Easy Reading – Marked for Plot

Private Eye – Memes in a Post-Internet Noir

I picked up Private Eye as a text for the Queer Comics elective that I get to teach when student interest is high enough. While there are plenty of breakout hits in that space, I also force students to expose themselves to a broad variety of stories for our independent exploration units. This was one of the few queer noir comics I’d heard about. It was fun and irreverent, great for helping me manage stress at the start of the school year – probably a running theme in my reviews in the next month or so. Unfortunately, and unfairly, I kept comparing this to Watchmen, and it just isn’t on the same level as the greats in the comic space.

The Premise: a private investigator in a world where masks and pseudonyms are part of everyday life sees his most recent client brutally murdered. Now, the target is on his back as both a suspect of her death and as a mysterious criminal seeks to tie up loose ends.

Read if You Like: weird imaginings of humanity’s future, dynamic characterization (in writing and art), stories that push a little bit on the edges of absurdity

Avoid if You Dislike: classic noir structures, books without a ton of thematic heft, ambiguous endings

Mage Errant – A Concussion Victim’s Dream!

August has ben so much fun! I have finally been blessed to join the concussion club and had a string of days where reading visually was simply not an option. It’s been two weeks at this point, and while my stamina is on the low end, it seems like I got the best possible version of a concussion possible. Hopefully this is the last time I feel compelled to reference it (outside of my August wrap-up). Mage Errant ended up being my audiobook series of choice, and I had a lot of time with a sleep mask over my eyes floating in and out of consciousness, especially for books 1-3. Thankfully, this is a reread for me, so I never felt particularly lost or confused. That said, the things that are popping up for me in this review are much more heavily weighted on the back half of the series – which is generally the better half anyways.

This will have some light spoiler elements for the first book in the series, but nothing specific or consequential.

Read if You Like: creative applications of magic, school settings, battles that span hundreds of pages, ensemble casts with plenty of queerness, morally complex (corrupt?) mentor figures

Avoid if You Dislike: prose that could use a line edit, characters leveraging ‘story logic’, critiques of imperialism, tonal shifts across the series from YA to Adult (no sex)

Villain – Psychologically Delightful

Hench is the book that relaunched my interest in Superhero media. It wasn’t the first to deconstruct whether or not the heroes are the good folks, not by any stretch of the imagination. However, it brought a modern take to the genre and reveled in delicious ambiguity. Villain was one of the releases I was most excited about this year. I think Hench is the stronger novel overall, but the highs in Villain are much more delicious and psychological.

This review will include plenty of spoilers for Hench, so I’d avoid continuing unless you’ve read it. See my review for that book here.

The Premise
Supercollider is nothing more than a ball of flesh, and isn’t long for this world. Leviathan and Anna (though now Auditor is more appropriate) have set their sights on The Draft, which is putting together a fresh response to the new strategies put forward by this villainous duo.

Read If You Like: the horror of involuntary medical procedures, competence porn, passing the point of no return, casual inclusion of mobility aids

Avoid If You Dislike: whiny antagonists, toxic romances, mandibles

Cut & Run – Look How Far We’ve Come

Cut & Run is a cult classic amongst the Queer Thriller crowd. It’s coming up on being two-decades old and recently got reprinted, so I knew I was going to pick it up. It has a reputation for being on the ‘mindless fun’ side of books, and it fit that brief delightfully. I’d been feeling a bit of burnout on reading, and this required so little brainpower that it started to fill my cup again. However, I also think it’s a good benchmark of what ‘well written’ gay love used to look like. It feels dated and a prime example of what happens when queer men are written with a straight female audience in mind.

This review will (in part) explore how this book gets writing queer men wrong. Many of these elements are frustrating patterns that still pop up in new releases. However, I want to anchor all of this with the idea that Roux & Urban were writing queer men long before it was seen as profitable, though they definitely profited. I wish we’d moved past the types of writing I found here, and I’m also thankful that they paved the way for better representation to follow.

I bear no ill will towards these authors and books, but this read was enough to convince me that I didn’t want to continue following these characters.

The Premise:
When a serial killer goes after the FBI agents investigating him, the Bureau takes an unusual step of assigning a new partnership to catch him. Ty is a loose cannon who recently fucked up a deep-cover case. Zane is a buttoned up agent from Cybercrimes who is trying to climb the ladder. They immediately decide they can’t stand each other.

Read if you Like: coworkers who hate and lust for each other, sexy fistfights, melodramatic serial killers, pulpy thrillers

Avoid if you Dislike: quality queer rep, there’s literally only one possible suspect, claustrophobia

Novella Readathon #28: Nine Goblins

Nine Goblins has been bouncing around my noggin for a while. I have a soft spot for the green little buggers, and thought it would be nice for them to finally get the spotlight. This novella went the way most of Kingfisher’s stories have gone for me: I liked the story well enough but kept wanting it to be something a bit different than it actually was. I don’t think I’ll ever regret reading one of her stories, but I’m never chasing down her newest releases either. This was a fun backlog read that I’m glad I got the excuse to finally get around to!

The Premise:
Despite its title, this book actually follows two separate storylines (which of course intersect). The first involves the titular Nine Goblins, soldiers in the war against human expansion. Interwoven into their tale is of a veterinarian elf who treats a variety of magical critters and has a particular fondness for trolls. When the goblins’ mission goes awry, they must find their way home from enemy territory.

Read If: you’re hankering for a story about goblins (duh), always wanted your teddy bear to come to life as a kid, want to see what a countercultural elf looks like

Avoid If: you don’t want your silly story to get gruesome, you refuse to read comedic fantasy inferior to Discworld

Novella Readathon #25: Murder by Memory

The Cozy Fantasy/Sci boom seems to have two modes: romance featuring the opening of a small business, and elderly folks solving murders. Unsurprisingly, this is the latter. I liked this book quite a bit, though Mystery aficionados will leave disappointed. The portrait of the generation ship that Dorothy rides on is unrealistic, but an engaging and evocative locale for a series of mysteries to be set in. I’ll read the sequel for sure, as this series feels like a great palette cleanser between longer novels. In terms of Hugo viability? I’d slot this well below Cinder House, probably about equal with Summer War.

The Premise
Dorothy was taking a break from life when the Fairweather’s AI stuck her consciousness in the body of a bank clerk. It turns out the previous host for her new body was tangled up in some shady business, including wiping a shelf of memory archives that included Dorothy’s herself. As she gets used to a new body that she very much hopes to abandon as soon as possible, Dorothy gets pulled back into her Detective work, hoping to solve a mystery that involved several deaths, at least one of which was permanent (not something that’s supposed to happen on this ship).

Read If You: are craving something light and readable, want to follow a stereotypical Auntie solving crimes, enjoy utopian portraits of humanity’s future

Avoid If You: want realistic depictions of space travel or economic models, want the experience of a tightly written mystery