This was my big month to ramp up for Comic-Con, and then spend the final week as “vacation,” while I visit the actual event … so, just my way of telling you NOT a lot of reading this month. Busy-busy-busy, but here’s what I did read.
Trust Her by Flynn Berry
Tessa and Marian, the Irish sisters from Northern Spy, are back in this sequel to Flynn Berry’s great book. In the first book, the two were IRA informers. It’s a few years later and both of them are now mothers with young children, relocated to Dublin from Belfast and living new lives under different names. Tessa is kidnapped and her family threatened by the IRA until she agrees to try and turn her MI5 handler, Eamonn, but on this long journey, the sisters realize nothing is what they thought it was. Quick story—I first discovered Flynn Berry in my favorite bookstore in Seattle, Elliott Bay Books. I came across her first novel, Under the Harrow, again about two sisters, and I loved it. (Confession: I love finding a good book to keep me company when I travel). I wasn’t as fond of her sophomore novel, A Double Life, but she definitely bounced back to form with Northern Spy. I’m very glad she continued the story of the two sisters, Tessa and Marian, and this book is absolutely thrilling—very suspenseful and heartfelt. I can’t wait to read what she does next.
Breaking the Dark: A Jessica Jones Marvel Crime Novel by Lisa Jewell
I was pretty much gobsmacked last year when one of my favorite authors, Lisa Jewell, announced she was doing a book with Marvel based on the Brian Michael Bendis character Jessica Jones (who was also part of Marvel’s Netflix series of “grounded” superheroes, played by actor Krysten Ritter). I felt a bit like George Costanza on Seinfeld, with my “WORLDS ARE COLLIDING!” And while my Marvel reading these days is mainly relegated to vintage stuff from the 1960s (Marvel in 2024 is so mediocre, it’s painful to watch, let alone read), I still wasn’t pleased. Beyond that, Lisa Jewell is one of my favorite authors and always a dependable and enjoyable summer read; she’s like clockwork with new releases each year, and while she has never gone down the recurring characters road (The Family Upstairs and its sequel, The Family Remains, are the rare exception), I was apprehensive about how she would be forced to deal with established Marvel continuity when it came to Jessica Jones.
Turns out this book is an enjoyable read, even though it has a little bit too much of a supernatural bent for my taste, and the whole mashing together of that genre and technology—and a bit of a lackluster ending, that comes across as a little preachy—left me cold. And while a lot of the action does take place in Jewell’s traditional setting of England, it sure doesn’t feel much like a Lisa Jewell novel. I think she impressively summons up the whole Jessica Jones vibe: angsty NYC superhero who doesn’t want to use her powers, with guest appearances by other Marvel/Netflix heroes Luke Cage and Danny Rand, I still feel this is a bit of an uncomfortable fit, especially for this Marvel and Lisa Jewell fan. Jessica is hired by a rich woman to figure out what has happened to her twins, who have returned from a visit to their father in England as flawless, “perfect” human beings, and a bit on the mysterious side. As per usual, Jewell moves us back and forth in time and between points of view with other characters, until everything collides later in the book. I hope there isn’t a sequel and next summer finds us back with the author and one of her usual novels, which I like to categorize as “urban paranoia,” with her typical great original characters and intricate plots.
Woe: A Housecat’s Story of Despair by Lucy Knisley
I have been a big fan of Lucy Knisley’s comics for many years now, dating back to her first book, French Milk. I loved Relish, and her two “Travelogue” books with Fantagraphics, An Age of License (about traveling alone and falling in love), and Displacement (about taking a cruise with her aging and failing grandparents). I’m also a fan of her Peapod Farms series, even though I’m not (obviously) the target audience. I just love her art and storytelling skills. I was very happy to find out that she was going to do a book on her dear, departed cat, Linney. When she would post Linney cartoons on Instagram, they always made me laugh, because Knisley took her cat’s woeful cries and translated them in such a way as to make Linney sound like she was a retired Shakespearean actor who still spoke like the Bard wrote. I’m not sure if any of those IG cartoons are part of this book (it appears to be all new to me), but it is a very enjoyable read, even though her art style in this one seems a little different. I couldn’t help thinking while reading it, though, what a great daily comic strip Linney would make, even though that’s a comics medium that has all but died, sad to say, as has Linney.
The Human Target Vol. 2 by Tom King and Greg Smallwood
This second volume of the Eisner Award-winning series completes the storyline with issues #7-12. Unlike Danger Street, which was also 12 issues split into two collected volumes, HT is an easier read, because the plot is very simple: Christopher Chance, the Human Target—called that because he masquerades as people in dangerous situations—has accidentally been poisoned in an assassination attempt on Lex Luthor. Chance has 12 days to live, and he decides to spend them finding out who killed him. I love Smallwood’s art, but some of his coloring choices seem muddy on this book’s paper stock, and I still find these angular highlights annoying (I mentioned them in my review of Newburn Vol. 2, in reference to Jacob Phillips’s coloring style, too … seems to be a thing when coloring comics these days, but they tend to look very unnatural and affected to me and oftentimes pull me out of the story). Otherwise, this is a very enjoyable read, and I thoroughly recommend it, but pick up both volumes as TPBs … god knows when DC will get around to a publishing a deluxe volume collecting all 12 issues.
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