Mini Nerdling's Mischief Makers Summer Reading Challenge 2018 - Reviews

This year was the second year of Mini Nerdling taking part in the Summer Reading Challenge hosted by our local library. If you don't know what this is, it's an incentive to keep children reading throughout the six weeks holiday (summer holiday here in the UK), they have to read six books and give them a score out of three stars. As they go through they get rewards and stickers and there are other activities to keep it interesting. Once they complete it they get some goodies, a wristband, a medal and a certificate. If you want to find out more, the official website is here. 

As Mini Nerdling has helped me out with book reviews before, he knows I give my "score" out of five stars and he knows I have to write about what I thought of the book, so although there is only room to score out of three stars on the form, he wanted to do it the way I do it. I thought it would be fun to keep a record of his reviews and share them with everyone. It's also good practice for when he helps with reviews and for school in the future. So without further ado, onto the reviews - 

Animal Fun! Touch And Feel - Tracey Radford

My favourite part was the elephants and I enjoyed feeling the pages.

5 stars

In-o-saur, Out-o-saur - David Bedford and Leonie Worthington

My favourite part was the cover and I liked that it was the same as a page in the book.

5 stars

Fortunately, Unfortunately - Michael Foreman

My favourite part was the aliens.

5 stars

100 First Animals - Dawn Sirett

My favourite animal out of all of them was the snake.

5 stars

But Excuse Me That Is My Book - Lauren Child

I liked the first page when the brother and sister were sat reading together

5 Stars

Meg And Mog - Helen Nicoll and Jan Pieńkowski

I liked the witches and I liked the page when all the witches looked the same and I spotted the differences.

5 Stars


And that's it! What do you think? Do you think he did a good job, because I do but I am biased. Have you and you kids read any of these books? What did you think?

August 2015 Book Round Up

After a bit of a reading slump, I am slowly getting back into my reading groove. After reading the Gone series and it being so intense I've been reading a lot of quick easy reads to break myself into things but by the end of the month I was ready for more.

Book 1 - Wolverine MAX, Vol. 1: Permanent Rage by Jason Starr - 4.5 Stars
Book 2 - Batman Incorporated, Vol 1: Demon Star by Grant Morrison - 2.5 Stars
Book 3 - Ms Marvel, Vol.1 No Normal by G. Willow Wilson - 3 Stars
Book 4 - Fear by Michael Grant - 5 Stars
Book 5 - Light by Michael Grant - 5 Stars
Book 6 - Elektra, Vol. 1: Bloodlines by W. Haden Blackman - 5 Stars
Book 7 - A Night In Terror Tower by R.L. Stine - 4 Stars
Book 8 - Fright Camp by R.L. Stine - 4 Stars
Book 9 - The Unexpected Occurrence Of Thaddeus Hobble - 4 Stars
Book 10 - Batman Adventures Vol. 1 by Kelley Puckett - 5 Stars
Book 11 - Forensics: The Anatomy of Crime by Val McDermid - 5 Stars
Book 12 - Rogues Revenge by Geoff Johns - 3 Stars
Book 13 - X-Men: Wolverine/Gambit by Jeph Loeb - 4 Stars
Book 14 - Red Queen by Victoria Aveyard - 5 Stars

I'm thinking about trying a different format of how I do my round ups at the end of next month to make this a little more interesting. If there's anything specific you'd like to see, like recommendations or synopsis of the books, please let me know.

June 2015 Book Round Up

I started the beginning of June with a serious case of reading slump and I didn't read for days as I just didn't know what I was in the mood for. I then decided that I really wanted to read some manga but it seems I've exhausted my local libraries supply and there was only one that I hadn't read, so I ended up with a few graphic novels/trade paper backs as an alternative.

Book 1 - The Borrowers by Mary Norton - 3 Stars
Book 2 - Batman: A Death In The Family by Jim Starlin - 5 Stars
Book 3 - X-Men and Power Pack: The Power of X by Marc Sumerak - 3 Stars
Book 4 - Animal Academy: Hakobune Hakusho Volume 1 Moyamu Fujino - 2 Stars
Book 5 - Hunger by Michael Grant - 5 Stars
Book 6 - Lies by Michael Grant - 5 Stars
Book 7 - Captain Atom, Volume 1: Evolution by J.T. Krul - 4 Stars
Book 8 - Justice League Beyond: In Gods we Trust by Derek Fridolfs - 4 Stars
Book 9 - Uncanny X-Men: Sisterhood by Matt Fraction - 3.5 Stars
Book 10 - Batman: Gotham by Gaslight by Brian Augustyn - 5 Stars
Book 11 - Marvel 1602 by Neil Gaiman - 5 Stars
Book 12 - The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas - 1 Stars

Not a bad month, though I really need to get back into it as that last book has put me back into a slump! What's everyone else been reading this month?

Can I Borrow a Feeling - My Review of The Borrowers

Back to PopSugar for this reading choice, and I opted for "a book my mum loved" It took a good while for her to decide what she would suggest., but her final decision was to suggest The Borrowers by Mary Norton which made me really happy as it was a book I loved as a child, so off I went to borrow it from my local library.

The book started off extremely slow and I found it very hard to get into, I kept putting it down and finding pretty much anything else that I could do instead of finish reading it. Sadly I think the book has aged badly due to it's casual mentioning of smacking children and being firm handed with your wife, The idea of the story itself is brilliant and with the amount of things I put down which disappear, I'm inclined to believe in Borrowers.

When Arrietty meets the boy, some of the magic I remembered came back into the story and it seemed to pick up the pace of the story as before she was "seen" the story was just meandering along with no real purpose or destination.

I think my favourite part of the book was in the back, where there were loads of quizzes and activities to do once you had finished reading. One of the activities was to draw your own Borrower family and make up a story around them which I think is a fantastic idea.

I started this book on the 19th of May 2015 and I finished reading it on the 6th of June 2015
I gave this book 3 Stars on Goodreads

Things that go bump in the night - My review of The Haunting of Hill House

I took my time choosing the book for the PopSugar challenge topic "a book that scares you" as I wanted something scary, but not too scary, because as I've got older, I just can't deal with horror the way I used to be able to and now pretty much everything terrifies me. I decided on a classic that sounded more psychological than outright horror and it's one I have wanted to read for a long time, the book I chose was The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson. There will be a spoiler in this review, so you have been fairly warned.

The first thing that struck me about this book was the writing, it seemed slightly "off" to me. The book was written/published in 1959 and yet the writing seemed to try and make it feel like it was written a lot earlier than that. Once I got into it though, I got used to how it sounded and it felt natural.

The story itself took almost half the book to get started, but I did enjoy the character building with Eleanor. I absolutely love how Eleanor made stories in her head about things that she saw as she was driving along as I do the same thing when I'm out and about. Something I didn't like was the conversations between the guests at the house, I know it was written in a different time, but seriously who has conversations like these people do? All the make believe and non sensical stuff at times took away from the story and I found I didn't really follow what they were talking about.

This bit contains the spoiler. After finishing the book, there are a few things I'm still unsure about so if you can answer any of them or have your own thoughts please let me know! I'm not 100% sure whether there actually was any paranormal activity or whether it was just fear creating fear. And finally the ending left me confused, did Eleanor really exist? Did she kill herself? What happened?

Overall though I enjoyed this book and I'm glad that I got around to reading it.

I started reading this book on the 2nd of April 2015 and finished reading it on the 4th of April 2015
I gave this book 4 stars on Goodreads

A Trip Down Memory Lane - My Review of The Enchanted Wood

Choosing a book for the "a book from your childhood" section of the Popsugar reading challenge was very difficult due to the fact I loved so many books! I ended up choosing the first book in The Faraway Tree series, The Enchanted Wood by Enid Blyton.

Re- reading this as an adult, I was worried that it may have lost its charm, however I was wrong. I still thoroughly enjoyed Beth, Joe and Franny's adventures in the Enchanted Wood and up the Faraway Tree. I love the imagination and thought that went into each of the worlds that they found at the top of the tree. Each of the characters has its own personality and I particularly like Mr Whatizname as a grumpy old wizard who loves his sleep. I look forward to my little ones reading this series and seeing what they make of it.

The only things I did notice (as an adult) is that the children aren't just "mischievous" they're downright naughty. Sneaking out at night, disobeying their parents and doing things they know that they shouldn't. Though I think that my parent might be showing! There was also one story where the characters were all turned into toys and Silky was turned into a doll and everyone kept saying how pretty she was and that they wanted to take her away. This made me feel a little uncomfortable, but when this was originally released in 1939, it was a completely different time.

Overall I still really enjoyed this book and will probably now go back and re read the whole series. It brought back great memories of reading this as a child and I'd definitely recommend it to anyone.

I started this book on the 26th of March 2015 and I finished it on the 1st of April 2015
I gave this book 4.5 stars on Goodreads (rounded up to 5 stars)

Once Upon A Time - My Review of Jack of Fables: The (Nearly) Great Escape

I've been wanting to pick up a Fables book for a long time and the Panels comic book read harder challenge gave me the perfect excuse under the topic of "read a fantasy comic". The book I picked up at the library was Jack of Fables: The (Nearly) Great Escape by Bill Willingham.

I have played the first chapter of The Wolf Among Us by Telltale Games on the Xbox 360, which I loved and so I did have a little insight as to the Fables and how their world works.

The story was really great and very interesting, I loved all the characters (except Jack, but I think that's the point). It was weird, in a good way to see all the characters that I grew up reading about as grown ups themselves and doing "grown up" things like smoking, drinking, swearing and having sex.

The artwork was brilliant too and worked brilliantly with the writing, I loved searching each page to see which fairy tale characters I could spot in the back ground.

I absolutely loved this book and I am hoping to add it to my own personal collection at some point in the future, as well as all the other volumes.

I started reading this book on the 22nd of February and completed it the same day
I gave this book 5 stars on Goodreads

I Need Eye Bleach - My Review of Requiem Vampire Knight

For part of my Panels comic book reading challenge, under the category "a comic published in Europe" I picked up Requiem Vampire Knight Vol. 1: Resurrection by Pat Mills from the library (my library has an amazing selection of graphic novels and trade paper backs for such a small town).

I wasn't sure what to expect as I didn't read any synopsis and chose it for the fact it was published in Europe and the cover art was awesome. Looking back I think I could have done with some preparation for what I was about to face.

I have really struggled writing this review as I've been so unsure as to what to say about this book. The story itself is interesting as it describes how depending on your crimes during your life time you get "resurrected" in hell as different terrors and the worst people become Vampire Knights. The main protagonist is a Nazi who was killed by the woman he was attacking and we follow his story and learn about vampires.

The artwork was stunning if not brutally graphic. I still don't feel that I needed to see a grotesquely pierced penis to help with the story and was left worried about looking too hard at the details on the pages, The one picture I thought was awesome though was the flying ship.

All in all a weird read and not something I'll be picking up again.

I started reading this book on the 20th of February 2015 and finished it on the same day
I gave this book 2 stars on Goodreads

In Blackest Day , In Brightest Night - My Review of Green Lantern: The Sinestro Corps War

This library haul pick would only be my second comic book experience with anything Green Lantern (though I love the animated versions of him, never seen the live action film!) The book I'm talking about is Green Lantern: Sinestro Corps War Vol. 1 by Geoff Johns. 

From my experience Green Lantern and the rest of the Corps' have a really bad reputation as not being very interesting and the characters aren't great, This has always put me off picking anything up about them, but the more I've watched different animated versions of Hal Jordan and the gang, the more I thought I should give them a fair chance and make my own opinion. So when I saw this book looking back at me at the library I picked it straight up. 

I knew Geoff Johns was awesome before reading this, but I believe it even more so now! This book is action packed with enough story to balance it perfectly. You see lanterns that as far as I'm aware you don't normally see and you learn so much, 

I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book and I will be picking up the next volume as soon as I can. There is one part where Parallax possessed Kyle Rayner and Sinestro welcomed him to his Corps, I actually out loud went "ooooooooh" it was just such an epic moment and the art work did it justice with a totally badass picture. 

I'd recommend this to anyone even if they've never read or seen anything of the Corps' before,

I started this book on the 20th of February 2015 and finished it on the same day

I originally gave this 4 stars on Good reads, but have changed it to 5 stars

My Review of Golden Age Sub-Mariner Volume 1

As part of my Panels read harder comic book challenge, the one category I really thought that I'd struggle actually finding anything to read was the Golden Age (30's to early 50's). However, while deciding on my options I went to the library with my husband and he spotted Marvel Masterworks: Sub-Mariner - Volume 1 (Marvel Masterworks #47) by Bill Everett, Ray Gill, Stan Lee and Mickey Spillane. This was originally written and published individually in 1941, so it fell perfectly right in the middle of that time frame.

Much as I wanted to love this, as this time period was when comics really got started, I really struggled with the stories and the way the text was written. I felt that each story with Namor was pretty interchangeable as each issue followed the same arc of finding the Nazis did something bad and then punishing them for it, usually by punching them in the face. (action was certainly very different in the 40's)

The writing itself felt very formal and stilted, however that could be due to how people spoke in the 40's, but its not all that long ago in the whole scheme of things.

I believe the stories were run as part of a propaganda plan to try and get America involved in the war (I seem to think we saw Captain America fighting in the war too before America officially joined). This does give at least the reason why the Nazis are in every story, however how they are shoehorned in or blamed in some of the stories is quite unbelievable.

Overall with the Namor stories, I got bored after the second one, so it was quite a slog to get through the rest of the book.

Saying all that, there were stories at the end of each issue about The Angel. These stories and this character I absolutely loved and looked forward to getting to his pages. I liked his character, I thought the stories were good and slightly cheeky. I also loved the idea that when he left a scene, he left a shadow of an angel on whatever surface there happened to be (wall, gravestone etc)

I gave the book 3 stars, mainly because of The Angel, however had this been a more modern book, I would have given less.

I started this book on the 14th of February 2015 and I finished it on the 20th of February 2015
I gave this book 3 stars on Goodreads

Nice To Meet You - My Review of Supergirl, Vol. 1, Last Daughter of Krypton

Ok, I'll be honest with you, my only experience with Supergirl I believe is from Smallville. So when I picked up Supergirl, Vol. 1: Last Daughter of Krypton by Michael Green I had no idea what I was to expect and I already had a bit of bad feeling towards her as I really disliked her character in the TV show.

The art I felt was not the greatest that I have ever seen and I actually don't think it did justice to the story being told. Truthfully, I disliked the art and I found myself not looking at anything other than the text for the most part.

This book has been a revelation and definitely a great introduction to Supergirl for me. I absolutely loved the story and I loved the character. I felt that Green got the perfect tone for a confused teenager without her sounding whiny or bratty. She reacted to her situations exactly how you would expect someone in that situation to react (someone in that situation and a superhero naturally). I enjoyed meeting villains that I had not come across before, the Worldkillers, they were really interesting and I really want to know more about them and what they go on to do.

I originally gave the book 3.5 stars, however I was still thinking about how good the book was days after I had read it so I changed my mind to a 4.5 stars. I can't give it a full 5 due to the art work as it really let it down in my opinion

I started reading this book on the 14th of February 2015 and I finished it on the same day
I gave this book 4.5 stars on Goodreads

A Light in the Dark - My Review of The Darkness Vs Eva: Daughter of Dracula

When I picked up The Darkness Vs Eva: Daughter of Dracula by Leah Moore and John Reppion, though it seemed familiar, it didn't click until I got home and the hubby pointed out that it was The Darkness that the video game was based on. This made me happy as I love that game and the story in it.

This book is incredibly well written, as soon as I started reading it, I didn't want to put it down. Jackie Estacado is exactly how I remember him from the game, which is great as I love his character, he's such a badass. Eva I have never met before, but I definitely want to meet again, she is such an interesting character and I want to learn more of her back story and then more of what she goes on to do after this story. As well as having two powerful main characters, the peripheral characters all have personality and presence, so they do not get lost in what could have been a two man (well one man, one woman) show.

The artwork by Edgar Salazar, matches perfectly the tone of the story and is just genuinely beautiful work.

Though I'd liked the sound of the synopsis and was pleased when I discovered it was related to The Darkness video game, I really wasn't sure if I would like this book. I was pleasantly surprised that I enjoyed it and that I enjoyed it so much. Definitely one to recommend to fans of the game who may not have read any of the comics or to people who love kickass, powerful women characters.

I started reading this book on the 11th of February and finished it on the same day
I gave this book 4 stars on Goodreads

A Journey Into The Bizarre - My Review of Maria Holic #1

As one of my choices for the 2015 Panels Comic Challenge one of the selections was for a volume of manga, as I pick up manga from the library anyway, I just chose one of the volumes I already had borrowed that week, Maria Holic #1 by Minari Endou.

The premise behind this story could have been gold. Kanako, the main protagonist is allergic to men and has transferred to an all girls high school to try and meet her soul mate (finding out along the way about her dead mother - though this is barely touched upon in this first volume). The first person she meets, she believes to be "the one" immediately, except that they turn out the be a mean, cross-dressing boy.

Sadly the writing and the art work fall far short of the potential this book had. The story is incredibly mish mashed and at some points, I had to go back and re-read a page to make sure I knew what was going on, but sometimes even that didn't help. The artwork as well, I really don't like and I normally love how beautiful manga artwork is.

Reading this made me sad about how the idea seems to have been wasted when it could have been so good. I would have liked to have learnt more about Kanako's mother and that story, as well as seeing how she dealt with Mariya, however I will not be continuing with this series. Maybe something has been lost in the translation, but I can't face reading another volume just to see if it gets better.

I started this book on the 11th of February and finished it on the same day
I gave this book 2 stars on Goodreads, though it's more of a 1.5 stars

Nananananananana Batman! - My review of Batman: The Jira Kuwata Batmanga, Vol. 1

For such a small library, my local one has quite a good selection of comics, graphic novels and manga. One of my most recent finds there was Batman: The Jira Kuwata batmanga, Volume 1 and as soon as I saw it, I picked it right up as though I had heard of Batmanga, I had never seen any.

Before I begin to review the actual content, I would just like to take a moment to tell you how absolutely beautiful the book itself was. The cover art was stunning and the paper used for the pages was amazing quality and so thick, it was such a joy to hold and read such a well made book. 

The volume is a collection (the first 20 chapters) of Batmanga's written by Jira Kuwata written back in the 60's to bring Batman to the Japanese audience. The writing holds up incredibly as well as the art and reading it, it could have been written today. Adam West is my personal favourite portrayal of Batman (Michael Keaton is a close second), so having stories based on his character in the TV show was really good for me. 

I love that only the cover page of each story is in colour and the rest of the pages are in black and white. It shows the skill of the artist to get so much detail and keep the readers eye while not using colour. 

Each story is based on Batman and the Boy Wonder defeating a different enemy, the names of which are awesome (Dr. Faceless and Professor Gorilla as examples) but my absolute favourite name and story has to be the first one in the book about Lord Death Man. I love the slight cheesiness of it all and the incredible deductions Batman makes to solve each crime. 

It really pained me taking such a wonderful book back to the library and I genuinely will be adding this book to my collection at some point in the future, as well as the other volume. 

I started reading this book on the 6th of February 2015 and finished it on the 10th of February

I gave this book 5 stars on Goodreads

Lost In Space - My Review of Star Wars: In the Shadow of Yavin, Vol. 1

I have always wanted to try some Star Wars literature, so when I saw Star Wars: In The Shadow of Yavin Vol. 1 by Brian Wood at the library, I made sure to pick it up.

This book is timed just a few weeks after Episode IV movie ends and we're following the story of the Rebellion trying to find a base and further their challenge to the Empire. We see the fan favourites, Leia, Luke, Darth Vader, Han Solo, Chewie and others and yet, their characters fall flat. Wood has failed to capture the personalities that the real life actors put into their characters. None of them seem quite right, a bit like a bad imitation.

The artwork for this book is good, but I wouldn't say that it was exceptional. The ships were definitely the best looking things on the page.

As to the story itself, I think there is a very good idea of a story, hidden in there behind all the blocks of text. There could have been drama, there could have been suspense, there could have even been some mystery and intrigue, but again it all just seems so lifeless. I KNOW I am comparing this to the movies, but when you are writing something that is to fill in the gaps between movies, then your characterisation and storytelling need to be on point.

Added at the end of the book was a mini story between Boba Fett and Darth Vader (I believe set before Episode IV) and it felt almost like an apology for the rest of the book. Sadly, this added nothing and I barely ended up skim reading it because I was so glad to be finishing the book. This should have taken me a couple of hours to read, but it took me days as I kept picking it up and putting it down because I just was not enjoying it at all.

Overall I was extremely disappointed with this, I will be trying other Star Wars literature, but I will not be continuing with this series.

I started reading this book on the 31st of January 2015 and I finished reading it on the 6th of February 2015
I gave this book 2 stars on Goodreads

Schooled in Manga- My review of PhD: Phantasy Degree, Vol. 1

As part of my visits to the local library, I have been picking up any volume 1's that I see of Manga (and graphic novels) so that I can try loads of new stories without having to read a whole backlog if I find I really like something. One of the most recent pick ups was PhD: Phantasy Degree, Vol. 1 by Son Hee-Joon and I wasn't really sold by the synopsis, but being a library book and with how quick I can read a manga, I figured it was worth a shot.

Before I began, I had problems as I started at the "end" (as all usual mangas read from back to front and from right to left) and this one started from the front and read like a usual book. But that was just a small confusion, more due to my presumption than anything else.

Lets just say, wow was I wrong! I am so glad that I picked this book up, the characters are all interesting, the story is paced and written perfectly and the art matches the tone of the story beautifully.

The lead character is Sang and I took an instant liking to her, she's confident and there is mystery around her which made me want to get to know her better. I have to say that I will definitely be looking out for the rest of this series and I am seriously considering buying them and not just borrowing them from the library and I can't really give a better recommendation than that.

I started reading this on the 31st of January 2015 and finished it on the same day
I gave this book 5 stars on Goodreads

If You Like Scott Pilgrim, This Review Is Not For You!

Ok I caved and finally picked up Scott Pilgrim's Precious Little Life (Scott Pilgrim #1) by Bryan Lee O'Malley after seeing it there week after week. Before I get into this, I will warn again, if you loved this book (or film), the rest of this review is not for you!

A bit of background story first, I have never seen the film as it was not something that I had fancied and I'm not a fan of the actor that was chosen to play the lead role. I wasn't aware that it was also a book until quite recently and even then, I wasn't sure if I'd read it as it's not the kind of thing I would normally read. Having said that, my goal for this year is to expand my reading even further and try things that I normally wouldn't (hence the challenges), so I thought "what the heck" and picked this up.

I'm not sure I can quite form my feelings on this book into sentences that will make sense so I will bullet point to make things clearer.

• What kind of name is Knives? I had to read it three times to ensure that I'd read it right.
• I want to bleach the bookmark I used with this to cleanse it
• I want the 40 minutes it took me to read this back
• 7 Evil ex boyfriends, REALLY?
• What is this even about?!
• It is very rare that a book can make me hate it this much
• The best thing about this book was when it ended
• I WILL NOT be investing any more time in this series

I feel that pretty much covers everything and now I want to go away and pretend that I never spent any time on this book at all. 

I started and finished this book on the 298th of January 2015

I gave this book 1 star (because I had to) on Goodreads

Which Came First? - My review of .hack//XXXX. Volume 1

The last of my library books from last week was .hack//XXXX, Volume 1 by Megane Kikuya and Hiroshi Matsuyama and I have to say I was really looking forward to reading this after reading the synopsis on the back (front) of the book.

At the start of the story, there are a couple of pages dedicated to introducing the characters with a little picture of them so that you know who everyone is before it starts and you know a little bit about them. I really liked this touch as I've found in manga a lot of characters can be brought in very quickly and it can become overwhelming figuring out who everyone is and what their role is in the story.

The action certainly gets started with a bang and right from page one you are in the thick of a battle. It was certainly an exciting way to begin a story and it also made me extra glad of the introductions at the beginning.

The more I read of the story, the more I started to wonder which came first, this or Sword Art Online as the story lines are incredibly similar. They're in a video game that has affected people in their real lives due to some hidden code in the programming. There's a young male protagonist who teams up with girl(s). The main protagonist has extra "skills" that other people don't. This isn't a bad thing as I really enjoyed the first season of Sword Art Online (I haven't got around to watching the second season yet) I just wonder who had the idea first.

The story progresses rapidly as it seems to in some mangas and by the end of this volume, they had already defeated half of the bosses necessary to help their friends, I'm guessing that means that this story has only two volumes as I can't see why it would need to be any longer. I did have a quick search on Goodreads and I do only seem to be able to find one more volume. I actually feel that this story would have benefited from being more drawn out and spread across more volumes so that you could become more attached to the characters and care about what happens to them, as it is, it's a nice story but I'm not invested in any of their lives.

Overall this is an nice book with good art (and I like that they used logs instead of chapters as it is computer related) and if I see the second volume, I will definitely pick it up to see how the story is concluded but I will not go out of my way to find it.

I started reading this book on the 15th of January 2015 and finished it on the same day
I gave this book 3 stars on Goodreads

The Good, The Green and The Ugly

I picked up a few graphic novels this week and one of them was Avenging Spider-man: The Good, The Green and The Ugly written by Kelly Sue DeConnick and art by Stuart Immonen

I really enjoyed this book! To me it portrayed Spider-man exactly how he should be, sarcastic, funny and annoying (to the other characters at least). The book was split into three stories in which Spidey teamed up with a different character for one reason or another.

The first story Spidey teamed up with She Hulk. I have never read anything with the She Hulk in and know very little about her, so this was a really nice way to be introduced to her. I really liked the character during this and I will probably go off and find more books to read about her, so that is definitely a good sign about how well this book is written.

The second story follows Spidey and Carol Danvers (Captain Marvel) and again this is another character that I have never read before and know little about. This story I feel was the weakest out of the three in the book, though I did still enjoy it and it was good to meet another character I haven't met before.

The third and final story involves Deadpool. I am a huge fan of Deadpool and him and Spider-man teaming up is always good for a good laugh! The story itself is really interesting and well written and the villain is hilarious. Overall I think this was my favourite story in the book.

Other good things I can say about this book include the artwork being great and all the little references to real life things (check out the DB Cooper reference) which are a really nice touch and it makes you feel good when you catch them.

I started this book on the 14th of January 2015 and finished it the same day
I gave this book 5 stars on Goodreads

Minimum Carnage Maximum Confusion - My review of Minimum Carnage

I have always been intrigued by Venom and the other symbiotes that come after him, so when I saw Minimum Carnage by Christopher Yost at the library I thought I'd give it a shot and see what Carnage was like.

From pretty much page one I was sat scratching my head, Venom is a "police officer" what is that about? I've obviously missed some important plot development before this book as the Venom I am aware of is a villain.

I really was not a fan of this book, I didn't like the way it was written, I didn't like the story and I didn't like Venom being a "good" guy. I feel that the idea of the microverse could have been done in a much better way and in a way that wasn't so rushed.

I actually feel bad as I can't remember anyone else's name from the story and yet it introduces a lot of people. I'm trying to think of anyone other than the main two characters and I know there was a reporter and a scientist (because every good "hero" story needs a reporter or a scientist and this has both), there was a team of some kind made up of tiny people, but I couldn't tell you more that that and I only read this last night.

I will say that the artwork is fantastic and Carnage looked exactly how I'd imagined so that was a definite bonus for me.

Sadly not for me, however I will try again with a different book at some point in the future.

I started reading this on the 15th of January 2015 and completed it the same day
I gave this book 2 stars on Goodreads