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I hope you all had the happiest of Thanksgivings! It was great to see my parents (HI MOM AND DAD! I KNOW YOU'RE READING THIS!) It was nice to also just hang out a bit and relax.

Yesterday afternoon, we were all sitting in the living room reading. Well, Dan was doing something on his laptop. I knew Mom was at the end of a spy novel. I was pretty into my book, too. Dad looked like he was into his.

Dan: So, what are we going to do all afternoon
Me: Um, I think we could just sit here in read, I know Mom's near the end of her book
Dan:?!
Me: Dear, they are my parents. This pointing to them, and to my book is totally a learned behavior!

Also, while we were gorging ourselves on mashed potatoes and stuffing (ha ha, not me. Two things I don't like. I gorged on pie. And cranberry dressing.) Our fearless Cybils leaders were putting together the final long lists. CHECK THEM OUT!

So usually, when I post multiple reviews, there's some sort of theme or something. Today's theme is:

These books are all due back at the library TODAY. In order in which I liked them:

Confessions of a Blabbermouth Mike Carey, Louise Carey, illustrated by Aaron Alexovich

So, this is part of the Minx series of graphic novels. My favorite, up to this point, was Re-Gifters , but I think I like this one better. The good news is, they're both by Mike Carey, so now I have a new author to be on the look-out for!

Anyway, Tasha is an angry blogger whose mother has a knack for dating losers. This new one she's brought home? Takes the cake and thinks that Tasha just needs a strong father figure in her life. His own daughter, of course, is perfect. Too bad she's a grade-A stuck up bee-yotch. And every time Tasha thinks that Chloe might be human after all, Chloe writes something awful in her newspaper column.

Tasha is supposed to spend spring break in the US, off-line, with these freaks?! How will she survive?!

Hilarious. Carey obviously knows how to write for the medium of the graphic novel and Alexovich's depictions of the bully Big Sylvie? Excellent.

The Diary of Ma Yan: The Struggles and Hopes of a Chinese Schoolgirl Ma Yan Ed. by Pierre Haski. Trans. from the French by Lisa Appignanesi, originally trans. from the Mandarin by He Yanping

Ma Yan is a school girl from Ningxia province, in Central China. She is a member of the Muslim Hui minority. She, like many of her neighbors, is extremely poor. She struggles with spending 50 fen (which is about 6 US cents). All she wants is to go to school, to make her family proud, to get a good job so she can support her family. School is expensive and she's often pulled out so her brothers can go and she can work at home. Her father spends most of his time in Inner Mongolia, looking for work. Her mother is very ill and climbs mountains far away from home, picking fa cai to sell.

This is not so much a good book as an important one. Ma Yan's diary is written by the thirteen year old girl that she is. She's not writing for an audience. Her prose goes between matter-of-fact and very earnest. But what she does is paints a picture of modern day Chinese poverty that can get forgotten in all the coverage of China's booming economy. She paints a picture of hunger and parental sacrifice. And, above all, she paints a picture of hope and the strength of spirit. That sounds dumb, but it's true.

The photographs and Haski's information given valuable insight and background information.

I Am the Wallpaper Mark Peter Hughes

Floey Packer is sick of always being overlooked in favor of Lillian, her fabulous older sister. So, one summer, stuck at home with her two terrible cousins, she decides to make herself fabulous.

And she's getting the attention she wants. Until she finds out why. (Now, I think this is a bit of a spoiler, but it says so on the back cover so... her evil little cousin is posting her diary on the internet. No wonder her best friend is so pissed off!)

The problem with Floey is... Hughes has captured the voice of a 13 year old perfectly. The guy she likes called her and they talked for an hour! It doesn't matter that they're good friends, he obviously LIKES her! It's all going so well!

And, frankly, 13 year old girls? Are annoying. Oiy. So, Floey annoyed me. It's never good when your narrator annoys you. But, she annoyed me because Hughes is so good. Aiya.

Also, Floey writes a lot of haikus. Love. It's good while still sounding like it was actually written by a teen.

Blood Red Horse K. M. Grant

This is an excellent book for a teen who still loves horses.

Hosanna is the blood red horse of the title. A horse with mystical powers to bridge opposite sides of the Crusades.

Gavin and Will are brothers. Ellie's the girl that Will loves but is betrothed to Gavin.

Richard is the king that's dragging everyone (Well, not Ellie) off to the Holy Land.

La la la la la la.

This book took me a month and a half to read. I just couldn't get that into it. But, I was enough into it that I couldn't put it down, you know? I'm not that into horses anymore. And the crusade battle scenes? Kinda bored me. That's never a good thing.

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Forgive me if I am distracted, but wouldn't you be if such a bundle of cuteness came and started to live with you? Meet Sassy, our new puppy-dog. She's almost 3 years old, a hound mix (hound is the only identifiable breed in her) and is super sweet, pretty mellow, and big fan of getting scratched behind the ears.

I'm celebrating Vetran's Day over at Geek Buffet today with my list of recommened WWI reading.

But, let's get down to some books, ok? Earlier this summer, I blogged about DC Comics new imprint, Minx. I have now had the chance to read two more books in the series.


Clubbing Andi Watson and Josh Howard

Exiled to her grandparent's Lake District golf resor after a minor incident involving a club, a fake ID, the cops, and a school, night, Charlotte is set for a summer of drudgery. But then, a woman trying to tell her something is found murdered, drained of blood, with some weird symbol carved into her arm. The police rule it as suicide, the Charlotte and her friend Howard think differently.

Vaguely reminiscent of Hot Fuzz, the ending left me a big underwhelmed.

I really liked the drawing style of clear, bold lines, with lots of large blocks of space.

Re-Gifters by Mike Carey, Sonny Liew, and Marc Hempel

Dixie is hapkido (a Korean martial art) fanatic. Living on the edge of LA's Koreatown, she battles the usual high school crap of boys and the urban crap of which side the street it's ok for Koreans to walk on.

In a daring move to get the guy, she spends her tournament entry fee on a statue of a Korean warrior. The guy promptly gives it to the prettiest girl in school. Heart in the gutter, with no way to enter the tournament, Dixie needs to find her missing ki, and fast.

A most fantastic story, this is my favorite Minx title so far. Very well done. I love Dixie's prickly character and the very real story arc.

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I'm back in the UK, and, today, really starting to feel the jet-lag, which means that the long description of everything I did in Japan may have to wait, or to be one of those things I always mean to write and never do. But I had a really busy Saturday and was taken to many places -- the oddest of which was a blessedly short visit to the Maid Cafe. "The line between pop pulture and porno is sometimes blurred in Japan," said my guide as she took me there, which meant that whatever I was expecting it definitely wasn't the Japanese equivalent of being taken to a cafe where the waitresses were all completely asexual children's party hosts pretending to be six themselves, speaking in helium chipmonk voices and dressed like Alice in Wonderland, where I would feel as if I had tuned into a game show on a foreign television station that I did not understand. I kept trying to imagine how one could transpose something like that experience into the US or the UK, and failing.

I bought lots of brush-pens.

I came back to the UK.

And am now brain dead (which is okay as nobody is interviewing me today). Tomorrow I am a special guest chairperson at Susanna Clarke's event

EXCLUSIVE UK EVENT
Susanna Clarke with special guest chairperson Neil Gaiman, Tuesday 25 September, 7pm
UCL Bloomsbury Theatre, 15 Gordon Street, London, WC1H 0AH

Susanna is the international bestselling author of the wonderful Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell and to celebrate the paperback publication of The Ladies of Grace Adieu she will be in conversation with legendary author, Neil Gaiman. This is a rare appearance by Susanna and the only UK event to celebrate publication so book early to avoid disappointment.

Click here for booking information and ticket prices.

(Incidentally, Mike Carey is doing a talk in the same series on October the 25th.)

Several people have sent me links to this New York Times article on Bill Hader, and it made me feel incredibly happy to be lucky for someone, especially as long as the lucky thing is him reading the books and not, say, cutting off one of my feet and carrying it around in his pocket, which would be just dreadful really, all things considered.

And since I posted links to the Joyce Hatto case when it started -- here's the definitive article from the New Yorker, which is a lot closer to what I thought had happened than I expected.

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I don’t know about you, but I’ve been pretty excited about this new Minx line from DC Comics since I first heard about it.

The new titles are inspired in part by the fast growth of translated Japanese comics called manga. While gory and violent themes aimed at boys are staples of manga, fantasy and romantic storylines meant to appeal to girls have helped manga capture the attention of female readers, an audience comic publishers have long struggled to attract.

Since I happen to have my very own comic book geek handy, I’ve had the first two Minx books, The Plain Janes and Re-Gifters, delivered to me without even having to ask. Stuff for me on new comic day! Who’da thunk?

The Plain Janes was written by Cecil Castellucci, author of Boy Proof and The Queen of Cool. I’ve never read either of these books, but I’m definitely interested now!

The main character, Jane (of course), moves from the city to the suburbs after being injured in a bombing. Jane rebels against the fear and complacency of her new life by banding together with a group of misfits (all named Jane) to start P.L.A.I.N. (People Loving Art In Neighborhoods). Their escapades cause some trouble in the town, but the girls refuse to give up.

I really, really enjoyed this book. I found myself rooting for the Janes, hoping they would get through to their community without getting in too much trouble! My only complaint was that it ended a bit too abruptly, I thought. I wonder if the author was limited to a certain number of pages in which she had to end the story.

Re-Gifters was written by Mike Carey, a comic book writer who wrote the fantastically adorable My Faith in Frankie.

Re-Gifters is the story of a young Korean girl, Jen Dik Seong (Dixie to her friends). Dixie practices hapkido, and she has a crush on her fellow competitor Adam. She spends the money she’s supposed to be using to enter a martial arts competition to buy Adam an expensive birthday present, setting into action a series of misunderstandings and catastrophes that end with Dixie facing off against Adam in the finals of the competition.

Dixie is cute, spunky and utterly likeable. Of the two releases so far, I liked Re-Gifters better, but The Plain Janes isn’t without its merits. Looking forward to the new titles!

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