Y: The Last Man, Vol 10: Whys and Wherefores by Brian K. Vaughan & Pia Guerra

( 111 ) – FYI:  Spoiler Laden commentary, read at your own risk

Last book of the year – everything else is carrying over to 09.

I wanted to read the whole series before putting together my impressions, since it seemed wrong to me to try to judge the story lines along the way.

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I was… dissatisfied with the ending.  I could buy the whole human cloning thing, but the food thing bugged me.  One or two lines in the last book referred to people solving the “animal” problem, but I wanted to know HOW they renewed the livestock stores of the world after all the male mammals died off and the lack of an answer annoyed me.

I loved the lack of an idealized society.  And the fact that the women who most say men are the root of all evil became themselves, largely, the root of all evil–or at least of a lot of the violence.  I was particularly intrigued by the different military group responses to the lack of men.  Some slid in and filled the void effortlessly, others went off the deep end.  I was surprised, and not surprised, by the Israeli colonel’s storyline, but the fact that they drug it out from book 1 to book 9  drove me batty. She’d spent her life judging herself against a male yardstick, and fought dirty to find a MAN to kill her, seeing it as the only honorable way to go.  Weird, but in-character weird.

The series is well-written and cinematic in scope. It wouldn’t be a very good movie, I suspect, but I would love to read an in-depth, fully-fleshed novel-length adaptation of the same story and, heck, even the same characters. I kinda like poor Yorick — for having survived that name if nothing else!

The art, well, honestly, it kinda pissed me off.  This whole series was drawn by the same artist and she couldn’t keep the artwork consistent between books? Yea, not impressed.

I would recommend it if asked, but I will say you need to be pretty open-minded about a lot of things — like rampant lesbianism (world w/o men and a limited supply of batteries, Hello!) — if you want to enjoy it.  I may read it again someday, and would consider buying a single bound edition that had all ten volumes, but for now, no.

Y: The Last Man, Vol. 9: Motherland

( 110)

No Way to Treat a First Lady by Christopher Buckley

( 109 )

I have to say, while this was better than Boomsday, I found it far less satisfying than Supreme Courtship, or, my fave, Thank You for Smoking. I was excited to see Nick Naylor back, if only for a few paragraphs…

Y: The Last Man, Vol 8: Kimono Dragons

( 108 )

Queste by Angie Sage

( 107 ) Septimus Heap, book 4

Better than the 2nd & 3rd in the series, still not as entertaining as the 1st, but far less predictable, so it balanced out nicely.

Y: The Last Man, Vol 7: Paper Dolls

( 106 )

Y: The Last Man Vol 6: Girl on Girl

( 105 )

Y: The Last Man, Vol. 5: The Ring of Truth

( 104 )

Y: The Last Man, Vol. 4: Safeword

( 103 )

y: The Last Man, Vol. 3: One Small Step

( 102 )

Christmas Jars by Jason Wright

( 101 )

So I have a friend who spent some quality time with a dentist today.  She’s in my book club, too, and I’m fairly certain this book is the cause of her tooth decay.  And I started out inclined to like it; after all, anything would be better than “The Cat Who Came for Christmas”.  As the self-same friend said last year, “It took him TWENTY PAGES to name the frigging cat!”

I wanted to like it because the MC is a writer and I have a weakness for entertainment that features writers; books, movies, you name it.  But the level of coincidence involved in this very thin book, well, it was just waaaayy too far to ask me to suspend my disbelief.  One big coincidence I could believe, maybe a couple small ones, but to have the whole story rely on such a whopper… yea, not so much.

It was a sweet little book, all feel good and crap.  Great plotting and writing it was not.

Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing by Judy Blume

( 100 )

I’m not sure how I feel about my 100th book of the year being friggin’ Judy Blume.  When I was a kid I liked that she was more honest than most authors of middle-grade fiction; not a problem we have as much these days.  But I never cared for her books.  I didn’t find them funny or charming or REAL.

Still don’t.  But I made the 7yo a promise that I would read what she has to read–combine that with bizarre left-field where-the-hell-is-this-coming-from ?!?! self-esteem issues she’s been having lately and I figured I needed to read the book, just in case.  It was harmless, I’m still clueless, and she has moved on to the next Fudge book.  Yea *shudder*

Boomsday by Christopher Buckley

( 99 )

Interesting, and smart, and funny, yet… No where near as good as “Thank You for Smoking” or “Supreme Courtship” both of which I absolutely loved.  It does highlight a valid concern.  Less so than usual right now because of the crappy economy, but still…

Y: The Last Man, Vol. 2: Cycles

( 98 )

Y: The Last Man, Vol. 1:Unmanned by Brian K. Vaughan & Pia Guerra

( 97 )

Intriguing premise; bloody beginning.

One day, out of the blue, all the men just die.  Not just the men, actually, ALL male mammals.  And they don’t just die, they go out in a bloody nasty mess, bleeding from the nose, mouth, ears. Oh, and it includes unborn male fetuses.

Yea, not for the faint of heart.

I’m not going to try to review each individual volume, but I will try to write something a little more in-depth when I’ve finished all ten volumes.