13 Reasons Why – Best Audiobook this year

Here is a book that was made to be an audiobook.  The setup is this: a teenage girl, Hannah, has commited suicide, but before she did, she made tapesof 13 stories connecting all the people that led her to lose hope.  Now they must listen to the tapes and pass them on to the next person on the list.  The audio chores are shared between a woman narrating Hannah and a man voicing the thoughts of Clay, the boy who had a crush on Hannah and one of the recipients of the tapes.  This setup adds drama and intensity to this YA staple and the voice acting is top notch.  I find that I prefer audiobooks done by casts or in this case, two people who can breath life into these characters.  The one drawback of the book (and it is pretty big), is that I don’t buy Hannah’s selfish descent into self-pity and nihilism.  She is not portrayed as that vulnerable throughout the book.  Just the fact that she makes the tapes would lead you to believe she has more fight left in her.  Yet, perhaps that’s how a real suicide might occur.  I appreciate the fact that the suicide is seen from the eyes of a boy who cared about her.  It makes it painful, but you can feel the weight of her actions on others rather than getting wrapped up in her self-pity and loathing like other books about this topic.  In the end, she gives up and that is not celebrated here.

Twilight – I’m clearly not the target audience

While this book started out well, by the end, I couldn’t wait to be finished with it.  The basic setup is that Bella has moved to a small Washington town to live with her father.  While at a new school, she meets and is captivated by a strange young man who turns out to be a vampire, love ensues.  Bella was intriquing initially, but ultimately, didn’t seem to change much.  Edward never did much for me.  He’s truly an unrealizable fantasy.  I feel sorry for the actor who will play him in the movie.  There is no way to live up to the expectations of this character.  I enjoyed Anne Rice’s vampires in Lestat even though they have led us to the place where horror as a genre is crippled. But Edward pales in comparison to Lestat.  That vampire could carry multiple books all on his own.  I don’t want to know that much about Edward.  In this, I know I’m in the minority.

One of my main problems with the book is the fact that it’s too much about their relationship.  I know this may be a typically male thing to say, but this is a story about vampires!  There has got to be more action.  At one point, I thought we were finally going to see some vampire on vampire action and Bella faints!?!  Cut to her waking up and I was ready to throw the thing across the room.  Who cuts away from a vampire fight?  I can’t imagine them doing this in the movie, but we’ll see.

The relationship was repetitive by the end.  Conversations were repeated and rehashed over and over.  We are told constantly that Bella needs to stay away from Edward because he’s dangerous for her.  He tells us repeatedly that he should stay away from her.  So stay away already!  Saying this once or twice is alright, but it’s the foundation of the book and it gets old.  I shudder to think how I would feel after reading four books like this.

My favorite comic of the summer – Y: the Last Man 10

Out of everything I read this summer, nothing comes close to Y: the Last Man 10: Whys and Wherefores by Brian K. Vaughan, his final chapter in the series.  This series has always been a good read, though it sagged a bit in the middle.  Here, Vaughan has pulled off a difficult feat, ending it in a satisfying way that seems appropriate to the story he was telling.  I don’t want to indicate that this is a sappy ending where everyone lives happily ever after, it’s not.  Anyone who cares about these characters will probably shed a tear by the end, but Vaughan ends the story in a sure-handed way that indicates he knew where he was going the entire time.  Pia Guerra’s lends a consistency to the storytelling that most ongoing series don’t have as artists come and go because she stuck around from start to finish and did almost as much as Vaughan in defining these characters.  The story picks up as Yorrick, the last man on earth after a medical catastrophe kills every other man, finally catches up to his long lost love, Beth, after 5 years of searching.  The reunion doesn’t quite go as planned and all the plot threads Vaughan has been building over the past 9 volumes converge to offer a sad, engaging, appropriate finish.  From there, he jumps forward 30 years to show what a world without men would look like over time.  We get to see Yorrick’s final act and it is pitch perfect ending for the character that he was.  More than any other comic series, Y: the Last Man is the one to recommend to your adult friends to show them the storytelling possibilities that exist in comics and graphic novels.  This may replace the Sandman as my favorite comic series.

Other recent graphic novels worth checking out:

Buffy Season 8: No Future for You by Brian K. Vaughan
Joss Wheden turns over his season eight storyline to comic creator Brian K. Vaughan and he knocks it out of the park.  He focuses on Faith and Giles in this story as they track down one of the new “slayers” Buffy created, who has decidedly evil ideas about how to use her new powers.  She is an English aristocrat and Faith must gain her confidence in order to get close enough to take her out.  But can Faith finish the job knowing she must kill a human woman to do it?

Principles of Uncertainty – Maira Kelman
This is a whimsical, imaginative meditation about many aspects of Kalman’s life told through her paintings and photography.  Initially, there doesn’t seem to be a direction, but the strength of her own personality and interests provides one by the end.  Alternately fun and thoughtful, a remarkable achievemen

House – Josh Simmons
This one would be great to read around Halloween.  This is a wordless graphic novel that reminded me of the dread I felt after watching the Blair Witch Project.  Simmons has a very cartoony style, so you don’t really expect the horrible things that happen to the three protagonists in this story.  These characters set out to go hiking and find an old abandoned house, which (of course) they decide to explore.  Things get progressively worse for them while there.  Simmons is able to convey their doom by doing pages with more and more panels showing their lives getting smaller and smaller.  This is in contrast to a lot of typical superhero comics where the panels get bigger as the story gets more intense.  Definitely not for the squeamish, but worth a look.

The Killer – Matz
This stylized graphic novel is about an assassin who is slowly losing control of his anger and it’s starting to affect his work.  The art is well done, but the story seems a little schizophrenic.  If the protagonist of your story is to be a cold blooded killer like this, there better be a reason to identify with him, and I’m not sure there is in this case. 

Exit Wounds – Rutu Modan
Kobi’s estranged father goes missing after a Tel Aviv bus bombing.  At the urging of a young woman, Kobi tries to confirm whether or not his father was on that bus.  As he searches, he learns more about his father and the woman who wants to find him.  A powerful and fascinating look into modern Israeli life.

Manhunter 3 & 4 – Mark Andreyko
In these stories, we learn more about attorney Kate Spencer’s Manhunter armor and where it came from.  In the forth volume, Kate switches sides in the courtroom to become a public defender in order defend Wonder Woman after she kills a man.  Kate’s rough edges seem to get smoothed out some here, which lessens her appeal, but this is still a superhero title unlike many others you will find.

Green Arrow 5 – City Walls, V 6 – Moving Targets & V. 7 Heading into the Light
Judd Winick hits his stride with Green Arrow in these volumes.  Green Arrow fights one of Batman’s villains in volume 5 after his city is locked down by various mystical forces.  In volume 6, GA confronts the new menace of Brick and various other mobsters and villains who want him taken out while his new protege Speedy, struggles to deal with a new medical condition.  In V. 7, Dr. Light seeks revenge on GA and the other heroes for all the wrongs they’ve done to him over the years.  Winick has a good take on the liberal crusader and he keeps the action coming.