Did you ever come across one of those graphic novels that you admired tremendously but couldn’t quite decide if you liked? It’s a conundrum, because in the case of Reneé French’s The Ticking (Top Shelf Productions), whether or not I like it seems kind of trivial. I’m not even convinced that it wants to evoke that kind of simplistic response.

At the same time, it isn’t one of those books where you can smell the hunger for importance and weight. It isn’t some grabby, Oscar-bait comic, slathered with relevance and depth (though the marketing leans in that direction). It’s much more precise in its effect, and that effect is both familiar and unsettling.

It’s got the rhythms of a children’s book and something of the jarring tone of an early David Lynch film. But it isn’t comforting as the former or alienating as the latter. It occupies its own frank ground. French doesn’t really seem to want to disturb you too badly, but she doesn’t want to lie to you, either.

She follows the life of Edison Steelhead, a boy born with facial deformities. His mother dies during childbirth, and his father, Cal, moves with his son to an isolated island. Cal might be trying to protect Edison from the cruelty of other people, or he might just be caught up in his own pain and embarrassment, or maybe it’s a mixture of both.

Edison is thoughtful and observant, like French. He spends his days sketching mundane, even grotesque objects, not to beautify them but to record them and perhaps understand them. As Cal tries to conceal and alter Edison’s appearance, Edison becomes increasingly dedicated to accuracy (or honesty). He respects things as they are. (This even extends to the chimpanzee Cal brings home as a sort of sister for Edison. She understands things by eating them.)

The conflict between father and son is profound, but French never overstates it. She simply presents it with a weird kind of delicacy, using just a smattering of dialogue and narration. The emotional arc of the story, which is really all there is, seems to arrive in an almost off-handed way. There aren’t any flashes of naked despair or conventional uplift so much as captured moments that create a cumulative effect. It’s a fascinating approach, and it fuses perfectly with the visuals.

French’s illustrations straddle the line between endearing and bizarre. She looks unflinchingly at Edison’s disfigurement, though she almost discreetly averts here eyes from Cal’s pain. It’s a poignant visual representation of their different perspectives, the individual ways they’ve chosen to deal with life. She does lush, varied work with tones and shading. It adds depth and texture to the illustrations, grounding her odd, ugly characters in something almost normal.

I don’t think I’ve ever seen a graphic novel that was so much of a piece. Words and images are perfectly in balance with story and tone. Every element serves every other element in some interlocking way. At the same time, there are enough contradictions in the work that it doesn’t seem static or pat. It’s creepy and sweet, funny and haunting, honest and sad.

Looking over what I’ve just written, I think The Ticking isn’t really something you can simply like or dislike. It’s much more elemental than that.

(Thanks to Greg McElhatton for sharing his preview copy of the book.)

Alex Robinson’s Tricked (Top Shelf Productions) is kind of like a building. When you walk in, you can’t help but admire the architecture. It’s been designed carefully and with imagination. The proportions are impressive, and the structure hangs together. The interior design doesn’t suit the structure, though. It’s a little chilly and uncomfortable.

Robinson has crafted the graphic novel equivalent of a Robert Altman movie (like Short Cuts or Nashville). Six very different characters move through their individual lives, but their stories bump together with increasing frequency. The intersecting personal arcs move inexorably towards a shared – and traumatic – experience.

It’s an impressive piece of narrative construction. And Robinson doesn’t just rely on proximity, creating thematic undercurrents that link his sextet together. Most of the events are driven at least partly by fandom or hero worship. But how much weight those themes have depends on how invested the reader can become in the characters, particularly the six leads. For me, the results were mixed.

While there isn’t really a lead in the conventional sense of the word, the most pivotal role is held by Ray Beam, rock star in the midst of a creative dry spell. He’s got a ready-for-VH1 biography, personally and professionally, with a turbulent romantic history and a shattered band in his wake. Robinson’s too smart to think there’s much sympathy to be mined from Ray’s life, so he makes Ray somewhat ridiculous. He’s lazy, self-indulgent, and completely out of touch with the way normal people live. He’s also going through a string of attractive young “personal assistants” in search of a muse who can kick-start his recording career.

Steve is a big fan of Ray’s. He writes lengthy missives to Ray, delving into his work and offering unsolicited career advice. He’s also off his meds, and his innate misanthropy and obsession are gaining ground. Nick is a husband and father who’s been reduced to forging sports memorabilia after losing his office job. He’s lying to his family about his activities, and his boss has an unsettling mean streak.

The women protagonists are driven more by relationships. Waitress Caprice is coming off of a bad break-up. She re-enters the dating scene with mixed results, though she does find a promising boyfriend candidate. Unfortunately, her low self-esteem may derail the relationship before it really begins. Teen-ager Phoebe has jumped on a bus from New Mexico to track down the father who abandoned her family when she was an infant. And Lily gets drawn into Ray’s orbit while temping at his management agency. A misunderstanding leads Ray to believe Lily is a fan (she isn’t) and a potential conquest (she declines), but her apparent disinterest only makes him more intrigued. Lily is a practical person, and she’s willing to tolerate Ray’s weirdness to hold onto a lucrative, undemanding job.

Their lives are interesting to varying degrees. Caprice is the most obviously sympathetic, and her romantic woes ring true, even when they bring her into Nick’s unsavory orbit. Phoebe is a nice balance between innocence, anxiety, and anger, and her scenes with her long-lost father are written with subtlety and care. There are hopes on both sides, but Robinson is careful not to lapse into fairy tale. And Lily is a marvelous example of understated character development. She doesn’t really care if Ray’s inspired by her presence, and she isn’t much phased by the hostility of Marybeth, Ray’s real personal assistant (the one who does all the actual work). She seems like an innocent, but she’s really just biding her time.

The men are more problematic. If Robinson doesn’t really ask us to feel for Ray, he can’t quite bring himself to let us laugh at him too much. Ray is a man-child and a jerk, and he needs a team of people to handle his appetites and his ego. But there’s the suggestion that readers wouldn’t be out of line in seeing him as somewhat tragic, and I just can’t. Steve is tragic on paper (in the same way as under-medicated antagonists who show up periodically on Law and Order), but he’s an exhausting nerd. His interests are so narrow and his dedication to them so boundless as to generate resentment. While his deterioration is carefully and cleverly portrayed, he’s really unpleasant company. And Nick verges on walking plot device. His dishonesty has put him in an uncomfortable and dangerous position, but he’s kind of a jerk to begin with.

But even if the character arcs aren’t always affecting, they cohere. Robinson may indulge in some narrative legerdemain to bring his cast together together, but he plays fair for the most part. Nobody is shoved into too unlikely behavior to serve the story or its construction. It’s detailed, mostly restrained work. (I did find Robinson’s decision to have the chapters count down to one a little pretentious. Things tick along nicely without a virtual timer.)

For me, Tricked ended up being less than the sum of its parts. It left me admiring the craft of the work without feeling fully engaged. It’s impressive but not entirely moving.

(This review is based on a complimentary copy provided by Top Shelf Productions.)

It’s summer in Estabrook, and things are looking up for some of its younger residents. Ana, a rabbit, thought she’d be miserable with her best friend off at music camp. But she gets a job at the town’s underground newspaper, the Scoop, and she’ll get to team up with Em, another friend (and bird) who’s working there as a photographer. Shy Turnip, an elephant, figures he won’t do much of anything until he’s befriended by Stucky, a dog from his class. Stucky suggests Turnip sign up for sculpture camp with him.

The activities seem normal enough, but they end up putting the kids’ creativity, compassion, and courage to the test in Aaron Renier’s very entertaining Spiral-Bound (top secret summer) (Top Shelf Productions). Renier balances the comic adventure with some very perceptive and moving moments and does some terrific world building in the process.

Ana’s first assignment, a preview of the sculpture camp, leads her to investigate one of Estabrook’s biggest mysteries, the Pond Monster. Her investigation stirs up the fears of Estabrook’s adults and puts the sculpture teacher, a whale named Ms. Skrimshaw, in a tough position. Turnip enjoys sculpture camp, trying projects with the various different media, but he worries that he’s not really being creative, just appropriating other people’s styles and inspirations. Ana and Turnip’s activities intersect in clever ways, keeping the various subplots connected and moving forward.

The characters, especially the kids, are wonderful. Ana has the spunky reporter thing down. She’s intrepid and curious, but she’s also thorough, doing research in the library and in the town’s bookstore and grilling sources. She also has some hilarious moments of outrage when people tell her to pull back on the Pond Monster project or notice that she repeatedly uses certain words in her writing. (“But sometimes that’s the most fitting word!” she says in defense of her beloved “impeccable.”)

Renier resists the urge to cute up Turnip’s shyness and uncertainty. The little elephant takes things very much to heart, and he’s hard on himself. When a flustered Ms. Skrimshaw snaps at him, it has real sting because she’s inadvertently touched on some of Turnip’s most vulnerable points. Fortunately, Stucky is as thoughtful and persistent as he is inventive, and he does his best to keep Turnip on his creative track. (“Nobody’s an island, Turnip. You’re going to borrow something from everything!”)

Renier has also given his characters subtly individual voices. Ana is outspoken and declarative, and her conversations with Em have a funky, friendly rhythm. Turnip flusters easily; it’s like he isn’t that used to talking to people, at least about things that matter, and he can’t always articulate the complex things that are going on in his head. It’s a big cast, with camp students, newspaper employees, parents and various other townspeople, and each makes a distinct impression.

The story itself is less consistently successful. The solution to the over-arching mystery is less satisfying than the investigation. That might partly be because Renier has tried to concoct a solution where nobody’s really at fault for the misunderstandings that have preceded it. That’s tough to pull off, and Renier has sprinkled some almost ugly moments of tension into the story. Estabrook’s adults are alarmingly (and a little unconvincingly) prone to mob mentality. They’re driven by protectiveness, but some of their behavior leaves an unexpectedly bad aftertaste. (The illustrations don’t hold up as well in the tenser action sequences, too.)

But the overall feel of the book more than compensates for the rougher edges of the story. Estabrook is a wonderfully rendered fictional environment, and its Noah’s Ark citizens make for charming visuals. Crowd scenes are filled with funny Easter Eggs. I particularly love Renier’s conception of how the Scoop operates, half newspaper and half spy organization. With such a great landscape in place, it will be a shame if Renier doesn’t follow up with a sequel.

Best of all is the fact that the kids end up stronger than they start. Ana proves herself as a reporter through resourcefulness and hard work. Turnip inches out of his shell, making friends and finding a creative outlet. They’re active and inquisitive, learning by doing and having a positive influence on their town in the process. Watching this unfold is very satisfying and a lot of fun.

(This review is based on a complimentary copy of Spiral-Bound provided by Top Shelf.)