Posts Tagged ‘ review ’

Review: Driven By Lemons by Joshua W. Cotter (Adhouse Books)

December 1, 2009
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We all live in the real world where we can use all of our five senses every day. But when we sleep at night (or even daydream) we drift off into another place. It can be a land of pleasure, pain or just some odd happening that wakes us up and has us shake our head – “What the heck was that all about”?

Driven By Lemons by Joshua W. Cotter (Skyscrapers Of The Midwest) from Adhouse Books takes us into one of those places. Call it a dream or nightmare it’s in our subconscious and to see it on paper is a horrific and wondrous experience.

It’s hard to explain what exactly this book is, or about, what the story is (if there even is one) and what the outcome is. The subtitle of the book is, “Up The Stream Consciousness Without A Paddle”. That, in and of itself, could mean a number if things. The book begins with a two page rant that looks to be from one of John Doe’s notebooks from Se7en. The sentences are not coherent but are an interesting read nonetheless. We then move to a truck falling from the sky and from there the realms of consciousness and subconsciousness intertwine with the colors of red squares and blue triangles strewn about the pages of pencil sketches. We do meet a protagonist, of sorts, a rabbit that will, eventually, be laid up in a hospital bed (was he the driver of the truck?). From there he drifts off and on to sleep and we hear what he hears including his distraught roommate in the hospital. The rabbit becomes tormented and from there we follow his journey. Is it real or not? Or was the hospital even real, we don’t really ever find out.

But what we do know is that the images are worth repeated looks and readings. Immediately finishing the final page, I turned back to the front only to read it again to get a better understanding as to what I missed – the red’s and blue’s for instance. Cotter wants us all to make our own interpretations of the book, so your will undoubtedly be very different from mine. According to Adhouse it’s a, “Sketchbook replica of recent multimedia explorations in intuitive narrative”. However this sketchbook was put together it does form a somewhat lucid story and it will make you think twice about what you see when you are conscious or what you forget when you are unconscious.

Hollywood constantly explores this realm – The Butterfly Effect, Jacob’s Ladder even A Nightmare On Elm Street. What you see and feel is not always the truth. Or is it? Sometimes it’s hard to say and sometimes both mesh to form their own little world. Cotter’s world is no different in that he gives us a glimspe as to what he has seen with his eyes and his mind. It’s a fascinating journey and one worth taking.

Driven By Lemons GN by Joshua W. Cotter
Adhouse Books, 2009
104 pages, 5″ x 8″, $19.99 US

A copy of this book was supplied to me by Adhouse Books

Collected Edition Blog browsing on Tuesday morning

November 24, 2009
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Things are slowly getting back to normal around my house, which means that I’ll be able to spend more time on the blog and podcast. I’ll have some new and exciting things in the coming weeks including reviews for some critically acclaimed books, creator interviews, and new additions to the Library Section and loads of extras for the highly anticipated Collected Comics Library iPhone/iPod Touch App.

On a personal note I finally finished reading all 27 Volumes of Will Eisner’s Sprit Archives. This includes the Dark Horse volume that was recently released. I started it for my annual Adopt-A-Character podcast that I announce every January. I originally tried to get it all done in 6 months, but it was hard to find the time with family commitments this past summer. I’ll be writing review for the blog soon. It won’t be of every single volume, but will be broken up into segments: Pre-War, War, Post War, The 1950’s, The Dailies (Volume 25), Post-Sundays (Volume 26) and The Dark Horse series (Volume 27). I have not read any of the current DC run, except for the Batman/Spirit, so that won’t be covered, but I hope to start that run very soon. I can tell you that overall it was a great set of books and I’m proud to of achieved this feat. I received a lot of encouragement from all of you the past 12 months and for that I thank you. Come 2010, I’ll start a new series of hardcovers. I’m leaning toward the Iron Man Marvel Masterworks. I read Volume 1 when the first movie came out and now the series is up to 6 volumes. It shouldn’t take me too long to get caught up.

The CCL podcast for this week will be on Agents of Atlas: Dark Reign Premiere Hardcover (Marvel), look for it tomorrow. I also hope to have the latest podcast with John Mayo discussing the sales estimates for September 2009 this week, too. Now on to some links:

CCL Podcast #201 – The 2008 Year in Review

December 31, 2008
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Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Collected Comics Library Podcast #201
95,244Kb; 101m 19s

http://www.collectedcomicslibrary.com/

This is it! My Big Year in Review Show! Not only do I go over my Top 10 Collected Editions of 2008 (which I already blogged about), but I also do a month by month look – and critique – of many news and noteworthy books that caught my eye from all the major companies this past year.

Warning: I say it every year; this particular podcast should be taken in moderation because this is not your typical CCL Podcast. What this basically is, is one big list, so I suggest you listen while shoveling snow, mowing your lawn, going on a long commute, etc. It’s perfectly alright to keep this as a reference tool.

I have also supplied a much more expanded collected editions release list for 2008 and a time listing of all the different months.

Into and Top 10 – 0:01
January – 10:04
February – 17:55
March – 25:08
April – 34:25
May – 44:50
June –50:26
July – 56:02
August – 1:04:50
September – 1:10:48
October – 1:17:25
November – 1:28:15
December and Outro –1:35:18

Chris

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Collected Edition Blog browsing on Tuesday afternoon

September 23, 2008
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It’s been a while since I did some link blogging, so let’s not waste any time.

Collected Edition Blog browsing on Independence Day

July 4, 2008
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As I said the podcast for this week that I would be getting to a new round of links and happenings in the Collected Edition universe. I couldn’t find anything real significant that came out of Wizard World Chicago. Just some “maybes” to some books (Complete Hitman) and things we already know about (Hellboy/Batman/Starman included in the Starman Omnibus). Dynamite (not Devils Due) has acquired the rights to publish The Phantom. Hopefully we’ll see some more classic Phantom collections.
Have a safe and fun holiday weekend, on with the links: