Books and comics read in June 2014

[usuallyhats]

Brothers in Arms - Lois McMaster Bujold
Guardians of Paradise - Jaine Fenn
*Secret Avengers: Run the Mission, Don't Get Seen, Save the World
Uncanny X-Force: Torn and Frayed
*X-Men: Reckless Abandonment
Side Jobs - Jim Butcher
*Wake - Anna Hope
Prodigy - Marie Lu
Mirror Dance - Lois McMaster Bujold
Memory - Lois McMaster Bujold

Secret Avengers: Run the Mission, Don't Get Seen, Save the World
This was a bit of a disappointment, sadly. It was full of characters I like or want to like (Natasha, Sharon, Valkyrie, Steve, Beast and Moon Knight, who turns out to be delightfully weird) and there were some lovely character moments and interactions, but overall there was only a tiny little bit of that and an awful lot of veering-to-grimdark morally dubious violence. SIGH. I feel like the one-shot format hurt it too: all the stories could have done with more room to breathe and to give the characters' actions more consideration and weight. The first story in particular is particularly egregious in this regard in that our heroes kill a load of bad guys to save the world and then spend only a panel or two going "maybe this is not ok, no it's totally fine because maths" before the issue ends and we move on. :/

X-Men: Reckless Abandonment
My problem with Brian Wood's X-Men writing is that I find it incredibly forgettable. I know I enjoyed this and the previous volume when I read them, but pretty much all I can remember about them now is... there was a boat? Something about DNA? I did really enjoy the Daredevil and Domino team-up (written by someone else!) in this volume, though - the two characters sparked off each other beautifully, leading to some great dialogue.

Wake
I think this book suffered from being slightly overhyped - it was good, but it wasn't as amazing as I was expecting. It tells the story of three women in the aftermath of WWI, and it does it well and movingly, but I didn't feel like it was doing much that was new. That's not a problem, really, but given what I'd heard of it I was expecting more.

...well that is all very complainingy. I did read more good stuff this month but it was either rereads (Vorkosigans!), the middle book of a trilogy (Prodigy) or part of an ongoing series (Guardians of Paradise), and thus I felt less moved to talk about it.

Comments

[persiflage-1.livejournal.com]

Sorry to hear you didn't enjoy Wake as much as I did.

[usuallyhats]

I wish I'd liked it more! I mean, I enjoyed it, but I wasn't blown away by it like I was hoping to be. :(

[persiflage-1.livejournal.com]

Apparently I'm lacking in discrimination and easily pleased - 'cos I was definitely blown away by it.

[ladymercury-10.livejournal.com]

How did you like X-Force? I tried to read the Remender run a while back, and I loved the art but it was kind of too dark for me.

[usuallyhats]

I thought this volume was a bit of a mess, unfortunately! There seemed to be a whole lot of storylines going on and none of them made much sense. And it was one of those volumes that lots of different artists had worked on, which didn't help - I don't think I actually disliked any of them but it added to the general aura of confusion. I remember the previous volume being better, though it was also a bit confusing.