Retrolective: From the Ashes

This was, barring a couple of Spider-Man comics I stumbled on as a young boy (I was unimpressed, although largely because anything with Black Cat in is too predicated on the UST between Spidey and not-Catwoman to appeal to a six year old), my first brush with Superhero comics. I was fourteen or fifteen (I know, right, but seriously for years I had literally no idea that either Superman or Batman had been in comics first) and I found it in the library. I wasn't new to comics - I'd been reading Marvel UK's slightly expanded Transformers run for years and read through most of Judge Dredd: Cursed Earth during rehearsals for Oliver! - and I knew of the X-Men in passing from a choose-your-own-adventure book I'd picked up - also in the library - which hadn't been very good, but which had intrigued me enough to check out this comic, or rather trade paperback.

I must have read it cover to cover three or four times in a couple of days.

Having no background with the ongoing series, I had no idea what the Phoenix Force was or who Jean Grey had been, but that was part of what intrigued me; the fact that this seemed to be part of a much larger world. Part of the reason I read and re-read was to pick up on as much detail as I could. It also contained challenging storylines - Madeleine Pryor might just be confusing, but the same volume has the introduction of the Morlocks, including Storm's fight to the death against Callisto, one random mention of Colossus's sister having been kidnapped by demons and, best of all, Rogue's original face turn.

The latter begins with Rogue - short hair, modest green outfit - showing up at the Mansion after absorbing Ms Marvel's powers and conscience, only to get punched out through the roof by Marvel (now called Binary), which is awesome, followed by a clash with Silver Samurai's minions alongside a highly doubtful Wolverine which contained such a critical mass of sparky, antagonistic banter (ending with Rogue testing her newly-gained invulnerability almost to destruction and Wolverine thanking her with a super symbolic kiss to transfer his healing factor to her temporarily) that I've never entirely forgiven either Gambit or Jean Grey for being their official main crushes in the wider narrative.

The conclusion of the main storyline (a wizard did it, or at least a mutant with illusion powers) was actually a bit weak compared to the rest of the book, but this was still the one that got me into superheroes and comics in a big way.

I should probably write something about Transformers at a later date, as that was a big influence, and possibly the X-Men cartoons on My Life as a Doge...

The Man Who Was Thursday

The Man who Was Thursday: A Nightmare is a surreal and semi-philosophical ramble by GK Chesterton, he of the Father Brown stories and the hardcore Catholic conversion, which tells of a man named Syme who embarks on a great and wondrous adventure in the name of law and order and poetry.

It's hard to say more without giving too much away, but it really is a splendid read, full of whimsy and excitement, two things that are not often enough mixed.

I'm currently in the middle of reading it to my girlfriend and baby, because I find the dreamlike rhythm of the writing to be rather restful.

Reckless

Reckless is the first novel in German author Cornelia Funke's follow up to the acclaimed Inkheart trilogy, also called the Reckless series and intended, so they say, as a pentalogy. The second book came out recently and is on my Kindle and to-read list, because Reckless was a book that I very much enjoyed. I got back into young adult fiction, especially fantasy, during my teaching years, when I reviewed books for a site called Write Away. (Oh look; a new Marcus Sedgwick - no! Be good! You already bought Fearless today.)

Reckless takes place in the fairy tale setting of Mirrorworld, so called because it can be reached from the ordinary world by way of a mirror. Jacob Reckless first passed into this world after his father disappeared (possibly vanishing into the Mirrorworld himself) and has spent half his life using it to avoid the responsibilities of reality. Responsibility comes crashing into his existence however, when his brother Will follows him and is afflicted with a terrible curse.

In part a retelling of various Grimm's fairy tales, Reckless is also an adventure story in its own right, and the two are cleverly woven together, not least in the presentation of Jacob as a hunter of the precious objects of fairy tales, some of which he keeps and uses as tools of his treasure-seeking trade.

Notably, the book is listed as written in English, whereas Funke's previous work has been written in German and translated. I'm looking forward to cracking into Fearless in the coming week.

Rivers of London

I discovered Ben Aaronovich's Rivers of London series on a trawl through the Kindle Store. It wasn't cheap, but the concept looked interesting and... Oh, who am I kidding. Ben Aaronovich wrote Remembrance of the Daleks and Battlefield.

Anyway, I kicked off with Rivers of London, which introduces us to half-Sierra Leonean copper Peter Grant, a man with a scientific mind but a limited patience for the nitty gritty of police work, as compared to his fellow newly-minted PC Leslie May, who is going places. It is through Peter's eyes that we are introduced to a world of magic that exists below the surface of the normal, where a miniscule but dedicated force of civil servants struggles to control an array of ghosts, monsters and gods through a labyrinthine network of vaguely defined 'arrangements'.

Note: there may be spoilers ahead.

I'm interested to know where Ben Aaronovich comes by the knowledge of Black London culture that informs not only PC Grant's background, but also the family of goddesses who represent the lower reaches of the Thames. I confess, white people - especially middle-class white Englishmen like me - writing about anything other than other middle-class white Englishmen always makes me a little uncomfortable, but Aaronovich does it well and has been largely praised for using a black central character, which suggests that he hasn't gone horribly awry, so I can mostly relax and enjoy the rest of the book.

And I did. It's got a wry sense of humour that I like in my fiction (I don't consider stony seriousness a bad thing, but it's not really my thing) and a world that feels real in its scope and incompleteness. In many ways, it is the fact that not everything is explained that makes it work.

Grant's approach to magic is at odds with that of his mentor (the technical term is Master, but as a black man working for a white man, he refuses to use it), Inspector Nightingale, an old school Newtonian wizard whose adherence to tried and trusted forms gives him power that Grant, lax student and experimenter, sacrifices for a flexibility which sometimes pays off. The fact that neither Grant nor May (who starts as an apprentice wizard later and is much better at the correct form) is shown as definitively superior (May, the student, masters the standards better; Grant, the natural, throws out wild cards and tries to look at how and why it works) is another strength. Most books of the sort are yay new thinking, and a few hardline traditionalist, but I like the mix better. Making the male lead the intuitive one is by now almost standard enough a reversal to be its own cliche, but it's done well.

A bold move comes at the end of the first book and is cashed in for the third, as the lead female character's face is transmogrified into the aspect of Mr Punch and then collapses, leaving her unable to speak for most of the second book and hideously disfigured in the third. As well as putting the mockers on your chances of selling the film rights, the complications in the relationship between May and Grant, and the impact on May's character, are played out effectively and convincingly, which is good going for a book that is largely quite lighthearted.

I basically chained through the first three books (the fourth is out in June) and enjoyed all three. It put me in a mood for urban fantasy which was only killed by Kate Griffin's A Madness of Angels, and that only because the woman badly needs to learn to use a semi-colon (not just because everyone should, but because she writes in sentences that just flat out beg to be semi-colonised). I am told that that one is well worth it, however, so will be getting back to it at some point, possibly just before Broken Homes comes out in June.

The Iconomicon

Finally, this is my book blog. Life will remain on my LJ (lslaw.livejournal.com) save where it pertains to my status as ersatz dad.