Graphic Novel Review - 'The Pirate and the Porcelain Girl' by Emily Riesbeck (Writer), NJ Barna (Artist), Lucas Gattoni (Letterer)

2023 EDIT: Part of my 2023 clear-up, of books I no longer like, or am no longer interested in, or remember well as standing out, or find as special anymore, or I otherwise will not miss.

Final Score: 3.5/5





Original Review:



There are things I could criticise about 'The Pirate and the Porcelain Girl' in terms of story, characterisation, themes and pacing, but darn it it is so fun, colourful, creative, bold, satiating, and (mostly) fulfilling by the end. A complete graphic novel action adventure story.

It needs to receive praise for its character designs, in that you cannot, should not, assume anyone's gender just by looking at them. Except for Ferra Brickminder and Ephemeral, and maybe Felucca, no one in 'The Pirate and the Porcelain Girl' adheres to or even gives a passing thought to gender stereotyping. A story about pirates should subvert stereotypes, and this graphic novel has strong pints of it in the sturdiest barrels. It's an LBTGTQ+ loving world to the core.

The action, rich worldbuilding, emotion and catharsis are solid and awesome, too. So blast it all to the few character-and-motivation inconsistencies, and the underdeveloped side characters, like the many pirate crew members, 'The Pirate and the Porcelain Girl' - exactly what it says on the tin, meaning the title and cover art, wherein lies the romance between a pirate captain, Brigantine, and a union leader's daughter-turned-to-porcelain-by-a-presumed-missing-god, Ferra - is a treat.

The main romance is not the heart of the story; alongside it is the child-and-parent/mentor relationship between Brig and her elder first mate Cutter, which in my opinion is much better developed and more believable, and then there's the history with Brig and her pirate captain hero, Yawl. Overall and at the end of the day, the "brute" Brig cares deeply for her crew. Her family.

Fantasy creatures, orc people, people with pointy ears, and gays galore, 'The Pirate and the Porcelain Girl' is thrilling fun. Another thing a pirate tale shouldn't be is boring, and this is certainly not boring. I'd love to see spinoff material starring Beryl Weaver, Felucca, Dhow, Corinth, Languor, Ketch, Jazri, Billon and Magna - to see more of them and what their stories are would be fantastic.

A heartbroken girl made of porcelain isn't as easily breakable as she initially thinks. Nor is she fragile, pathetic, hopeless, and incapable of being loved. The roughest, toughest, blusteriest pirate captain in all the known seas can be the softest, most sensitive soul underneath, who thinks she has much to prove; too much to reasonably handle, at least alone. The vulnerabilities of these two complete opposites, both external and internal, are what make them complete people, and are what bring them together.

The pirate eyepatch/missing eye/eye scar symbolism and parallels are also well done.

Final Score: 3.5/5

Graphic Novel Review - 'Hellaween' by Moss Lawton

A funny, manic, hella witchy and Halloween-y comic. Anyone who is into spooky stuff, and funny-and-scary cartoons like 'Invader Zim', and really anything Nickelodeon and Cartoon Network, should definitely check out 'Hellaween'. Its art is of the thinness, straight lines and sharp angles kind, but it is very colourful, matching the characters' zany yet soft and vulnerable personalities. It's cute as well as rebellious, action-packed and hysterical.

'Hellaween' is about a young pink-haired witch named Gwen, who is friends with a vampire, Miles, and a werewolf, Sloane, who are from the Hallowlands, a realm filled with chaos and terrifying monsters, and they can only visit the human realm around Halloween time. Gwen is an aspiring, practicing human witch - when witches were long thought to be extinct everywhere, apparently - and she is a lonely outsider all year round, until Halloween comes, and with it her monster friends. Then the trio can have fun together, and cause magic, haunts and mayhem wherever they go - their own trick 'n treating. Gwen makes her own wand, and receives her own broomstick and (hella mysterious) grimoire. Miles and Sloane love their skateboards.

That's the gist of it. There is more going on, and mysteries left unsolved. But what's written above is all I'll reveal for those who haven't read 'Hellaween' yet. It is very entertaining, and it deserves a shot, a chance. It's the newest addition to join other cute, cartoony, Halloween-themed graphic novels, such as 'Hilda', 'The Okay Witch', 'Kim Reaper' (easy comparison there), 'Séance Tea Party', 'Mooncakes' (hell this one also has a nonbinary werewolf character! And ghosts!), 'Beetle & the Hollowbones', 'Spell On Wheels', 'Unfamiliar', 'Pumpkinheads' (love pumpkins, and pumpkin patches and mazes!), 'Baba Yaga's Assistant', 'DeadEndia', 'Snapdragon', and 'Fangs'.

'Hellaween' isn't perfect, as a few aspects of it do feel incomplete, or even abandoned (an example of this: four other teen characters at the beginning, who seem like they will become important, just disappear suddenly and are never seen again). However, nothing feels underdeveloped, or really ill-thought out. Maybe there will be a sequel? One mystery the comic doesn't reveal are the details of how Gwen met Miles and Sloane, years ago. And where is Gwen's family? What is her home life like?

I wouldn't say 'Hellaween' is for children, either, due to the language used, but I'd recommend it for young teens and up. Only a tiny amount of blood is shown.

Honestly? I fell in love with the comic on page 19; as early as that. I'm a sucker for a crescent moon, and the comic clearly loves them, too. I'm also hopeless in the face of witches. And witches riding on brooms. And bats.

Gwen's quotes:


"Hell yes! Unshackled from the concrete sidewalks! I can go anywhere I want! Damn, this rules. So glad I'll never have to buy a car."


"Miles and Sloane are finally back, and I've got my new broom and grimoire. This Halloween, we'll be unstoppable."


Support LBGTQ+, nonbinary creators. And hilarious, animation-homage-ing and nostalgic comics!

Final Score: 4/5

Non-Fiction Review - 'The Pulp Girls Tarot Deck: A 78-Card Deck of Magic and Affirmations' by The Pulp Girls

An awe-inspiring, life-affirming, therapeutic (these are cheaper than therapy, not that you shouldn't go if you need it, of course), witchy girl power tarot deck and booklet. Fantastical, colourful and well-drawn, too. I like to collect stuff like this.

Happiness can seem unattainable sometimes, and certainly hard to find. Happiness - and fulfilment, satisfaction, self-worth and forgiveness - are found from within. There is positivity to be found anywhere, at anytime, and choice, change and moving on to look forward to.

Put your energy out there, for the world to see. Your life-learned, life-loving energy.

Final Score: 4/5

My Oban, Scotland Holiday 2023

These are the photos I took while on holiday in Oban, Scotland. I had a lovely time, and I adored our old apartment, too! 😄

Look out for the rainbow! 🌈🚢⚓⚓

Graphic Novel Review - 'The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl: Powers of a Squirrel' by Ryan North (Writer), Erica Henderson (Artist), Various

Sometimes, you've got to read a 'Squirrel Girl' comic, just to cheer yourself up.

So much for me giving up on Marvel entirely. I guess anything about Squirrel Girl/Doreen Green is worth your time, as I've yet to be disappointed in an appearance by her.

She, and her stories, are just so cute, funny, wholesome and positive (the ones I've read are, at any rate). 'The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl: Powers of a Squirrel' collects her first starring volume by Ryan North and Erica Henderson, plus a few subsequent issues - all entertaining and fun. I whizzed through it all, even while also reading the extra humorous footnotes at the bottom of nearly every page.

Squirrel Girl talks to bad guys and acts as their therapist (including Galactus), as well as beats them up. She is super strong, super agile, and has a big bushy tail. But most importantly, she is body positive, super smart, worldly, adaptable, unflinchingly optimistic and altruistic, effortlessly hilarious, and freaking adorable. Surprisingly human and down-to-earth, too, for a squirrel mutant hybrid who is literally unbeatable in the Marvel universe. I love her best normie friend and college roommate, Nancy Whitehead; she truly is the best. The comedic duo really work well together.

This comic contains Squirrel Girl reimaginings/tales, squirrel squad armour (the furriest sentient armour!), an Iron Squirrel suit, Chipmunk Hunk, Koi Boi, Thor (the female version, so she should actually be called the Mighty Thor), Spider-Man, Captain America, Black Widow, a mind controlling space squirrel from Asgard, and Loki with a cat head, as Cat Thor. I couldn't make this stuff up if I tried.

It's fun, cute, cartoony, harmless, self-aware, and consequence-and-tie-in-free Marvel material. An astronomical breath of fresh air. From the innocent, relaxed, happy time of 2015. Starring one of the greatest superheroines ever created. No joke.

It's Squirrel Girl. Nothing more needs to be said.

Look at all the squirrels! So many squirrels! So much squirrel love present. And Squirrel Girl's own Spider-Man-like theme song sounds genuinely cool and clever and funny.

Final Score: 3.5/5

Book Review - 'Hair Love' by Matthew A. Cherry (Writer), Vashti Harrison (Illustrator)

An adorable picture book about Black female hair, self-confidence, self-love, and father-and-daughter relationships, that is a companion to the equally (though in my opinion more touching and emotionally effective) sweet, lovely, empowering and important animated short film. 'Hair Love' might not be a keeper for me, but it will be for others, and it is wonderful it exists.

It's so positive! And I love all of Zuri's hair styles.

Final Score: 3.5/5

Book Review - 'This is How You Lose the Time War' by Amal El-Mohtar, Max Gladstone

Goddessdamn this book.

It's confusing, baffling, all over the place, and borderline pretentious, yet I could not put it down. The writing is so lyrical, poetic, clever, and even funny - the authors mostly achieved what they'd set out to do - despite its oftentimes bizarre choices of words. Words that could be English, words that may or may not be made up entirely for the book. And the bizarre uses of words. Maybe I'm merely uneducated in my vocabulary and in literary, cultural and historical references, and don't get it.

When I let it flow through me like water in a river in a traditional Japanese garden, however, when I let it go and it subtly and gently consumes me from the inside out on the long run of the reading journey, I found I could still enjoy the whole wretched thing set out to undo me. There are passages that will leave some readers cross-eyed, reading back again and again until midnight strikes, but the overall tasty and beautiful writing, and content, should render these concerns moot. Like soot.

If nothing else, 'This is How You Lose the Time War' is an unforgettable experience. It is highly ambitious and daring in its uniqueness and deliciousness, its delirium. I was spellbound whilst reading it, even with its purple prose and lost words and phrases necromancy. Go with the flow, tread on the (time) thread, and it is a legitimately smart, thought-provoking, dazzling, soft, intricate, and passionate piece of literature. It can be pretty like a jewel, hard to crack but fascinating to just sit and stare into for hours on end.

'This is How You Lose the Time War' is about two opposing sci-fi soldier/agent women - Red and Blue, cyborg plant and plant-plant, grown for war - who are against each other in a war across all of time and space and multiverses and dimensions, who throughout their changing and threading lives (including their own) write, create, invent, plant, and induce letters to only one another, and fall in love, without them actually meeting properly on the same time thread, at the same time. It's a beautiful premise ripe for science fiction, that is executed beautifully. And I dare not say anything more about it. It should be stepped into, and experienced, as blindly as possible, for the full wonder of the blasted, frustrating parasite of a novella.

I'm half-joking. Or am I?

I'm not sure anymore.

And thank goddess 'This is How You Lose the Time War' is a novella. Short and sweet, and doesn't overstay its welcome. How much more of the lovely and addictive pain in my arse could I have taken before throwing up my hands and giving up at last?

Where is this review going? What is thought? What is content? What is cohesion? What is going back and editing? I don't know, the writing of this is kind of like how I've experienced the book itself.

A book that has gotten me out of a long, long, depressing slump, and made me possibly love reading new (and old) books again. Made me believe in the magic and revolutionary power of prose literature again. Regardless of what anyone thinks of this magnum opus, and whatever they gather from it in coming away from it...it makes you think. It's its own anomaly, a great trial and effort towards a great achievement.

Of course I recommend it.

'This is How You Lose the Time War' - Feminist, LBGTQ, creative, genius, and a hell of a lot of seeds-and-pollens-and-pods-and-stars-worth of WTF-ness. It mentions nature, tea, books, libraries, seals, dragons, and other gorgeous (and human) things that exist (except the dragons), too.

For a story about war, it is not too gruesome: killing, poison, bones and blood are not all there is. It is also about love reaching across every timeline, multiverse, and everything and everywhere all at once, forever.

(See what I did there? In addition, the book could easily be made into a video game as well as a film. Okay, I'll shut up now.)

(…One more negative point to end this messy review of a messy and perfectly imperfect small-but-big book: It could have done with more birds, literal or metaphorical or symbolic, especially towards the end. The cover is almost a lie.)

Final Score: 3.5/5

Graphic Novel Review - 'Coraline' by Neil Gaiman, P. Craig Russell (Adaptor/Artist)

Every 'Coraline' fan should read this.

I know I should have read the graphic novel adaptation years ago. It makes sense since I dearly love both the book and the animated film. But I was put off by the negative reviews online saying they didn't like the artwork; that it made the story and the characters plain, bland and lacking in the spooky, scary, whimsical atmosphere that makes 'Coraline' so famous and beloved.

However, now that I have finally read the graphic novel, to judge for myself, I can say that, in my opinion, it is as well told as the original novella - it is a solid adaptation, beat for beat - and it is effective in creating an unsettling, unnerving, horror atmosphere for the bold, imaginative and story-loving children reading it.

It is not as good as the book or the movie, which are darn-near perfect and the most famous in the 'Coraline' pop culture IP, but it is a worthy addition to its name. It is what you'd expect of it, and more: a deceptively creepy fairy tale about an ordinary young girl's coming-of-age journey, rescue mission, quest, and escape; achieved using her exploration, curiosity, cognizance, learned experiences, wits, and courage.

The unique, unchanging, timeless story of Coraline Jones, and her fight and persistence against the evils in her new home - hidden, and be they deep underneath, demonic, or Cthulhic (?) - is about bravery. What it truly means to be brave.

True, this adaptation's artwork can be a mixed bag, hit-and-miss. It's simple enough - the story has its humanity and mundanity of life as well as its supernatural side, after all - and colourful, cloudy, smoky, and ghostly, if a bit dry, but often in a good way. Then there's the Other Mother, the Other Father, the Other Bobo, the corridor between worlds, and especially the mice and rats - they look terrifying; subconsciously, tinglingly, tantalizingly so. Seriously, I didn't think I could be afraid of rats until I read this comic!

But the human characters, most notably their faces, are off-model at times, with strange expressions that don't fit with what is currently going on. I don't think it was a deliberate attempt to reflect the creepiness of 'Coraline'. Also I think P. Craig Russell has trouble drawing necks. Examples include: in one panel at the beginning Coraline looks like she has a big ball-shaped lump under her chin; and in one panel over the halfway point it looks like she has no neck at all! Just her head and long hair floating over her body. A stylistic choice?

Later on, Coraline says she had wanted yellow frog boots in a shop, when previously, in the scene/panel she is referring to, said boots are clearly green. She mentions "protective coloration" when planning a trap at the end of the book...this makes more sense in the novella, where "protective coloration" is mentioned beforehand near the beginning, when Coraline first learns about it, thus setting up and foreshadowing its use by her at the end of the story. Russell added in the payoff, but forgot the set up, in his adapting process, I guess. And at said ending, where she is supposed to be always wearing a key in a string around her neck, in most panels she isn't. Consistency in the artwork is not this 'Coraline' adaptation's strongest, smartest suit.

The smallest of details are predominantly the most important.

Yet regardless, I kind of love it. I love the 'Coraline' story, and the graphic novel does it justice. It's still 'Coraline'. Effectively, chillingly, colourfully 'Coraline'.

'Coraline' - one of the very few works of Neil Gaiman that I still enjoy to this day, and which has aged the best, in my opinion. Now I can add the official graphic novel to my 'Coraline' corralling (heh), alongside the original book, the film, a doll, and other stuff.

Good stuff.

Final Score: 4/5

Non-Fiction Book Review - 'Stacey's Extraordinary Words' by Stacey Abrams (Writer), Kitt Thomas (Illustrator)

I read 'Stacey's Remarkable Books' first. While I personally don't find 'Stacey's Extraordinary Words' to be quite as compelling, it is still an important biographical picture book for children to read and learn from.

Important lessons and arcs - progression - are threaded throughout. It is about words and spelling bees, and how much Stacey Abrams has always loved them, and wanted to know everything about every word since school. It is also about bullying, particularly racist bullying. But 'Stacey's Extraordinary Words' remains cute and ever-so hopeful on the whole.

Like 'Stacey's Remarkable Books', the artwork is adorable, colourful, lush and beautiful. Unlike 'Stacey's Remarkable Books', it contains word balloons on a few pages, like a comic book. It just adds to the highly expressive visual style - even when young Stacey sounds out and spells words.

'Stacey's Extraordinary Words' - a gift of a picture book. Intelligent, easy to digest, diverse, dazzling, bonny, and passionate. It is a strong feminist read - including a beautiful, wonderful mother-and-daughter bond. Stacey and her mum are the best.

Terrific. Inspiring.

Final Score: 4/5