Rik HoskinRezensionen

Very interesting graphical novel set in Takeshi Kovacs' universe.

Story wise this is standard Takeshi :) Put to jail because of disorderly behavior Takeshi gets called to get information from only murder witness (maybe better said only person found in vicinity of murder location).

From here story just explodes. We follow Kovacs getting more and more involved (and finally getting sponsor to execute his private vengeance) in fighting through government/protectorate conspiracy, shadowy special operation teams, genocide aftermath and very advanced AI that just wants Kovacs out of the way.

On the art side it is a little bit mixed case here. Some parts are OK but some parts look like exaggerated putty constructions (you know bulgy cheekbones, head shape weird depending on perspective etc). So anatomy-wise sometimes you will see weird things depending on the perspective and body position. Artist's style might put some people off but I have no problem with it. I think it captures the characters and story itself very fine indeed and those few weird panels did not ruin anything for me.

Recommended to all fans of Takeshi Kovac, cyberpunk, noir and SF in general.

Hi good but independence novel of the altered Carbon universe. Does involve Takeshi Kovacs and is in general very readable and if you know about receiving not difficult to follow. I enjoyed it. I would say that the plot is fast moving yet well containing after a single graphic novel. I’d certainly look out for others, but I’m not sure I can make it a priority.

Spring 2020 (March);
~ My Sisyphean Sanderson Challenge

I finally waded my way into Sanderson graphic novels, part 2! This is going to be another write-up across to volumes (yes, only two so far, as I'm still needing to read number #3 sadly, alas!). I love, love, love this absolutely different system of magic, and the family/friend dynamics being played out everywhere. I love how Sanderson manages to pull in such disparate people(/s) and then slowly work them together, in highly believable way, with many slips and pitfalls along the way.

I am quite excited to get on to volume 3.

White Sand II is just as fast-pace and disorienting as the last one, I don't have enough time to really know the characters or learn about this world. There's a jarring change from a sketchy art style to a flat and dead one near the end.
I like the fights with the assassins, as well as the negotiations with the Taisha.½

Kenton struggles to save the Diem while trying to understand its secrets that might have led to its betrayal in the desert while the Duchess Khriss tries to continue her mission. Brandon Sander’s White Sands Volume 2 finds the various protagonists introduced in the previous volume struggling to accomplish their goals.

The middle installment of this trilogy sees politics and mysteries take center stage as Kenton and Khriss work separately and together to achieve their goals. This is a classic Sanderson story though in graphic novel form, which is brought to the page by the art of Julius Gopez (Chapters 1-5) and Julius Otha (Chapter 6) in addition to colorists Morgan Hickman (Chapters 1-2) and Salvatore Aialas Studios (Chapters 3-6). Overall, the story is good and engaging, however given the format the book the art and color are important. Given the multiple artists I would say that the coloring of Salvatore Aialas Studios worked with both comic artists even though Gopez was more unique while Otha seemed more “generic” in character design but was satisfied in the results.

White Sands Volume 2 is a good continuation of the story in Brandon Sanderon’s Cosmere but shortness of the book made me feel that all three volumes had been combined in an omnibus edition.½

One of the things that I feared most about getting into these stories is the big 'art style change'. I see it. It's definately different. But having read all manner of graphic novels over the last year--some change *far* more dramatically than this. They're similar enough that I barely even noticed for the most part.

And it still is quite beautful:



That's really the strongest part of these works, the art is quite well done (no matter the style).

On the weaker side, the characterizations and wording is just ... weird at times.



It just doesn't feel 'Sandersony'. I'm not actually sure how much of it is Sanderson and how much the adaptation (and how much is me knowing that it's different and that making me see things that aren't there), but it just feels wrong.

Among the bits I remember really enjoying from the prose version and that does come through well here is Khriss' desire to understand things scientifically. Sanderson makes 'scientific' magic systems, so having an in-universe character that is fascinated by how they work just makes me smile.



It can be a bit of a tone shift, but I still did like seeing it here.

Speaking of Khriss--dang that red dress is striking. Even more so than the blue and white of the previous books.



A fun way to spend an afternoon. Onward to the final book!

Not the most exciting thing I've read

White Sand #2 continues the story of Kenton, Khriss and the Sand Masters Diem. This tome is very political and the action is a lot less than that in the first volume. There are some developments of the lore and how sand mastery is supposed to work and more mysteries are introduced but no real plot lines were resolved. This medium continues being weird for me... and to make things worse, there's a very dramatic art change in the last few pages that really threw me off.

I'll definitely read the third volume as I wish to see where it all goes and especially now that I know who Khriss really is in the Cosmere.

6/10

I'm only going to compare this story to the bulk of Brandon Sanderson's other work because most of us already know he's both prolific and fun and he rarely ever writes a bad story.

The same is true for White Sand. I stayed up late into the night last night reading far past my normal bedtime, enjoying the hell out of Vol 2 and most of Vol 3.

In retrospect, the story may be slightly predictable, but it is fundamentally the same as Game of Thrones in the broad brushstrokes.

The fate of a *small* kingdom of Sand magicians is beset by a council that wants to shut them down permanently after a tragic occurrence. He must change how they are perceived and he must earn or otherwise force the votes of the council in two weeks in order to save his people.

In other words, it's a political fantasy with assassination attempts, great worldbuilding, good characters, and plenty of twists and turns.

It's definitely not a bad work of art by any stretch. I just wanted to keep on READING at all costs! :)

Bottom line? Worth it.

But what happened with the last issue in this volume? I was LOVING the sketch-art! Why couldn't it continue???

The setting for this comic is set after the events of the book Altered Carbon but the reader doesn’t need to have read the book or watched the series on Netflix to understand what is going on in the comic. The far future allows people to send their conscious across the stars and house them in clone bodies. Takeshi Kovacs is brought by the cops to use his info about being a former Protectorate soldier, he is only doing it in order to have his assault charges dropped from a bar fight. Things go south quickly, and he is drawn into solving to mystery. A good intro to this story universe and now I want to read more.

A graphic novel tying-in to Morgan's Takeshi Kovacs series. It's a decent story, but the art looks a little dated--not bad, but very 90s cyberpunk.

Received via NetGalley.½

This is the 2nd volume in Sanderson’s White Sand graphic novel series. While this volume continues to have the same issues of the first one (dense text and lots of jumping around) I still enjoyed it.

The main story continues to revolve around Kenton trying to save the fate of the Sand Masters. Khriss, the Duchess, steps up to help him with his diplomacy.

I like the interesting world and the intriguing characters. The illustration for chapters 1-5 really matches the tone of the story and is well done. I found the illustration in chapter 6 to be really confusing; it's childish looking and the characters' skin tones changed all the time. The Duchess in particular went from having the same skin tone as Kenton early in the chapter and then having her original much darker skin tone later in the chapter. Consistency please!

Anyway, hopefully the illustration style for Volume 3 sticks with the original illustration style, otherwise I am probably going to stop reading this series.

Overall this continues to be a well done epic fantasy graphic novel series. I enjoy world and characters and hope the story gets a bit more exciting in the next volume. I also hope the illustration stay more consistent in volume 3.½

Pierce Brown’s Red Rising: Sons of Ares enlightens us to what happened before the YA Red Rising Trilogy, as told by Fitchner.

Brown, writing with Rik Hoskin (Heroes of Skyrealm, Brandon Sanderson’s White Sand) provides us with an insight to how a caste system begins to break down purely because an elite member of the Gold caste is not supposed to love a lowly Red, so the Red begin to rise!
The art by Eli Powell (Yakuza Demon Killers, The 13th Artifact), takes us one a fun and informative journey across the universe, and delivers a peek in the events which lead to the uprising, in previous trilogy. All is not what it seems.

It's a spin-off that pretty much hits the tone of the series spot on. Although, I h
ave to say it's not quite what I expected in terms of content and art, which is dark, shady and obscure at times, but nevertheless it's a fun read with romance! If you like gritty, sci-fi comic book action, which grows even more tense as the plot progresses, you should still enjoy this read featuring forbidden love of opposing castes, where sadly their love for each other is their downfall.

When my brother and I transferred a bunch of games from our father’s old monochrome computer (black and orange) to our Windows ‘98 PC, it was a bit of a shock to discover that some of those games, which I had grown up playing, were actually in colour. Simple and garish colours. That’s what the colours in White Sand: volume 2 sometimes reminded me of. I don’t dislike the pictures, per se, but they don’t particularly appeal to me.

(I wonder if they would look better in monochrome.)

The action scenes are effective but I am not convinced the the graphic novel format is the best way to depict all the politicking which goes on. (I wonder if a prose/graphic-novel hybrid would have worked better.) Or maybe a graphic novel is just the wrong format for me to enjoy to enjoy this particular story in?

… but I’m interested enough that I will read the next volume, I guess.½

In the YA series, Red Rising by Pierce Brown, readers were thrown into a future where mankind has spread to other planets. A caste system has developed ruled by the Golds while the Reds, the lowest caste, are brutally exploited. But a rebel group, the Sons of Ares had risen to fight back. In the graphic novel, Red Rising: Sons of Ares, we learn the backstory story of the rebel group and its leader, a Gold named Fitchner.

Red Rising: Sons of Ares collects issues 1 – 6 of the comics of the same name. It is well-written and –plotted edition to the story. It was fun learning Fitchner’s early story and how a member of the Golds came to lead a Red revolutionary group. I was less enthusiastic about the art although I found the use of colour in the dialogue bubbles to denote the different castes an interesting idea. Overall, though, I found the art somewhat muddy. Still, I am a huge fan of the series and found this a nice edition to the story. Although I believe it would work as a standalone, I really recommend reading the series because it’s one gorydamn good tale.

Thanks to Netgalley and Diamond Book Distributors for the opportunity to read this book in exchange for an honest review½

With assassins chasing him, a pressing need to secure votes to preserve the Sand Mages, and darksider visitors unhappy he didn't reveal his true identity to begin with, Kenton has plenty to keep him occupied. Khrisalla, one of the Darkside envoys, decides to help Kenton secure his votes. He gains some measure of protection against the assassins in Ais, a former assassin. She doesn't necessarily like Kenton, but does justice to her job. Kenton’s job is only made more difficult when debts are brought up. More than that, though, the reluctance of the people to preserve the Sand Mages lies in the fact that the majority feel they are privileged, and above a capacity serving others. Kenton sets an example himself, going out to a collapsing building and using his magick to stabilise it enough that people can be rescued.

Ok. My bad. I jumped into this story not having read the previous book. I was a bit confused at first, but quickly got a grasp on what the situation was. The ending to this book was, of course, a cliffhanger. I'll have to wait to see what happens!

I love Brandon Sanderson's works, and White Sand was no exception. I love that his disparate stories are still set within the same universe, even moreso when they briefly touch. Sanderson has a gift for unusual magick systems. The metal magick of the Mistborn series, chalk magick with The 'Rithmatist, here with sand magick. I love seeing different magical systems, how they progress and grow. For this book, I like that Kenton is pushing them out of their haughty arrogance. Respect and trust must be earned.

While I enjoyed this book, and will check out the others, I feel that this wasn't quite up to Sanderson’s level. His books can be rich, and deep, and infinitely complex in ways hard to limit to pictures and dialogue bubbles. A picture is not always worth a thousand words, yeah? If you are new to Sanderson's works, these graphic novels are not the place to jump into the complexity of the Cosmere. I'd recommend starting with the Mistborn books.

***Many thanks to Netgalley and Diamond Book Distributors for providing an egalley in exchange for a fair and honest review.

A fun prequel to the Red Rising series (it focuses on a specific backstory of one character) in a different medium, graphic novel. The text flows well and it's pretty easy to follow the artwork as well. I wouldn't mind another one with a different character's background to follow up. For graphic novel fans and readers who loved Red Rising.

Net Galley Feedback

Satisfying, though not as grand a story as I expected.

(Full disclosure: I received a free e-ARC for review through NetGalley.)

Fitchner au Barca is a goblin among Gold Gods. In a world that places a premium on physical perfection, he is short, scrappy, and ugly. But he's also a survivor, one who makes it through the Passage even though he was sent there as a sacrificial lamb. He weathers the Institute by swallowing his pride and aligning himself with the leader of a rival house. But his loyalty goes unrewarded: rather than serve by his friend Arturius's side, Fitchner is forced to sell his contract after graduation. He's sent to a terraforming colony on Triton, where he falls in love with a lowly Red named Bryn. The rest, as they say, is history.

Based on the Red Rising trilogy, Sons of Ares gives us a little glimpse of proctor/terrorist/freedom fighter Fitchner's backstory: his time at the Institute, his relationship with Bryn, the birth of Sevro, and the injustice that would prove the seed of the rebel group Sons of Ares.

The story itself is interesting; while there isn't much new here, it does at least flesh out Fitchner's past for us. That said, and especially considering Brown's intro, I half-expected the roots of the Sons of Ares to go deeper, for the tale of the rebellion to be a little grander and far-reaching. Fitcher might have been the match that lit the spark, but I'd love to know more about the many men and women who provided the kindling and accelerant leading up to Bryn's murder. Certainly he couldn't have done this all on his own? It takes a village ... over many generations.

It feels more like Fitchner's memoir than a people's history of the uprising, if that makes any sense.

Sons of Ares is constructed as a standalone story, but most likely fans of the series will enjoy it most: newbies might find it difficult to get fully invested in the characters, given the sheer scope of Brown's universe and the comparably short length of the comic.

3 stars for non-fans, 4 for Howlers.

http://www.easyvegan.info/2018/03/16/pierce-browns-red-rising-sons-of-ares/

3.5 Stars

Full review to come!