Speaking of Stephen King and graphic novels. In an effort to promote his new book, Just After Sunset. King has started releasing a series of 25 short comic inspired films on this web site. Each is only about two minutes long and are somehow connected to the story N. which will be in his new book. I’ve only watched the first few episodes but if you have a couple minutes, I’d recommend checking it out. It seems interesting.

Blurb for the back cover:
“Sexily”

I am not the biggest Stephen King fan. Out of his many, many books I have only read eight of them: The seven books in the Dark Tower series and his pulp fiction inspired The Colorado Kid. The Dark Tower series is one that I am surprised more people aren’t interested in. It started in 1970 when Stephen King released The Gunslinger. Thirty-four years later, he finally finished the series with The Dark Tower in 2004. What drew me to this series is that it wasn’t King’s traditional horror type story but The Dark Tower is more of a fantasy story. Throughout the series, the story intertwines through some of King’s other work and occasionally crosses over in to real life.

Enter, 2007 when King returned to the series to pen a series of comic books that continue the story of the Gunslinger. In the first story arc, the one featured in the sexily hardbound edition the encompasses the first story arch, is based off of the fourth Dark Tower book, Wizard and Glass. I’m looking forward to the next story arcs which feature an original story.

The Gunslinger Born tells of Roland and his two best friends who are tricked in to early adulthood by evil man of many faces. Because of that they are sent away from their homes and come across a whole new set of problems in Hambry where Farson, the big evil guy, has put plans in to motion to use machinery from the old world to crush the forces of Affiliation led by Roland’s father.

This book is beautiful. Drawn by hand, colored by computers, the artwork in the book might be the nicest I’ve ever seen. It lacks the charm of a hand drawn, black-and-white graphic novel. It’s like comparing a low budget indie film like Juno to an expensive Hollywood blockbuster like Pirates of the Caribbean. But like all Hollywood blockbusters (especially the later two Pirates of the Caribbean films), something feels lost with such high production values. Since this graphic novel is based off of a 718 page (mass market version) book, something is bound to be lost and I am not sure how this story will read to somebody who has not read Wizard and Glass. I feel the story is a little rushed as they condense it down and the reader would have a hard time grasping the relationship between Roland and Susan or Roland versus the Big Coffin Hunters. I hope that in the future graphic novel plot arcs will be a little more clear.

Overall I wouldn’t call this a good introduction to the Dark Tower series (for that read the second book, The Drawing of the Three). Fans of the series however will enjoy this continuation of the series. So much of Roland’s life is left unexplored in the books that the graphic novel format is a good way to explore his past.

Blurb for the back cover:
“I like the color green”

Marie’s day is going along normally until a friend she hadn’t seen since high school shows up only to get hit be a speeding van. After that her day deviates from normal as car chases ensue, birthdays are celebrated, affairs are had, people are shot and in the end, Marie quits smoking. All because her now comatose friend was up to no good and now she is caught up in the middle of it all. One Bad Day is graphic novel that is fittingly called Slacker Noir. The protagonist does little to advance the plot except to continuously be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Steve Rolston who is an illustrator by trade ventures forth with his first attempt at writing in addition to drawing the entire book. For some reason the book is printed in a dark green ink instead of the traditional black. There was probably some logical, artistic reason for that. Whatever that reason could be escapes me, but it does give the book a softer feel. Plus, I like the color green.

Perhaps my favorite thing about this book is the way Marie is drawn. With the hoodie, piercings and lesbian haircut, she presents herself in a tough but casual, slightly aloof, manner. This book was an enjoy, quick read worth keeping an eye out for in your local graphic novel store.

I’ll be spending this week trying to finish the 560 page tome that is A Short History of Nearly Everything. So until I finish that particular volume, this week will be dedicated to graphic novels.

Blurb for the back cover:
“It will be over soon”

In Jeremy Tinder‘s short, little graphic novel Cry Yourself to Sleep, the images depict a seemingly normal day of three seemingly normal characters. We have the Jim the rabbit who gets fired and tries to find work and overcome his disadvantages (being a rabbit), a robot known as Robot who comes to the realization that he is a soulless machine and tries to find meaning and understanding in the world by adopting a bird-like lifestyle, and lastly Andy (human) who spends his time working at a video store in between receiving rejection letters from publishers. What follows is a sad picture of life that it is easy to relate to your own. Losing a job, not being able to pay rent, depression. It’s a sad story. Don’t worry though. It will be over soon seeing as how it is only roughly 80 pages long and that’s pretty short for a graphic novel.

Moving on the the things that make this graphic novel graphic, the illustrations in this book are simple and in black and white. They’re not realistic, after all one of the main characters is a bunny, but the cover posted above is exactly how they look in the story, except in black and white. Their heads are large to help convey their emotion via facial expression. For a story like this, the illustrations work. Anything more complex would distract from what the characters were going through.

The book is a quick read, small, and cheap ($7). If you stumble across it would be worth picking up if you have a few extra dollars to spear or if you enjoy stories about a robot wanting to become a bird.

The Book Pirate’s Musings on…

Literary Tattoos

The other day when I came across the blog featuring pictures of literary tattoos I began to consider what literature inspired tattoo I would commit to my body. Many people seem to favor Kurt Vonnegut. Since I haven’t read any of his works, I can’t really jump on that particular bandwagon. Another popular choice is designs from children’s books such as Dr Seuss or The Giving Tree. Both are fine, and a Dr Seuss tattoo could be cool if I could find a design of his that I liked. But I was never a big Dr Seuss fan as a kid. If I were to get a tattoo from the children’s book that I liked as a lil’ Book Pirate, it would have to be from Miss Nelson Is Missing.

Unfortunately, Miss Nelson/Miss Viola Swamp is not someone I want tattooed on my body.

I would probably end up going with my next favorite childhood book. It was the Choose Your Own Adventure Series. I loved them. I use to collect them until one day they were mysteriously donated to the library which I don’t recall giving my consent to do that.

So my tattoo would be Choose Your Own Adventure themed. The story would start on my right arm and you would have to look at different parts of the body to continue the story. I would become a walking book. To demonstrate how I envision this, I have created a little demonstration.
Edit: This little demonstration doesn’t seem to work if you are viewing this post via an RSS feed of sorts.

Before I get this tattoo though, I would have to get over my fear of needles. Until that day comes, I recommend the book Pretty Little Mistakes by Heather McElhatton. It’s a Choose Your Own Adventure inspired book for adults that I have had since it came out and still haven’t found all the endings. Fantastic.