Comrade Superman

 Superman: Red Son

By: Mark Millar and Dave Johnson

What if the Last Son of Krypton had landed in Soviet Russia?
The answer to this question makes for great storytelling.

I think i just realized the purpose of blogs. I just read this book and I wanted to talk with someone about it. But it's after midnight. All my friends are asleep. Suddenly I remember this dusty old, sadly neglected blog. Yes! I can post about this great thing I just read and satiate my hunger for a dialogue on literature for the time being. Blogs are here to help excited people quiet their minds so they can get to sleep easier.

 

While I'm on a Superman related post, here is a short list of good Superman books. These books made me appreciate a character that I had previously written off as flat and uninteresting. The staggering majority of Superman material out there had supported my young mind's suppositions. However, the authors of the following books have proven that any character, in the hands of a capable creator, can be used to tell a good super story.

All-Star Superman

By: Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely

Far and away the best Superman story ever told.

Grant Morrison is a literary virtuoso.

Here he makes a good point about how folks often miss the point.

Superman: Birthright

By Mark Waid and Leinil Francis Yu

The best iteration of Superman's origin told so far.

Kingdom Come

By Mark Waid and Alex Ross.

A good future-of-the-DC-universe story with solid, accessible artwork.

Also, check out Alan Moore's Superman stories... because he is a magical wizard.

 Also, this.

A book about a seagull.

I had heard this title mentioned in some way or another in the past and knew nothing about it save that others held it in high esteem. One day a few weeks back I saw an old, recovered library copy sitting on the mini fridge in my apartment. A roommate had checked it out. I impulsively began reading it when I didn't have the time to finish it. a few weeks pass and on this past Sunday I noticed the book was still there. It seemed like a nice quick read (my kind of book usually) so I picked it up the second time. I read it out loud so my roommate could enjoy it as well. It was my first time reading it myself. I had to stifle tears more than a couple times. A very good little story.

Catching up on my high-school reading...

I don't ever know what to say about classics like this.

I really enjoyed it.

Reading this makes me want to watch the film adaptations.

Both the old...

...and the new(er).

I've heard nothing but good things about the Lon Chaney Jr. version.
And Gary Sinise as George sounds like perfect casting.

Also, this!

Things that go bump in the night

Guys. 

The Princess and the Goblin.

George MacDonald is genius and it is the best faery tale of all time. 

Please read it.

It's been my favorite since I was just a wee little gal, reading the copy that my mom had that was falling apart.

And now I check it out from the library and force all my friends to read it.

So read it.

Yet Another One Night Stand

I have a very bad habit of meeting a new book, and instantly becoming obsessed with it. I will go around all day with my focus entirely on the book, I won't eat and I certainly won't sleep until I've finished it. But then at three in the morning when I've finished the book, I'm almost always left with an unsatisfied feeling. Maybe I need to just slow things down, make a longer commitment and enjoy the book a little at a time. But its so difficult for me to stop reading once I start reading, I just become completely infatuated. Its a problem.

Artemis Fowl

I borrowed this series from a friend this weekend, and I've been devouring them. I love anything dealing with Faeiries, and this is no exception. I love the modern twist, the smart mouthed punk that is Artemis, and the repulsive hilarity called Mulch.

I suggest it so much.

Quote:

"Argh? Pathetic and inarticulate. Nice combination. Your mothers must be so proud."

Promethea Vol. 1

A tale about a sentient story who manifests herself in the physical world by inspiring the minds of artists and writers in each generation and subsequently inhabiting their bodies, endowing them with goddess-like superpowers?

Alan Moore, could you please try to be a little more imaginative?

Seriously. Anything Mr. Moore writes is worth looking into. The man's doubtlessly hallucinogenic fueled mind is a wellspring of penetrating premises and poetic prose.
Favorite quotes from Book One of Promethea include the following:

"It was not [her] that I loved. It was the fantasy I'd spun about her. Now that fantasy had fled, I sometimes doubt it ever truly happened, and was not instead some dream of mine. But things are ever thus with faeries and romance."

"...All war and conflict, is naught but the failure of imagination."

Always entertaining, Mr. Moore.