Brenda's Current Reads

Because we all have varied tastes, I thought I’d copy Jen and create my own current reads post and see if this works out for me? Mostly I seem to have a lot of thoughts about the stuff that I read, but I rarely commit it to writing, so oftentimes I don’t get a chance to really work my own way through my own thinking if that makes sense? Below is a list of the books I read in December and a few thoughts on each book. I don’t know that there is a strong unifying theme here, but I seem to be drawn to books with seemingly strong and complex female characters—I say seemingly because in the case of some books, the cover often deceives me into thinking that I will get a more in depth story than what I actually end up with. So I'm rating these books on a 5 point scale, for those of you who are not numerically inclined, below is a breakdown of what those numbers actually mean.

5/5--YASSS! Fantastic! (this is my enthusiasm at its peak. Also a little nod to the ninth doctor from Doctor Who)

4/5-- Lovely (Gonna look into the series and keep reading)

3/5--I mean, it was a'right. (I'll keep reading, but like with measured optimism)

2/5--Meh. (If you're bored and you got nothing better to do, I guess this is a way to pass the time. But also, Jason Momoa pictures are on the internet, so why not go google those instead?)

1/5--Yo! [Insert publisher here] You owe me my money and time. (this is peak anger. I don't care for wasting my time. I could have spent that time playing Dragonvale instead of reading this)

Anyway, without further ado, here are my December reads:

Giant Days: Early Registration 4/5

Sometime in 2018, Jen directed me to Boom’s Giant Days by John Allison. Her pitch? “It’s quintessentially British and it's about these three friends starting college.” That gave me pause. I remember my early college days as a cacophony of anxious hope exacerbated by tv on dvd, so I was interested to see what the college experience is like for folks who aren’t a mess. This book (along with a number of other factors--including teaching) helped realize that my own insecurities and fears were not unique and that everyone is mess when they first start college. 

The series follows three young women at Sheffield University, and this book is essentially a prequel to the the series. The artwork in this collection of stories is done by the author while the series is illustrated by Lissa Treiman. I will admit that it took me a couple of pages to get used to the artwork--mind you, I started with the printed series and not the webcomic, so I was used to Treiman's style and not Allison's. That said, it really didn't take long for me to get into the narrative. The characters are as charming and funny as they are in the series, so the change in art style didn't bother me for long. I will say this though, the use of color in this collection of stories is a lot flatter than those illustrated by Treiman. While Treiman and Cogar shade the panels so that the positive space pops and the images move as if watching a television episode, Allison's panels and use of color are a little flatter so visualizing that movement takes a little more work on the part of the reader. 

Treiman's artwork in Giant Days vol. 1

Allison's artwork in Giant Days: Early Registration

Mind you, Treiman is a Disney animator, so her skill in capturing movement on still images makes sense. 

So anyway, in the story, we see Esther make use of her boxing gloves and knock out one of the head girls, Daisy yoga floats in an attempt to back Esther up, and Susan struggles to get a decent night's rest, and when that fails, she sets fire to a head girl's extensions after said girl tries to bully Esther into joining the head girl squad. Essentially, this book narrates the origin story of their friendship. It's worth a read. It's funny, and like the series, documents the girls' lives in all their messed up and complicated splendor. The breakdown of Esther's long distance relationship is particularly striking as we see Esther make ill advised, but very human, choices. She sleeps with Ed's friend in a moment of anger and immediately regrets, but she still has to deal with the consequences of such a decision. I like the frustration that Allison captures in Esther. She obviously loves her boyfriend but the difficulty of a long distance relationship is too much to contend with in light of all the other changes in her life i.e college, new friends, new experiences, etc. Esther's love story in this volume doesn't have a happy ending, but the fallout of her breakup allows her friends (and the reader) to see beyond the gorgeous goth and see Esther as the flawed human being figuring out her life and her place in the world. Likewise, we see Daisy incrementally grow out of her shy and quiet self into someone who is willing to go outside of her comfort zone and make a new friend. Susan runs for president of Indie Soc, an indie music student org, and wins. She beats Thom for the post by showing up to the election in a home made cape that lists her favorite bands on one side and has a picture of a skateboarding fox on the other. The book is filled with lighthearted moments like this to help balance the real struggles that the girls are facing--which is, I think, the charm of the series and definitely worth a read.  

White Tiger: A Hero's Compulsion 2/5

In Tamora Pierce and Timothy Liebe's White Tiger, we see Angela del Toro as she dons the White Tiger mantle and tries to make sense of her life after her uncle Hector's death, her FBI's partner's murder, and her mentor's imprisonment. Oh yeah, she also got her uncle Hector's mystical amulets in the mail and as a result got the powers of the White Tiger. The story charts del Toro's pursuit of a Yakuza member, Sano Orii, and her investigation into the secret organization: Chaeyi. She fights King Cobra a number of times, gets a job with a private security firm, and a number of meet ups with more established heroes (which no doubt are meant to borrow on their ethos to establish her as a hero). 

I wanted to enjoy this book. I didn't, but I wanted to. Mostly my problem with it is that I was bored by the detective storyline--I don't know if it's the genre or if it's that I didn't really feel connected to the main character? While there are some scenes where you see del Toro with her family, her character seems to be almost narrowly defined by her career? I mean there are moments in which the warmth and complexity of her family life appears, but those moments are brief and fleeting. I wish the authors would have focused a bit more on exploring those relationships and her struggle to follow the calling of the White Tiger, while trying to ease her family's anxiety regarding hero work--which when I think about it, speaks to the dual identity aspect of both the superhero genre but also the first-gen kid experience. As children of immigrant parents, many first-gen kids feel the pull of their American side and their cultural past and finding their own place in the middle of it--which I think would have made for an interesting narrative here, but I didn't quite get that here. Instead, we see some contrived inner monologue, a few flashbacks, and a lot of boring chats with Uncle Iron Fist. I will add though, that my problem with White Tiger, as a character, also stems from my feelings that Marvel tried to capitalize on Black Panther's success within the African American community and tried to do the same with the Hispanic community for profits' sake. 

Ricanstruction: Reminiscing and Rebuilding Puerto Rico

This book is very similar to the last book on my current reads list, but it's a little different in that it highlights La Borinqueña and adds cameos from different established heroes all of whom are helping la Borinqueña with relief efforts in Puerto Rico. The book is an anthology of single issue comics and is penned by everyone from Yanick Paquette to Gail Simone, but most notably, Edgardo Miranda-Rodriguez, creator of the aforementioned la Borinqueña.

While I enjoyed reading this book, it leaned hard on this sense of blind optimism that appears in a lot of superhero comics. While I love seeing la Borinqueña slay at the hero game, too many of the stories end with her saving the moment and suggesting that relief efforts take minimal work and can easily be fixed by a supe in a cape--which is fine, but I am partial to the nuanced work in Puerto Rico Strong. I can't help but compare the two books because both are attempting to make sense of the devastation while offering a ray of hope to readers, but I just think that Puerto Rico Strong is a better executed effort in this regard as it offers a mixture of authentic individual stories that recognize the complexity of what needs to get done to help Puerto Rico in the coming years.

That said, boy did I enjoy watching la Borinqueña interact with so many DC legends! The banter and moments of quiet reflection were worth the read. I have not read her series yet, but man am I stoked to pick it up. She's a breath of fresh air and is a much more nuanced character that is simply a delight to read. She understands the difficulty of saving Puerto Rico, but she doesn't shy away from the work and in that, I think, she accomplishes the work of the superhero: to inspire, so I definitely recommend.  

PICK OF THE MONTH

Puerto Rico Strong 5/5

This mess of a book was a hard read. Not because it's boring or anything, but some of the topics and history outlined within the book's pages is complex and quite dark. That said, I really enjoyed reading this and loved the amalgamation of art styles and stories.

The book is a group effort, and the proceeds go to Hurricane Relief efforts so purchasing the book will help do some good in the world. So yay! But also, the thing I enjoyed most is the variety of stories that allow the reader a number of viewpoints. You get stories from people living on the island before Hurricane Maria, some of Puerto Rico's history (as with any historical account, there's a lot of dark and awful stuff), stories of people who have immigrated to the United States, and some mythology--it just feels like there is something for everyone, but their unifying theme is the beauty of Puerto Rico and its richest resource: its people (I know that sounds hella corny but honestly this book does a beautiful job of helping readers see that the fallout of the Hurricane wasn't just the physical toll that it took on the island, but the impact that it continues to have on individual families and HOW it affected them).

Anyway, this book compiles 41 individual stories of island. It begins with an omniscient narrator and some brightly colored panels documenting the splendor of the island before the Hurricane juxtaposed against gray and blue panels that vividly illustrate the hurricane's destruction. The last panels in this story caught my eye--particularly as the narrator states: "Boricuas reaching across dark oceans to offer their light" (15). These panels are beautifully rendered and capture the melancholy that the story demands while echoing the theme of hope that runs strong throughout this graphic novel. However, what I think makes this theme of hope more markedly apparent is the reminder of the primos and  living in America and sending relief to their families back home. There's this attachment and this living nerve connection that the mainland shares with Puerto Rico that I think this book reveals. Anyway, there will be a more in-depth discussion of Puerto Rico Strong in the coming weeks with discussion from Tory, Jen and Terri, so check that out.

Thanks for reading! Let me know your thoughts in the comments below!