ESV Study Bible

author: Anonymous

name: Wayne

average rating: 4.76

book published: 2007

rating: 5

read at: 2014/12/31

date added: 2014/12/31

shelves:

review:







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Detroit Graffiti

author: Chris Freitag

name: Wayne

average rating: 2.83

book published: 2014

rating: 3

read at: 2014/12/28

date added: 2014/12/28

shelves: non-fiction

review:

'Detroit Graffiti' takes us on a tour of some of the interesting graffiti that has cropped up in Detroit. In an introduction, the idea of artists taking spraycations to the city to practice their art is mentioned along with the rules of not spraying an active building, residence or church. In a city of so many abandoned buildings, this leaves a lot of potentially empty canvas.



The book is divided up by neighborhoods, like Eastern Market, or the Old Packard Automotive Plant. The art is labelled where it can be showing who the artist. Most of the art is stylized names of the artists (Elmer gets around, as he is featured in most sections of the books). There are scattered quotes by some of the artists, but I think I would have like more insight from them than just the scattershot quote here and there. One artist named Malt seems to have parlayed his graffiti skills into commissions as a muralist. Some of the danger of doing this is mentioned in the book. Doing graffiti in some parts of Detroit would seem to be quite hazardous.



The work, since it's mostly stylized names, has a sameness to it, but it's still rather uniquely beautiful, and there are a few artistic murals that are just great to look at. Other than knowing the neighborhoods, it's hard to get context on many of the pictures since they are on concrete walls. There are some shots of whole buildings. I suppose it's better to see something full of color on the side of a building versus a rotting, empty building, and it seems that Detroit has found a potentially new tourism avenue. When it was done, I wasn't sure whether to revel in the art at large, or to mourn for a city that, at least in terms of this book, seems to be dying. I would have liked to have seen more evidence of urban hope, and less pages and pages of tags.



I received a review copy of this ebook from Schiffer Publishing Ltd. and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Thank you for allowing me to review this ebook.





via Wayne's bookshelf: read http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1104559534?utm_medium=api&utm_source=rss

Ciudad

author: Ande Parks

name: Wayne

average rating: 2.88

book published: 2014

rating: 4

read at: 2014/12/28

date added: 2014/12/28

shelves: graphic-novels

review:

What do you get when you combine amazing artist Ande Parks with screenwriters Joe and Anthony Russo (Community, Captain America: Winter Soldier)? You get a high velocity story like 'Ciudad.' It rockets from page to page and feels very much like an action movie.



Eva Roche is kidnapped and her father wants her back so badly that he'll hire mercenary Tyler Rake and his team to pull it off. The problems begin with the city of Ciudad that they find themselves in. Tyler is good with an inventive name and improvising when things go bad, but he's not so good when the victim he's rescuing gets under his skin. When things go sideways (more than once), Tyler and Eva find themselves thrown for curveball after curveball. The bullets fly as everyone involved shoots first before asking questions.



My review copy had some pretty low grade art, and I see complaints about it on GoodReads, but some online samples I've seen show a much better resolution than the review copies. That's unfortunate, because the review copy looked like a third generation xeroxed 'zine, and that's no way to treat Ande Parks art. The story is very cinematic and kept me turning pages. I thought it was a pretty good story.



I received a review copy of this graphic novel from Diamond Book Distributors, Oni Press and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Thank you for allowing me to review this fast-paced graphic novel.





via Wayne's bookshelf: read http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1018550765?utm_medium=api&utm_source=rss

Sovereign, Volume 1 (Sovereign, #1)

author: Chris Roberson

name: Wayne

average rating: 3.33

book published: 2014

rating: 2

read at: 2014/12/28

date added: 2014/12/28

shelves: graphic-novels

review:

'Sovereign Volume 1' attempts to tell an epic fantasy story with an interesting world. The problem is that some of the information you might like to have comes late in the book.



The book is comprised of shorter chapters which feature a quote by one of the characters. There are strange characters in masks. There is political intrigue. There are chapters of just exposition with no character dialogue. Strange creatures, explorers, walking dead, and lots of other interesting things going on.



The problem is that you are kind of dumped into the middle of it all and left to founder around to figure out how the world works. Since each chapter at first is another part of the story, these short fragments don't give you much to grasp onto. The book ends with some pages of text relating to the inhabitants of this world and maybe this is where someone should start, but it's dry and uninteresting, and by the time I got to these pages, I was done and ready to move on. The art at times was gorgeous and I loved it, and at other times seemed uneven and I didn't love it. I appreciate the scope of the story being told, and I might try volume 2 if I get a chance, but I wasn't as impressed as I'd hoped to be with this one.



I received a review copy of this graphic novel from Diamond Book Distributors, Image Comics and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Thank you for allowing me to review this graphic novel.





via Wayne's bookshelf: read http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1143838219?utm_medium=api&utm_source=rss

White Like She

author: Bob Fingerman

name: Wayne

average rating: 3.88

book published: 1998

rating: 4

read at: 2014/12/27

date added: 2014/12/27

shelves: graphic-novels

review:

Bob Fingerman's 'White Like She' is a comic from another time. Specifically the 1990s and that shows a litte in the zany, over the top story.



I'm not sure how to give a synopsis without wrecking this, so bare with me and my slight spoilers. When middle-aged black man Luther Joyce finds himself in a workplace accident that leaves him deformed, his job just wants to do away with him and cover up his death. Luther wants to explore other options, so he finds a way to transfer his brain into a Jewish teenage white girl's body. I think that's all you get, which is about what the publisher's synopsis might give.



The humor and violence are over the top. I liked the garish and ugly art, but I had a hard time seeing the remade Luther as a teenage girl. The character looked quite a bit older, but I think that's the style of the art. Maybe it's a reflection of the original character or her lifestyle. Poor Luther finds himself in a strange new world trying to figure out how best to survive. The humor at times is pretty juvenile, and the story is absurdly strange. It's at least an R-rated story, so definitely not for everyone. I enjoyed Bob Fingerman's 'Minimum Wage' last month and liked seeing another early work by him here. The extras show the early evolution of the story with some different story elements. I liked this glimpse of the creative process. I liked it, but it's definitely kind of a weird B-movie sort of ride.



I received a review copy of this graphic novel from Diamond Book Distributors, Image Comics and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Thank you for allowing me to review this graphic novel.





via Wayne's bookshelf: read http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1122315354?utm_medium=api&utm_source=rss

Wildfire Volume 1

author: Matt Hawkins

name: Wayne

average rating: 3.15

book published: 2014

rating: 3

read at: 2014/12/22

date added: 2014/12/22

shelves: graphic-novels

review:

If disaster movie mogul Irwin Allen were alive today, he might be telling an over the top story like 'Wildfire Volume 1.' It's the kind of mega-scale disaster and character motivation I remember.



Dan Miller is a plant biologist with seemingly good intentions: to accelerate plant growth so that food crops can feed an overpopulated world. When he is forced to change his experiment under corporate pressure, things go awry. The city of Los Angeles finds itself under siege. As newscasters fight to compete for the story, Dan just wants to find his younger sister. The government wants to find Dan because he may hold the key. Meanwhile, the city continues to find itself in a strange new world.



As I said, it's quite overboard, but fun. Every issues starts with quotes about genetically modifying food. At first there are pro and con arguments, but these eventually give way to just con. Matt Hawkins gives pages of articles at the end of the graphic novel. He states that he's approaching this story from a neutral stance, but that's not how it appears. The story itself is not preachy, but some of the supplemental material feels that way. I was less impressed with the art. It's not a style I'm particularly fond of. Overall, destruction good, preachy documentation less good, art only so-so.



I received a review copy of this graphic novel from Diamond Book Distributors, Image Comics, and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Thank you for allowing me to review this graphic novel.







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Doctor Who: The Shakespeare Notebooks

author: Justin Richards

name: Wayne

average rating: 3.83

book published: 2014

rating: 3

read at: 2014/12/22

date added: 2014/12/22

shelves:

review:

'Doctor Who: The Shakespeare Notebooks' is not so much a book as a series of fragments. Some of it works better than others.



The Doctor (of Doctor Who) fame, has visited Shakespeare during the course of the TV series, and maybe at other times not documented. This book takes some famous Shakespeare works and shows how the Doctor and his companions might have interfered. We get snippets from Hamlet and Romeo and Juliet. There are parts of sonnets and unwritten plays. Throughout there is the strange Doctor interjecting strange things. The volume ends with a short story with the tenth Doctor and Donna Noble involving a bed owned by Shakespeare.



Some of the gags are more clever than others. Sometimes it's easy to tell which Doctor it is, and sometimes less so, but that's not a problem. It's more a book to dip into than to read straight through. Since I'm a Doctor Whoo fan, I enjoyed it for the most part, but I'm not sure if I'd recommend it.



I received a review copy of this ebook from Random House UK, Ebury Publishing, and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Thank you for allowing me to review this ebook.





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