Coraline: The Graphic Novel

Coraline: The Graphic Novel

A creepier young adult novel about a girl who wanders into the shadowier side of her life 

 by Neil Gaiman

Rating: Young adult (older children will enjoy it, but it may be a little creepy for them, adults should also enjoy it)

Genre / themes: Family, supernatural, alternate reality, imagination


Art level: Pretty good. Not outstanding, but not bad either. All in colour, quite flat looking.

Star Rating: 4 Stars


Number of Books: One.

Other notes: Adaptation of Neil Gaiman's original novel (which won the Hugo and Nebula awards for Best Novella for the year 2003, and also won the Locus Award, the 2002 Bram Stoker Award for Superior Achievement in a Work for Young Readers and the 2002 British Science Fiction Award for short fiction) and recently made into an animated film in 2009.

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The Coraline novel is also available for the Kindle.

My Review

Coraline is for older children, young adults and anyone who likes Gaiman's slightly scary take on everything he writes. I got my dad this for his birthday, and it has been reread by both siblings and him several times since then - and is looking a bit battered! Coraline is a little girl who is lonely and imaginative and wanders into the wrong part of her new house - where she meets her creepy Other Mother and Other Father.

Her Other Mother at first provides her with everything she wants, including a great deal of attention - but then gets too creepy for Coraline, who runs home. Unfortunately, her Other Mother doesn't approve of this, and steals her parents away. Coraline has to return and face down her Other Mother in order to rescue them. If she can find where they are hidden.

The other Coraline books, and the movie.

Serenity (Firefly): Those Left Behind

The graphic novels that tell the story between Firefly and Serenity

Serenity, Vol. 1:
Those Left Behind

Rating: Young adult-adult

Genre / themes: Sci-fi, theft and petty crime, spin-off of Firefly.

Art level: Good. Colour.

Star Rating: 3.5/5 Stars. (plus a bonus 0.5 for being Firefly related)

Number of Books: Three so far, but I'm counting The Shepherd's Tale (a prequel) separately for the purposes of this review. So, two in the 'sequel' series.

Other notes: Picks up right after the last episode of the Firefly television series. Written by Joss Whedon and one of the writers of Firefly. Not mindblowingly awesome, but pretty darned good. With the exception of The Shepherd's Tale

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My Review of Books 1 and 2

Serenity, Vol. 1: Those Left Behind 

Serenity, Vol. 2: Better Days

Unlike the Buffy books, the two Firefly spin-offs - actually designed to fill in the gaps from the cancelled episodes - are worth reading for their own sake. The art is pretty good, the wit is witty, the criminals are criminal and our heroes are... well, the criminals.

It's the same familiar cast of Captain Mal Reynolds, his crazy crew, and the two stowaways, Simon and River. They pick up odd jobs, get in trouble with the law, and try and keep River away from the government.

The series is oddly constrained by the fact that it has to keep everyone alive and in the state they were at the beginning of Serenity, but does well enough within those boundaries. The first book is a good bridge/introduction between the Firefly television show and the film Serenity, with Agent Dobson (the Alliance spy from the very first episode) reappearing, and Inara leaving at the end of the book - although the second book is better.

Book Three Review


Art level: Bad, monotonous colour.

Star Rating: 2.5/5

I recently had the chance to read Serenity: The Shepherd's Tale (in the library, of course). It was very disappointing, and I'd give it 2.5 stars. While the cover is nice enough, and it was a hardback, I got through the whole story in less than ten minutes. I'm a fast reader, but I expect my graphic novels to last me at least twenty!

While it does give you Shepherd Book's backstory (which did affect how you see him, next time you watch him onscreen), it does it in a way that leaves you feeling cheated. Basically, it is in the format of flashback, after flashback, each only a couple of pages long, jumping further back into his life. And each flashback is just too short. The narrative would have worked better in the correct order, as you could have watched Book grow and change, but the authors clearly wanted the cheap tensions of the 'sudden reveals'. Also, the art  felt very dirty, which was probably intentional, to give it a 'gritty' feel. But the result, to me, was a book that looked ugly and slapdash.

And it could have been awesome. Despite the fact that they packed in more than they needed, it could have been an epic story. Only buy it if it's cheap, and you need to complete the set.

The Serenity Graphic Novels So Far

Rapunzel's Revenge

Rapunzel's Revenge

A red-haired cowboy Rapunzel saves the day!

By Shannon, Dean and Nathan Hale

Rating: Young adult, childrens

Genre / themes: Alternate fairy tale, cowboys and wild west, feminism,

Art level: Very good! Western art style. Colour.

Star Rating: 4/5

Number of Books: Two so far, but this title can be read on its own.

Other notes: Beaten out by Neil Gaiman's Coraline for teen graphic novel of the year (review here).
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My Review
Rapunzel's Revenge is a wild west take on fairy tales. Here, Rapunzel has grown up with her 'mother', the tyrannical Mother Gothel, until she discovers her real mother is a slave in the mines, faces off with Mother Gothel and gets trapped in a giant tree until her hair grows long enough for her to escape (due to Mother Gothel's growth magic saturating the tree). From there, she goes on to save the thief, the day and the kingdom with her hair-whipping skills and sense of justice. The art is very well done, and she makes a nice change from all the blonde princesses!

I love this book! It's a collaborative effort between the author, Shannon Hale, and Dean and Nathan Hale. Admittedly, it's definitely for the 'younger' end of the young adult scale, but the swashbuckling take on the old Rapunzel fairytale is both fun and magnificently illustrated. If you're looking for a Rapunzel Saves The Day book to distract your child from the overly pink Disney Princess version, Tangled, then this is the book you want. There's no pink in it at all!

Calamity Jack

A lot like the Fables books, this is a quirky take on established fairy tales - and has its own roguish Jack and the beanstalk appearance, among other things. The sequel, Calamity Jack (parodying the film Calamity Jane) has a jabberwocky and giants, and a lot more steampunk.

For a longer review and a peek inside the book, check out the Rapunzel's Revenge page! And if you're interested in finding other books about Rapunzel, then look no further than the Books About Rapunzel page.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer

The Long Way Home
(Buffy the Vampire Slayer,
Season 8, Vol. 1)

The spin-off comics from the awesome vampire dusting television series from Joss Whedon


Rating: Young adult-adult

Genre / themes: Vampires, Buffy, supernatural, saving the world, normal- 'super' heroes.

Art level: Very variable - mostly quite bad, but the artists change a lot. The season eight books are much better.

Star Rating: 3.5 stars (4.5 stars for season 8)


Number of Books: Seven Omnibuses (one for each finished season) plus individual graphic novels and comics. Season Eight is unfinished, so still only in single story graphic novels.

Other notes: Mostly spin-off stories and retellings of the show, so it's not too repetitive if you've seen the original series. Bonus materials (e.g. original covers) included. Storytelling and art highly variable originally. Season eight only available as graphic novels, due to the television series ending, and much better quality (also actually written by Joss Whedon in many cases).

This is a brilliant gift for a Buffy fan, so-so for anyone else (with the exception of season eight which is pretty awesome)

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My Review
The graphic novel version of the famous television series is collected in seven volumes, plus the eighth season that's still being written. The art doesn't get consistently good until the final season, but we're not buying this for the art. We're buying it for Buffy and the Scoobies.

 Some of the artwork or the stories are patchy, as they tend to be collaborations with various writers, but the omnibuses are the best way to collect the Buffy comics - they're even organised into chornological order (story wise). And the story is different enough to be worth reading, and to provide new enjoyment - especially the bonus stories! The stories in "Buffy the Vampire Slayer Omnibus, Volume 1" take place before the show's first season, and the other volumes all deviate from the television and include additional stories.

Season Eight - 4.5 stars
From what I've seen of the single graphic novels in the eighth series, the art is incredibly improved, and as it's the continuation of the television series, not the spin-off, and Joss Whedon is actually taking a hand in the plot, I can guarantee that a) it actually has a cohesive story (and is not just a bunch of collectible tales)  and b) it's canon, and good.

I actually met Georges Jeanty, the artist who did the pencils for the season eight books, and was impressed enough to buy one of his sketchbooks (reviewed here).

Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Season 8 was shortlisted for the 2008 Gaylactic Spectrum Awards, in the 'Other work' category.

All the BtVS compilations so far (not including season eight)