner’s new lack of interest and affection, but she nevertheless follows at Alex’s heels as the two encounter a George Romero–flavored landscape of staggering zombies, packs of ravenous dogs, and—perhaps the most dangerous of all—those few haggard survivors who will stop at nothing to stay that way. Throughout it all, Boots remains steadfast, but will her undying loyalty to her master get through that rotting brain of his, or is their relationship—like the world around them—doomed to destruction and decay? While the story may be wrapped in the familiar tropes of zombie fiction, Shepherd’s book is concerned more with the bond between man and man’s best friend than it is the standard apocalyptic nihilism of the subgenre, buoyed by sensitive work by Beaird (Action Land #3, 2018, etc.). Although the author’s narration occasionally veers into purple prose and Alex’s characterization is (understandably) minimal, Boots is effectively written and expressively drawn. And while some of the textured backgrounds, particularly in the smaller panels, threaten to overwhelm the action, Beaird excels with larger ones that allow him thicker, bolder lines and give the art a woodcut quality that fits the fablelike quality of the graphic novel. Should writer and artist embrace their strengths, they will undoubtedly be ones to watch in the future.
An unusually affecting tale of a man and his dog, complemented by frequently strong artwork.Pub Date: March 12, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-5255-1795-2
Page Count: 108
Publisher: FriesenPress
Review Posted Online: April 11, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles...
Sisters in and out of love.
Meghann Dontess is a high-powered matrimonial lawyer in Seattle who prefers sex with strangers to emotional intimacy: a strategy bound to backfire sooner or later, warns her tough-talking shrink. It’s advice Meghann decides to ignore, along with the memories of her difficult childhood, neglectful mother, and younger sister. Though she managed to reunite Claire with Sam Cavenaugh (her father but not Meghann’s) when her mother abandoned both girls long ago, Meghann still feels guilty that her sister’s life doesn’t measure up, at least on her terms. Never married, Claire ekes out a living running a country campground with her dad and is raising her six-year-old daughter on her own. When she falls in love for the first time with an up-and-coming country musician, Meghann is appalled: Bobby Austin is a three-time loser at marriage—how on earth can Claire be so blind? Bobby’s blunt explanation doesn’t exactly satisfy the concerned big sister, who busies herself planning Claire’s dream wedding anyway. And, to relieve the stress, she beds various guys she picks up in bars, including Dr. Joe Wyatt, a neurosurgeon turned homeless drifter after the demise of his beloved wife Diane (whom he euthanized). When Claire’s awful headache turns out to be a kind of brain tumor known among neurologists as a “terminator,” Joe rallies. Turns out that Claire had befriended his wife on her deathbed, and now in turn he must try to save her. Is it too late? Will Meghann find true love at last?
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles (Distant Shores, 2002, etc.). Kudos for skipping the snifflefest this time around.Pub Date: May 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-345-45073-6
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2003
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.
Four men who meet as college roommates move to New York and spend the next three decades gaining renown in their professions—as an architect, painter, actor and lawyer—and struggling with demons in their intertwined personal lives.
Yanagihara (The People in the Trees, 2013) takes the still-bold leap of writing about characters who don’t share her background; in addition to being male, JB is African-American, Malcolm has a black father and white mother, Willem is white, and “Jude’s race was undetermined”—deserted at birth, he was raised in a monastery and had an unspeakably traumatic childhood that’s revealed slowly over the course of the book. Two of them are gay, one straight and one bisexual. There isn’t a single significant female character, and for a long novel, there isn’t much plot. There aren’t even many markers of what’s happening in the outside world; Jude moves to a loft in SoHo as a young man, but we don’t see the neighborhood change from gritty artists’ enclave to glitzy tourist destination. What we get instead is an intensely interior look at the friends’ psyches and relationships, and it’s utterly enthralling. The four men think about work and creativity and success and failure; they cook for each other, compete with each other and jostle for each other’s affection. JB bases his entire artistic career on painting portraits of his friends, while Malcolm takes care of them by designing their apartments and houses. When Jude, as an adult, is adopted by his favorite Harvard law professor, his friends join him for Thanksgiving in Cambridge every year. And when Willem becomes a movie star, they all bask in his glow. Eventually, the tone darkens and the story narrows to focus on Jude as the pain of his past cuts deep into his carefully constructed life.
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.Pub Date: March 10, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-385-53925-8
Page Count: 720
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Dec. 21, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2015
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