The Bitter Guide to Jinx

Well, an enjoyable piece. I wonder if the author finds it at all sophomoric now? I mean, the dialogue is enjoyable, sure, but there's a reason people in fiction don't talk like people in real life. That reason is that 90% of the time, people in real life are pretty much COMPLETELY incomprehensible.

I'm all in favour of 'realistic' dialogue/speech, and when I write fiction, that's what I use. BUT you have to make sure you have, you know, complete thoughts and meaningful sentences. Realism and being interesting are not that far apart, and most of the time Bendis manages to tread the line well.

Art-wise, it's a bit of a mess. It's difficult to tell what's going on sometimes, which is pretty much an inexcusable crime in a graphic novel. Maybe I'm spoiled by 26 years of colour illustrations and improving paper quality, but I'm just an addict for lines. Overusing shadows is much the same as overusing 'realistic dialogue'. It's all a matter of learning control.

Enjoyable, though, and much more accessible than the Powers TPB I picked up.

The characterization is interesting, and the story moves well up until the end.

To rate it? I'd give it 2.5 out of 4.

Just checking

It's kosher to refer to someone as a 'total bitch' based solely on the grounds that you really don't get along with them, right?

Amusing fact

My proposal for the Margaret Atwood panel read

"Title: The Great Canadian SF writer
Description: Canada has produced one of the greatest SF writers of the modern day. But Margaret Atwood feels that she doesn't write SF, because of the negative connotations of the word. How can we drag the genre into respectability? Or must it be consigned to the sludge pit of media crossovers and endless trilogies, with every shining jewel covered with dross?"

The panel description reads

"The Handmaid's Tale and Oryx and Krake are two of the best known SF books of the past twenty-five years, but their author, Margaret Atwood, feels she doesn't write SF, because of the negative connotations of the word. Why doesn't Margaret Atwood simply come out of the SF writing closet? And why has the mainstream press and publishing industry been inclined to agree with her?"

Was I too harsh?