Whats everyone reading?

[pictsy]

I started reading Dune Messiah rather casually.  About a quarter of the way through and thoroughly enjoying it so far.  I got it for 40p in a second hand bookshop just before Christmas along with its sequel at the same price and I think it was a total steal.  I am also flicking casually through my Okami artbook I got for Christmas.  Totally loving it, makes me feel warm and cosy on these cold and rainy winter nights...
^{maybe I need someone to cuddle up to}

[GrinningChimera]

Currently reading Transmetropolitan - Lust For Life. I have been meaning to start reading this ever since I saw it on shelves years ago (I'm starting on this because vol 1 is still on order and I don't have enough self control to wait for it to turn up) After just reading Sinister Dexter it's nice to come into a very similarly styled world with a completely different character. So far loving I'm loving it. 

[CrazyFoxMachine]

Britten & Brulightly (Jonathan Cape) Hannah Berry



Another purchase from a local "Ladyeez Do Comics" event (Spring 2013 in Bristol) from speaker Hannah Berry. This, her first graphic novel, is a dark noir following a morose private investigator (Britten) and his partner who is a talking teabag (Brülightly). There is an underlying absurdity that pulls the gritty and twisting mystery into a unique and appealing world. Visually it's stunningly rendered and has a palpable physicality - Britten resembles a character from Chomet's Triplets of Belleville (and is frequently mistaken for being French presumably as an acknowledgment to this) - the moody greytones never quite spill over into full black-and-white and some of the more rainwashed scenes are breathtakingly atmospheric. The lettering is all freehand as well - and mostly works well although Britten's inner monologue is in a fussy joined-up handwriting that is sometimes difficult to read - and also the placement of some passages go against the reader's eye. This doesn't occur frequently however and it is not enough to prevent it being a thoroughly absorbing and remarkably unique graphic novel that marks Berry as a name to shout about. Her second book, an out-and-out horror called Adamtine, is going straight on my to-buy list.

[PreacherCain]

I've started reading The Black Dossier which I borrowed from my library. You can understand my surprise when I found this in the inside page:



Clearly it's Kevin O'Neil's signature, but how did it manage to get inside a library copy, or did the library purchase a signed copy? And how much would it be worth? I'm seriously thinking about keeping this one!  (Just kidding) but still, it's not something you see everyday.

Where are you based, Mabs? I bought my copy from Gosh! Comics on a visit to London once and that was also signed. They had quite a few signed copies for sale on the shelf at that time, maybe it's one of those!

[Mabs]

I live in London, PreacherCain. So you never know, it could probably be from the same place! 

[TordelBack]

...a talking teabag (Brülightly).

I must have this book.  That's a gag so good it has me laughing myself hoarse.  Given the Belleville allusions you mention, I wonder is the handwriting script a link to the incredible Claire Bretecher, who uses a similar aesthetic? 

[CrazyFoxMachine]

a link to the incredible Claire Bretecher, who uses a similar aesthetic?

Could be, although Bretecher's a great deal more cartoony and colourful than B & B. Her talk at the LDC event was about Adamtine her second book and how to portray horror in sequential art - it actually looks downright creepy:

[radiator]

I picked up volume one of The Sandman cheap on Comixology. I'm about two thirds of the way through it and have next to no idea what's going on.

[Mabs]

I'm having an absolute blast with Alan Moore's Futureshocks! Some of the stories are rip roaringly funny: I was reading 'The Wages of Sin' earlier today and I was literally howling with laughter! That form at the end was a classic! And Bryan Talbot's art for that particular story was superb. Moore & Talbot - what a team up. I wonder if they did anymore work together other than on Futureshocks?

@ Crazy Fox: Britten & Brulightly was an awesome read! I loved every second of it. I wish we saw more female comic writers / artists like Ms. Berry.

[Mabs]

Well it looks like I've kept one of my new years resolutions (to buy more Judge Dredd comics); I just had three books delivered - Tour of Duty: Mega City Justice, Brothers of the Blood and America. I already own a copy of America but the books were part of a bundle sale on ebay, and for the price I just couldn't resist. Looking forward to reading the first two, as for America, I might sell it on or give it to someone as a present.

[TordelBack]

It's early January, so I must be reading Gardner Dozois' Mammoth Book of Best New SF, Vol. 26, a perennial joy that rivals the Prog in my affections.  This year's collection is an absolute triumph - halfway in and I've read some of the most enjoyable SF I've come across in years.  Eleanor Aranson's and Andy Duncan's contributions are worth the cover price alone, and I haven't even got to the Reynolds, the several Reeds or the second McAuley.  700 pages (about a quarter-million teeny tiny words) of perfectly selected brilliance for STG£10, plus a review of 2012's SF and a reading list. If you enjoy the short fiction format at all (and as 2000AD readers you surely do) you cannot go wrong*. 



*Unless you buy the American edition of Vol. 26, which covers 2009, I think, not a bad year in itself but you should already have read it.

[Hawkmumbler]

Sounds intruiging. Ill add it to my "to look out for" pile.

[Link Prime]

I picked up volume one of The Sandman cheap on Comixology. I'm about two thirds of the way through it and have next to no idea what's going on.

All I can say is....keep reading.

[pictsy]

I loved the Sandman series.  Only comic to ever make me cry.  I enjoyed the spin off, Lucifer, as well, but haven't read the entire run, yet.  So many trades I'd like to buy, so little money to buy them with *sniff*.

[Link Prime]

I loved the Sandman series.  Only comic to ever make me cry.  I enjoyed the spin off, Lucifer, as well, but haven't read the entire run, yet.  So many trades I'd like to buy, so little money to buy them with *sniff*.

I've read most of The Sandman spin-offs, including full runs of The Dreaming & Lucifer.
Lucifer is by far the best, and one of Vertigo's finest series in its own right.
At the time of its publication it was at the top of my read pile every single month- an expertly crafted story by Carey, with almost every single plot thread building upon each other until the perfectly timed climax.

I blindly followed Carey (and Gross) onto The Unwritten after they finished Lucifer, and am quite glad I did so too.