Quote of the Week

"On a pistachio day, Delirium and Barnabas went out wandering. They sniffed the music and tasted the words that were particularly crispy on the tongue, like twinkle and citrus."
   –Jill Thompson in The Little Endless Storybook

SCARY GODMOTHER - Jill Thompson

Awhile back I started talking about this book and promised a review of it, what better time than Halloween season? Bear with me as I'm not accustomed to reviewing graphic novels, but here goes!

SCARY GODMOTHER is the first of two Scary Godmother collections by multi-Eisner Award-winning illustrator Jill Thompson. This first collection includes: "The Scary Godmother," "The Revenge of Jimmy," "The Mystery Date," "The Boo Flu," "Tea for Orson," and as a special bonus at the end, there's some additional art. The collection is labeled as a children's fiction/fantasy book, but I spent literally hours pouring over the pages and enjoying both the stories and the art.

Thompson touches on topics that affect nearly everyone at some point in their lives: fears, being left out, bullies. The stories are fun and uplifting; readers will be able to identify themselves, their children, their friends in the characters - both human and monster!

The writing is both poetic and playful:

'She's cookin' up potions and bottling frights! Capturin' shrieks an' paintin' clouds into the night! An' when every autumn leaf is crisped, and shivers chill your bones - she gathers up the Boozle, 'cause their work has just begun!' ("The Revenge of Jimmy")

From alliteration to metaphor to rhyme, Thompson paints as magically with her words as she does with her colors:

With time running out, and so much at stake, she didn't have time for her unionized breaks! It's hard to eat sandwiches by the light of the moon...or sip slurps of soup while you're riding a broom! ("The Boo Flu")

Nature is personified page after page:

Thunder rumbled in the inky clouds that hung in the Fright Side sky. BOOM HOO HOO! The sky sobbed furiously - casting down sheets of stormy tears! ("The Revenge of Jimmy")

There's a combination of narrative and illustrated dialogue bubbles to tell the stories. Within the illustrated dialogue bubbles, Thompson develops character through word choice; style and weight of lettering - I love that the spider speaks in cursive - and dialect, "What 'choo talkin' 'bout, Hannah?"

It's hard for me to say whether the art or the language is my favorite element of this collection. They are both so vivid and brilliant and make the stories come alive on the page.

The full-color comic sheets of this book are spectacular. The attention to detail makes for literally hours of entertainment as the reader makes out bone curlers and boo-tifying cream, a seat-belted broom, the grade on a discarded school paper amidst a mountain of mess in a young boys bedroom. And one of the most endearing features? Thompson's resemblance to her Spooky Godmother.

This beautifully bound collection is over 200 pages of smiles and laughs and heart-warming fun. It will provide young and old alike with hours of entertainment and some very sore smiling muscles.

SCARY GODMOTHER is available in hardcover from Dark Horse Books (ISBN: 978-1-59582-589-6)

Chicago Comic Con - A Fish Outta Water

This past weekend I was fortunate enough to be able to go to the Chicago Comic Con. If you know me, you know I'm a nerd, but not a comics nerd. I had ulterior motives. Gregg Hurwitz was appearing at the convention!

I introduce Gregg to everyone as a thriller writer, which he most definitely is. But did you also know he's a comic book author as well? He's written several comic book characters now and has some work coming up with The Penguin. You can see information about that work here.

I had intended to arrive at the convention on Saturday morning for Gregg's 11:00 panel on writing; however, no one informed my GPS or Google Maps about the Comic Con traffic delays! I missed the 11:00 panel, but was able to see Gregg at his signing after.

On the convention floor I felt like a fish out of water. I was constantly asking Ruth Jordan, Dana Kaye and Jon Jordan who people were supposed to be dressed as. I could identify the ones everyone knows: Ghostbusters (yes, there were Ghostbuster people), Superman, Wonder Woman, Batman, the Joker. And I even recognized Lou Ferrigno when he walked by us before breakfast on Sunday. But I discovered Steam Punk, which I thought were very cool.  There was a man with a furry yellow costume; that was weird. And I reaffirmed the fact that there are far more daring people in this world than I - holy moly, did your mother see you before you left the house looking like that? The little kids were quite cute. One who couldn't have been more than about 2 1/2 feet tall corrected his father (grandfather?) when he identified the wrong character on a t-shirt. Too funny! I didn't take any pictures on the convention floor because there was part of me that simply didn't know how to react. I was definitely a fish out of water.

Gregg moderated a panel later on Saturday, which I was able to attend. The panel consisted of two artists and a comic book writer. Essentially their discussion boiled down to something very similar to novel-writing: being successful requires high levels of talent, work ethic and luck. The talent has to come first, but there are many talented people out there. Luck does play a significant role in the comic book industry.

The other very significant part of this past weekend is the drug Jon Jordan hooked me on. She goes by the name of Jill Thompson. I have met Jill prior to this weekend, but on Saturday Jon handed me a copy of SCARY GODMOTHER, which you will all hear about later this week. Essentially all I had to do was open the front cover, and now I'm scouring about trying to find other children's comics that she's done. I. LOVE. HER. WORK!

That was my wonderful first experience with the Chicago Comic Con. While I don't think I'll be headed out to San Diego any time too soon, this was a fun experience and I'm sure it won't be my last. How about you all? Anyone been to a comic convention? Fun anecdotes to share? I'd love to hear them.

In the mean time, happy reading!