This Week in Reading

BOOKS:

Dragon Token, by Melanie Rawn, pages 143 – 185.

Kingdom Come, by Elliot S. Maggin, pages 102 – 115.

The Caped Crusade, by Glen Weldon, pages 1 – 126.

COMICS:

Lois Lane Book One

Ms Tree 9, 30, 32, 33, 36, 37, 42, & 43.

Parts of Strange Adventures 3, 5, 7, 15 & Secret Origins 43.

The Seventh Shrine, Books 1 & 2

Review of Batgirl: To Dare the Darkness

Book 24. Batgirl: To Dare the Darkness, by Doug Moench. Unabridged audio.

This is a YA novel that takes place in the Batman & Robin movie universe, in which Bargirl was played by Alicia Silverstone. It was published in 1997, and is written by a veteran comic book writer.

Wayne Tech has a creepy new employee. He villainous Black Mask has been turning people into weapons. Barbara Wilson (not Gordon, for some reason) believes that these events are related, and that they imply that dark days are coming. Bruce Wayne is not so sure that there is a connection. At least not at first.

This novel takes place early in Batgirl’s career. She quits her crime-fighting job at one point early in the book, dropping her mask in the Batcave. It is a poignant scene, made even more so when Batman leaves the mask where she dropped it, waiting for her to return and pick it back up. It’s a nice character moment for Barbara, Batman & even Robin.

In addition to her crime-fighting colleagues, Alfred also appears as a supporting character in the book, but Moench does a good job keeping this Barbara’s story. Despite the number of “larger than life” characters in the cast, this is definitely a Batgirl story. In the course of taking on Black Mask, she works with Robin a lot, proposing to Batman at the end that they all become a team.

Moench’s sense of comic book storytelling keeps the plot moving at a good pace. But there are many moments where the YA requirements for simplicity hurt the overall enjoyment level of the story.

Source: This book was read in chapters over a number of episodes of the podcast FromBatgirl to Oracle. The host of the show, Stella, did a wonderful job bringing the voices of all of the characters to life.

This Week in Reading

BOOKS:

Scorpia Rising, by Anthony Horowitz, COMPLETED.

Dragon Token, by Melanie Rawn, pages 98 – 143.

Kingdom Come, by Elliot S. Maggin, pages 29 – 102.

COMICS:

Dandy 1 – 3

Green Lantern 135

Messenger: The Legend of Joan of Arc, Original Graphic Novel

Mister X 1 – 6

Moby Duck 4

Review of Scorpia Rising

Book #23. Scorpia Rising, by Anthony Horowitz. Unabridged audio.

I have read all of the prior Alex Ryder novels, and have found them among the more serious Young Adult novels I’ve read. The concept of “teen James Bond” could go wrong in a lot of silly ways, but this series has always taken seriously the effects that this situation will have on both the teen and on those around them.

As the novel opens, Alex Ryder is out of the spy game, supposedly for good. He and his female caretaker, Jack, have moved to London, and Alex is back in school. The leaders of MI6 have pledged to never use Alex again on a mission, recognizing how lucky they have been that his involvement has not become publicly known. But an attack at Alex’s school and the interception of some troubling chatter leads MI6 to put him back in the field, for what they promise is one last mission.

A teenaged enemy from a prior book, Julius, escapes his secret prison. Having had his features surgically altered to become a virtual twin of Alex makes him the perfect pawn for the evil organization Scorpia to use. The novel is exciting, and Alex also manages to have plenty of character moments, especially with his female caretaker Jack Starbright. As the novel ends, it appears that Alex’s career as a spy is actually, truly over. We also learn that MI-6 is not as virtuous in dealing with Alex as we may have thought at this point in the series. This is a level of nuance and Realpolitik that is unusual for a novel featuring a teen protagonist.

There is one more book set in this world, but from what I can tell Alex is not the lead character. It may well be a prequel involving Alex’s spy father, and the man who came to be Alex’s greatest nemesis.

Source: public library

This Week in Reading

BOOKS:

Scorpia Rising, by Anthony Horowitz, pages 92 – 210

Dragon Token, by Melanie Rawn, pages 48 – 98.

Kingdom Come, by Elliot S. Maggin, pages 1 – 29.

COMICS:

Common Grounds 1 – 6

Invisible Republic 1 – 5
Martian Manhunter Annual 1

Space Action 1 – 3
Trekker omnibus, pages 296 –  324 (*)

Wonder Woman 1

 (*) covering the story “Trial by Fire.” Ruth and Darrin Sutherland talked about this story in detail on episode 18 of the excellent podcast Trekker Talk.

Podcast Guest Appearances

Over the last few weeks, I was able to appear as a guest on a couple of terrific podcasts, hosted by a couple of terrific podcasters. There are a few more to be recorded and released in the near future, but here are two that recently came out.

I appeared recently for the 5th (and probably final) time on Ryan Daly's excellent Secret Origins podcast. I joined him to talk about one of my favorite obscure characters, ManBat! That conversation occurs in the first section of episode 39 of that show.

I was also fortunate enough to join Paul the Producer Spataro on episode 241 of the excellent Back to the Bins podcast, on the equally excellent Two True Freaks podcast network. He and I talked about Issue 17 of the DC Comics run of Kurt Busiek's excellent Astro City, as well as a Hulk story from an early issue of Tales to Astonish.