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tobin_elliott's reviews
514 reviews
The Savage Sword of Conan (2024) Vol 1 by John Arcudi, Fafner, Patrick Zircher
adventurous
dark
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
4.25
Pleasantly surprised at the quality of the art and stories in this one. Loved this.
Conan the Barbarian: Battle Of The Black Stone by Jim Zub
adventurous
dark
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
2.75
Only okay.
I was expecting a lot more oomph out of this one. Yes, it brought a bunch of REH heroes together, but there didn't seem to be big stakes, and virtually no consequences to the deaths.
I was really hoping for a lot more out of this.
I was expecting a lot more oomph out of this one. Yes, it brought a bunch of REH heroes together, but there didn't seem to be big stakes, and virtually no consequences to the deaths.
I was really hoping for a lot more out of this.
A Hot Dose of Hell by Steve Stark
Did not finish book. Stopped at 26%.
Did not finish book. Stopped at 26%.
Tapping out on this one about a quarter of the way through. There's nothing wrong with it, it's just not grabbing me as I'd expected it to.
Whispers from the Black by Stuart Knott
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
tense
fast-paced
4.25
Absolute awesome collection of five short, very different stories, each packing its own punch. "Wish" and "Penance" are definitely the standouts, but there isn't a stinker in the bunch.
Honestly, if you haven't checked out Knott's stuff, this is the perfect place to onboard. He has a wonderful style of writing that easily captures very common, very realistic characters, then he drops them in his various black holes of horror.
But I have to say, from the very humble beginning of the first story, Wish, it just blows up into this cosmic mind-blowing story with some of the best writing I've ever read, period. Why Knott hasn't been snapped up by a major publisher, I'll never understand.
Read this.
Honestly, if you haven't checked out Knott's stuff, this is the perfect place to onboard. He has a wonderful style of writing that easily captures very common, very realistic characters, then he drops them in his various black holes of horror.
But I have to say, from the very humble beginning of the first story, Wish, it just blows up into this cosmic mind-blowing story with some of the best writing I've ever read, period. Why Knott hasn't been snapped up by a major publisher, I'll never understand.
Read this.
A Cellar Full of Noise by Brian Epstein
informative
reflective
fast-paced
5.0
Truly a fascinating, if brief, look into the carefully described world of Brian Epstein. Written at the literal height of Beatlemania, and published less than two years before his death, we get a cautious, self-effacing look into the man who helped put the Beatles on the map. His importance with the band cannot be overstated, and despite his having little experience in managing any band, let alone the biggest one the world has ever seen, the aftermath of his death also shows what a steadying influence he was on them.
This is a good book, but also a tragic one, knowing all that we know in the almost sixty years since his passing.
This is a good book, but also a tragic one, knowing all that we know in the almost sixty years since his passing.
Crampton by Brandon Trenz, Thomas Ligotti, Thomas Ligotti
adventurous
challenging
dark
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
5.0
Blah blah blah, unfilmed X-Files script.
Blah blah blah, reworked movie script.
(oh, and ignore the incorrect cover attached to this by StoryGraph)
But the real news here is, this is just an excellent story. No, you can't really read it with out seeing Duchovney as Mulder and Anderson as Scully, but sweep all that aside and just get dragged into the weirdity of the story, and you'll see.
This is probably the most commercial thing I've read with Ligotti's name on it, and yet his nihilistic stamp is all over it as well.
Loved this.
...and it really should be a movie.
Blah blah blah, reworked movie script.
(oh, and ignore the incorrect cover attached to this by StoryGraph)
But the real news here is, this is just an excellent story. No, you can't really read it with out seeing Duchovney as Mulder and Anderson as Scully, but sweep all that aside and just get dragged into the weirdity of the story, and you'll see.
This is probably the most commercial thing I've read with Ligotti's name on it, and yet his nihilistic stamp is all over it as well.
Loved this.
...and it really should be a movie.
There Is No Antimemetics Division by qntm
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.5
This one's a 3.5. And I almost want to take off a full star for the terrible title, but I won't.
So, for ideas? This book is just brilliant, and so much fun. The concepts are brain-cracking, and some of the situations are really good. I don't even mind that there's more of an overall concept rather than story. Instead, we're treated with stories that involve the same characters in similar, yet different situations.
However, there's also a point where it does feel like there's far too many smart people sitting in a secret office talking about all these concepts in a bit too much of a corporate/smart nerd speak, or we're treated to clinically written information laying out the particular mind-wiping threat.
And, unfortunately, the last story was far too long and outstayed its welcome. I think this book would have benefitted with a single through-line story.
Having said that though, I flat out loved the concepts, and some of the initial stories were really good.
Personally, I'd love to see what someone like Jonathan Maberry would do with this.
So, for ideas? This book is just brilliant, and so much fun. The concepts are brain-cracking, and some of the situations are really good. I don't even mind that there's more of an overall concept rather than story. Instead, we're treated with stories that involve the same characters in similar, yet different situations.
However, there's also a point where it does feel like there's far too many smart people sitting in a secret office talking about all these concepts in a bit too much of a corporate/smart nerd speak, or we're treated to clinically written information laying out the particular mind-wiping threat.
And, unfortunately, the last story was far too long and outstayed its welcome. I think this book would have benefitted with a single through-line story.
Having said that though, I flat out loved the concepts, and some of the initial stories were really good.
Personally, I'd love to see what someone like Jonathan Maberry would do with this.
Predator: The Last Hunt by Ed Brisson, Francesco Manna, Eder Messias
fast-paced
1.75
Meh.
The whole thing with both the Alien and the Predator species coming up with the Bigger! Badder! version is getting really old really fast. Use the creatures you have, and give us a meaningful story, instead of just a bigger fight.
I've lost interest in the Predator series.
The whole thing with both the Alien and the Predator species coming up with the Bigger! Badder! version is getting really old really fast. Use the creatures you have, and give us a meaningful story, instead of just a bigger fight.
I've lost interest in the Predator series.
OLD TOO SOON by Brian Bowyer
dark
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.25
Geez. I kinda don't even know where to begin with this one.
Maybe with a signature phrase I think I've read in all three of Bowyer's books that I've read? "Let me hit that whiskey."
Someone else has already said, if you've read any Bowyer, you know what to expect. That's mostly true. You're going to get an awful lot of psychopathic behaviour, and characters who have lost all sense of morality. Bowyer tends to write one of two types of characters...those who kill, or those who will be killed. There's virtually no one in between.
Bowyer writes some really bleak, nihilistic, violent horror. He's Jack Ketchum with absolutely no conscience or morality.
And please do not take any of this as negative statements, none of it is meant that way. Bowyer is a sadistic Hemingway who writes the sparest prose I may have ever read. His killers are dispassionate in the extreme. I don't think anyone else writes like this, and I'm sure I could pick out Bowyer's writing anywhere.
I will say, having read his biography, this one reads very much like an alternative universe Brian Bowyer, as I recognized a lot of the situations from the tales he told of his own life.
This is one mean motherfucker of a book. I don't read a lot of this stuff because, quite honestly, it bothers me. But I do make the exception for Bowyer.
Maybe with a signature phrase I think I've read in all three of Bowyer's books that I've read? "Let me hit that whiskey."
Someone else has already said, if you've read any Bowyer, you know what to expect. That's mostly true. You're going to get an awful lot of psychopathic behaviour, and characters who have lost all sense of morality. Bowyer tends to write one of two types of characters...those who kill, or those who will be killed. There's virtually no one in between.
Bowyer writes some really bleak, nihilistic, violent horror. He's Jack Ketchum with absolutely no conscience or morality.
And please do not take any of this as negative statements, none of it is meant that way. Bowyer is a sadistic Hemingway who writes the sparest prose I may have ever read. His killers are dispassionate in the extreme. I don't think anyone else writes like this, and I'm sure I could pick out Bowyer's writing anywhere.
I will say, having read his biography, this one reads very much like an alternative universe Brian Bowyer, as I recognized a lot of the situations from the tales he told of his own life.
This is one mean motherfucker of a book. I don't read a lot of this stuff because, quite honestly, it bothers me. But I do make the exception for Bowyer.
Saga of the Swamp Thing by Alan Moore
adventurous
challenging
dark
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
1.75
Maybe I've read too much Moore lately. Maybe it was a mistake to read this right after his run on Miracleman. Maybe I'm just discovering that I'm not as much a Moore fan as I thought I should be.
This wasn't terrible. Not at all. But I didn't find it as earthshakingly good as everyone (including Len Wein, the guy that created the Swamp Thing in the first place) says.
Let me explain...
Way way back in the late 70s, somewhere around late 77 or early 78, we'd just moved to a very small town in the middle of nowhere. I knew no one, and I was bored. I had to wait for my mother who was doing...something...so I walked down to the local variety store, looking for something to grab my attention. I tried the paperback selection on the spinner rack, but there was nothing there that I wanted. I moved to the comic book spinner rack and again, it was slim pickings. However, there was this thicker comic..."The Original Swamp Thing Saga" that caught my eye (mostly due to the gorgeous Bernie Wrightson art). I paid the ungodly amount of fifty cents and went back to where I was waiting for my mother, and I started reading this collection.
...and it blew my fifteen year old mind.
The art. The story. The actual writing. The art!
I couldn't tell you how long the wait was for my mother, but I can tell you I probably read that book cover to cover at least three times, and enjoyed it more every time. I continued to collect those reprints, that eventually covered the first ten issues and I loved them all.
So, yeah, Moore? He had big shoes to fill. And so did any artist who was brave (or foolish) enough to follow Wrightson.
Moore's big claim to fame was the separation of Alec from the Swamp Thing. Okay. Fine. I can take that, but it felt like it also drained much of the pathos from the story as well. Instead of this tortured man in monstrous form, now we get...a monster who sleeps in a swamp and lets the rain fill in his eye sockets? We get a very confident monster who calmly reattaches his arm and punches someone with it? We get...a basic hero?
Sorry. Yawn.
I will say that I did enjoy Moore's take on at least one of the predictably silly villains DC is famous for. The Floronic Man was slightly less silly. But when Moore took on Jack Kirby's The Demon—that I can see Moore totally loving because he gets to write his dialogue in rhyme—it just felt...chaotic. It didn't do much for me. Add to that a kid who's constantly spelling things out, and I just kept thinking...yep, here goes Moore, becoming all Moorey as usual.
And, side note: did the original Wein/Wrightson series not have its share of silly villains? Sure it did. But somehow, Len and Bernie made it work. It was entertaining, instead of being dark for dark's sake.
Like I said, it's probably me burning out on the curmudgeon that everyone seems to adore, but overall, I found his incarnation of the Swamp Thing to be far less relevatory than the original Wein/Wrightson version.
And it didn't help that I really disliked the Bissette/Totleben artwork, with the preponderance of heavy parallel line shading that seemed to obscure more than delineate, and characters' faces that seemed to change from panel to panel with no consistency. As well, the colouring—which should have helped clairify the muddy artwork—seemed to muddy it up even more.
Overall, I can see how, in the mid-80s this might have felt groundbreaking, but to me, it just changed the entire shape of Swamp Thing, and ruined it for me.
This wasn't terrible. Not at all. But I didn't find it as earthshakingly good as everyone (including Len Wein, the guy that created the Swamp Thing in the first place) says.
Let me explain...
Way way back in the late 70s, somewhere around late 77 or early 78, we'd just moved to a very small town in the middle of nowhere. I knew no one, and I was bored. I had to wait for my mother who was doing...something...so I walked down to the local variety store, looking for something to grab my attention. I tried the paperback selection on the spinner rack, but there was nothing there that I wanted. I moved to the comic book spinner rack and again, it was slim pickings. However, there was this thicker comic..."The Original Swamp Thing Saga" that caught my eye (mostly due to the gorgeous Bernie Wrightson art). I paid the ungodly amount of fifty cents and went back to where I was waiting for my mother, and I started reading this collection.
...and it blew my fifteen year old mind.
The art. The story. The actual writing. The art!
I couldn't tell you how long the wait was for my mother, but I can tell you I probably read that book cover to cover at least three times, and enjoyed it more every time. I continued to collect those reprints, that eventually covered the first ten issues and I loved them all.
So, yeah, Moore? He had big shoes to fill. And so did any artist who was brave (or foolish) enough to follow Wrightson.
Moore's big claim to fame was the separation of Alec from the Swamp Thing. Okay. Fine. I can take that, but it felt like it also drained much of the pathos from the story as well. Instead of this tortured man in monstrous form, now we get...a monster who sleeps in a swamp and lets the rain fill in his eye sockets? We get a very confident monster who calmly reattaches his arm and punches someone with it? We get...a basic hero?
Sorry. Yawn.
I will say that I did enjoy Moore's take on at least one of the predictably silly villains DC is famous for. The Floronic Man was slightly less silly. But when Moore took on Jack Kirby's The Demon—that I can see Moore totally loving because he gets to write his dialogue in rhyme—it just felt...chaotic. It didn't do much for me. Add to that a kid who's constantly spelling things out, and I just kept thinking...yep, here goes Moore, becoming all Moorey as usual.
And, side note: did the original Wein/Wrightson series not have its share of silly villains? Sure it did. But somehow, Len and Bernie made it work. It was entertaining, instead of being dark for dark's sake.
Like I said, it's probably me burning out on the curmudgeon that everyone seems to adore, but overall, I found his incarnation of the Swamp Thing to be far less relevatory than the original Wein/Wrightson version.
And it didn't help that I really disliked the Bissette/Totleben artwork, with the preponderance of heavy parallel line shading that seemed to obscure more than delineate, and characters' faces that seemed to change from panel to panel with no consistency. As well, the colouring—which should have helped clairify the muddy artwork—seemed to muddy it up even more.
Overall, I can see how, in the mid-80s this might have felt groundbreaking, but to me, it just changed the entire shape of Swamp Thing, and ruined it for me.