The 2005 Harvey Award nominations have been posted at The Beat. If Marvel thought it was going to split the internet in half, they’re going to have to pull off something rather special to top the Harveys. Eightball and Identity Crisis nominated for the same award? Heads will explode!

I’m really happy to see Bryan Lee O’Malley (Scott Pilgrim, Lost at Sea) and Andy Runton (Owly) get lots of nominations. With Scott Pilgrim, Owly, and Craig Thompson’s lovely Carnet de Voyage taking slots in the Best Graphic Album of Original Work category, I don’t envy the voters who have to pick just one.

And what the hell does the comic industry have against Paul Gravett’s magnificent Manga: 60 Years of Japanese Comics? First the Eisners snubbed it in the Best Comic-Related Book category, now it fails to appear in the field for the Best Biographical, Historical, or Journalistic Presentation Harvey. (If nothing else, these exclusions give me more chances to say how terrific Gravett’s book is.)

Instead of taking deep breaths to calm myself over the injustice of it all, I can just pop over and look at Lea Hernandez’s 24-Hour Comic, Dangerous Beauty. She’s posted it in three parts here, here, and here. As Johanna noted on her blog, it would be mighty delightful if this was published as a mini-comic. The cumulative effect of the three very different acts is really something in an electronic version, but I think it would be even more effective in print.

Speaking of comics you can read for free, Dave Carter is turning May into Free Comic Book Month at Yet Another Comics Blog. Dave will be digging into his own collection to match up entrants with comics they haven’t tried but might like, which is such a cool idea that it almost makes me wish I weren’t so selfish and lazy.

I’m still making my way through the haul from the Pittsburgh Comicon, and I’m learning that Ed Cunard is more than just an evil imp who encourages overspending. He was particularly encouraging at one dealer’s box of five-dollar graphic novels, and those purchases have turned out to be a gold mine of good reading. (Plus, I keep hearing Ed say, “You should get that!” whenever I look at them.) Highlights have been Chynna Clugston-Major’s screwball romantic comedy Scooter Girl (Oni) and Gabrielle Bell’s varied, accomplished collection of mini-comics, When I’m Old and Other Stories (Alternative Comics). The “to review” pile… it grows ever taller!

The following spoils certain plot developments from Captain America 5. If you haven’t read it but plan to, turn back!

I am clearly a ghoulish person, because every time I think about what I learned about Bucky Barnes in Captain America 5, I grin. Sometimes I even laugh out loud.

For those of you who don’t follow the book, writer Ed Brubaker has revealed Bucky’s true function as Captain America’s sidekick. Bucky Barnes, beneath his boyish innocence, was a highly trained killing machine. While Cap was giving inspiring speeches to the troops, Bucky was sneaking past the front lines, slitting throats and gunning down advanced guards. Cap couldn’t get his hands bloody and maintain his inspirational image, so he sent a kid to do it.

I don’t know why that idea tickles me so much. It might be the perverse logic of it. It might be the way it answers the long-standing question of whether Cap actually made it through World War II without killing anyone. It might even be the way it’s such a perfect thematic sibling to Gwen Stacy’s lusty romp with the Green Goblin.

Some people have noted, I think quite correctly, that the idea of teen sidekicks isn’t one that benefits from careful scrutiny. The argument goes that it’s hard to endorse an adult knowingly putting a child (or at least a minor) in real peril. And situations don’t get much more perilous than the front lines of World War II, so Cap and his military handlers could easily look criminally irresponsible for letting Bucky tag along at all.

But this revelation has a weirdly beautiful insanity to it. Bucky is one of those characters whose value has been that he’s dead, and that Cap feels badly about that. I’ve never seen a flashback story featuring Bucky where he made any kind of impression. (I admit that I haven’t read too many, and I don’t follow Captain America’s adventures too closely, because he bores me.) He’s never been a character so much as an emotionally charged headstone.

Now, everything we knew about Bucky was wrong! (Yes, I usually hate that as a narrative device. Consider this the exception.) He was a black-ops machine, stealthily offing the opposition as easily as he cried, “Jeepers, Cap!” (Okay, maybe I’m inserting the “Jeepers,” but you know what I mean.) It makes an odd kind of sense, but it’s inexplicably, morbidly hilarious at the same time.

As I said, Cap doesn’t really do a thing for me. I’m enjoying Brubaker’s run so far, but I wouldn’t be picking up the title if I didn’t generally admire Brubaker’s work (and that of artists Steve Epting and Michael Lark). So I’m curious to see how this development will go down with readers who actually are Cap fans. Because he does seem to inspire a great deal of reader loyalty, and some of those loyal readers are real purists about what they think Cap will and will not do. I’m actually kind of surprised I haven’t seen more of a reaction already, though I may be looking in the wrong places. (And maybe they’re waiting to see if this twist is just a side effect of Cap’s apparently unreliable memory.)

But the image of Bucky skulking through undergrowth with a big knife in his teeth, waiting to slit someone from ear to ear, is an image that makes me happy for reasons I simply cannot explain. It’s nuts, and I just love it. I know it’s wrong, but I just don’t care.

It’s not you, Sharknife. It’s me.

I’m just too old for you. We’re at different places in our lives. You must sense it too.

Sure, you’re stylish. Maybe you’re too stylish for an old codger like me.

Sure, I appreciate that you’ve chosen to appropriate a video-game aesthetic as a storytelling device. I love video games! I can see the craft and skill involved in pulling that off!

Maybe my tired old eyes just can’t absorb all this narrative invention, the kinetic action, the captured moment/screenshot qualities that drive the long, long, long fight scenes.

Okay, maybe it’s not entirely me.

Incompatibility takes two, and while you’ve got a lot going for you, I think most of it is flash. Tricked-out visuals only go so far when the characters are somewhat underdeveloped and the plot is kind of threadbare.

It’s kind of hard to talk frankly like this, because you’re so eager to please. You have energy to spare, but it all seems unfocused. There’s not much depth to you, and I know that’s a geezer’s criticism, but I’m not asking for too much. I just want a moment or two of consequence. I want the novelty to give way, even briefly, to some heart.

And the way you talk! You’re trying so hard to sound hip that you’ve circled all the way back to square again. Stop adding the letter “z” to everything! Stop randomly throwing words together so they sound manga-esque!

I’m sorry. This isn’t going how I’d hoped. Maybe we should just call it a night. You were never meant for me, and I shouldn’t hold that against you.

Don’t worry. I picked up the tab.

I love books on tape, and I always like to have one in the car. There are some I can listen to over and over again, even when the book isn’t a particular favorite, but because the reader does so well. I can listen to Jim Dale read the Harry Potter books again and again. (That’s funny, because I never want to hear Jim Dale sing anything again. His vocalizing from the cast album of Barnum reminds me of Michael Crawford’s, and that isn’t a good thing, in my opinion.)

One of my favorite readers is Barbara Rosenblat, who’s recorded many of the Amelia Peabody mysteries by Elizabeth Peters. She’s one of those readers who just precisely captures the way I hear the voices when I read the book, and it’s great fun to listen to her bring the cast to life. Her Amelia is just note-perfect: bossy, self-assured, impatient, funny, sly.

Now, the book I’ve currently got in the car is one that I haven’t actually read in print version, The Egyptologist, by Arthur Phillips. It might be entertaining on paper, but the audio version is… well… it’s agony. There are handful of readers on it, and one of them, who gives voice to an Australian private detective, is… well, let’s just say I can’t make it through ten CDs of it. There’s no way.

So when Kevin Melrose linked to an interview with Susanna Clarke, author of the sublime Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell, I made a mental note to check the library to see if they had a copy of the audio version. And I looked up the audio version on-line. It’s read by Simon Prebble.

Simon Prebble is one of the readers on The Egyptologist. But I don’t know if he’s the one who’s hurting me with the down-under gumshoe shtick. So, has anyone out there listened to the audio version of Jonathan Strange? Is it any good? The sanity you preserve may be mine.

Ed Cunard has posted some of the truly awesome dalmatian sketches he’s collected over the years. Ed also claims that he’s not much of a shopper, which may or may not be true. But he’s undeniably a highly skilled bad influence. Every time I look at my stack of purchases, I hear Ed’s voice urging, “You should get that.” He’s like the Bad Idea Bears from Avenue Q, though I grudgingly admit his advice usually turns out pretty well.

Thanks to whoever nominated me for a Squiddy Award.

This week’s Flipped went up yesterday. Yes, I’m still picking at the CMX scab.

Looking at this week’s list of comics is kind of dispiriting until I make my way down to the manga and see new volumes of Case Closed and Whistle! from Viz and Sgt. Frog from Tokyopop. And the shopkeep assured me up in Pittsburgh that Oni’s Sharknife is nestled safely in my file. (It isn’t like I’m starving for reading material to begin with, now that I think about it.)

(Edited for spelling crimes against spotted dogs.)

Bryan Lee O’Malley’s Lost at Sea (Oni) is one of those books that I’m almost afraid to review. This is going to sound like coffee house blather, but the work has a weird kind of purity that makes me reluctant to dissect it. O’Malley so perfectly and seemingly effortlessly captures a certain state of mind that it seems nitpicky to try and figure out how he’s managed it.

But it’s also one of those books where just saying that it’s a wonderful comic and I loved it doesn’t feel inadequate. It’s exactly the kind of graphic novel I want to read: smart, funny, observant, expressive, driven by character, and making fluid use of a distinct visual style.

Lost at Sea doesn’t so much tell a story as it follows a train of thought. Eighteen-year-old Raleigh has caught a ride home to Canada from California with three of her high-school classmates. The trio is close in a cantankerous, shorthand way that manages to accentuate Raleigh’s feelings of isolation and disconnectedness. And she really doesn’t need much help in that area.

Raleigh suspects that she doesn’t have a soul, and she ponders that a lot. As her fellow passengers tease each other in spiky, familiar ways, Raleigh looks inward. Her mind wanders to moments of connection in her own life, but she can’t seem to draw any comfort from them, because they all have accompanying moments of loss: her parents divorcing, her best friend moving away, being moved to a gifted class only to resent the fact that she isn’t special any more.

She tries to pinpoint the moment when her soul went missing, but she’s smart enough to know that life isn’t that linear, that what seems like a pattern may just be coincidence and that memory is at least partly, if not mostly, perception. Perception plays a big role in Lost at Sea. Raleigh seems to assume that her dilemma is obvious, and that the people around her must know on some level that she’s missing something. It makes her reluctant to connect with the people around her, even as their perceptions of her draw them closer.

Raleigh is so eighteen. A million thoughts swirl through her head, and she’s determined to make sense of them. At the same time, she recognizes the virtual impossibility of that aim. She can’t quite allow herself to articulate what she wants or what she feels, because the possibility of rejection or misunderstanding is always looming. She thinks she’s the weirdest person in the world.

It’s a fairly universal state of mind, but O’Malley portrays it articulate, sensitive ways that are entirely specific to his protagonist. He gives Raleigh a barbed, revealing stream-of-consciousness narration that never becomes tiresome. It’s not some dreary poetry journal; it’s the often jumbled thinking of a smart young woman who doesn’t know if she’s actually in crisis or is really just like everyone else, or which of those states would be less comforting.

O’Malley has given Raleigh the perfect companions for both the road trip and the head trip. Short-tempered Ian, above-it-all Dave, and blunt, funny Steph are all outgoing in ways Raleigh finds both baffling and attractive. I’m very impressed with O’Malley’s skill at portraying the kind of warm, casual friendship on display here and in Scott Pilgrim’s Precious Little Life. It’s almost more effective here, as the threesome’s rapport has to be convincing to shake Raleigh out of her mental loop.

I can’t help but think of Lost at Sea and Scott Pilgrim together, if only because they’re so distinctly accomplished. While Scott Pilgrim is dizzily entertaining and surprising, Lost at Sea offers quieter, more contemplative pleasures. O’Malley has real emotional range, but his work seems effortless. It’s seamless, like it just arrived whole on the page. But it doesn’t have any slickness to it. Everything seems connected, part of a warm, organic whole.

I wish I were better at talking about the visual elements of comic storytelling, because I feel like I end up using the same, limited vocabulary over and over. For lack of my own words, I’ll just have to lift something Bill Randall said about Osamu Tezuka in The Comics Journal Special Edition 5: “The unique vocabulary of cartooning, with its exaggerations and simplifications, its playful lines and caricature, can embrace the whole of human experience.” That sums up my aesthetic response to O’Malley’s visuals much better than anything I could come up with, so we’ll leave it there.

Lost at Sea is a wonderful comic. I loved it.

So we went to a performance of Carmina Burana this afternoon. And I have to wonder sometimes if people don’t actually intentionally go to cultural events so much as just get kidnapped from their homes and wake dazed in a theatre somewhere. Because people are so damned rude I could lose my mind.

I know everyone in the world has made these requests, but all the same:

1. Turn off your phone. No. Turn it off. The performance is an hour and ten minutes. You’ll live.
2. Do you really think your child wants to go see Carmina Burana? Is any cultural enlightenment he or she might pick up (entirely by osmosis, I’m guessing) worth the undying enmity of your fellow concert-goers as they grind their teeth when your kid asks, “Is it almost over?” for the seventy-fifth time?
3. Again, it’s only an hour and ten minutes. You can hold it. Stop popping out of your seat like a prairie dog.
4. That’s nice that your kid is in the children’s choir, but you’re sitting roughly a quarter of a mile from the stage, so the picture won’t turn out anyways, and you all just blinded the timpanist when your flashes went off at once.
5. It’s a program. It’s not a Triple A map. It’s not origami paper. Put it down.
6. Shut up. Seriously.
7. If you really feel like you need to unwrap a hard candy, could you do it during one of the loud, fast passages instead of during the soprano’s solo?
8. When people glare at you the first time you unwrap a hard candy during the soprano’s solo, the solution is not to do it again during the second soprano solo, only more deliberately. Because you know what? Unwrapping a hard candy slowly and carefully is actually louder than the way you just did it.
9. No one is making you sit here and listen to music. By the same token, no one cares if you act like an inconsiderate boob when you’re in your own home watching television. Think about it.

It’s always nice when an experience exceeds your expectations. I knew I would have a great time meeting Ed, Rose, and Steven at the Pittsburgh Comicon, and I did, but I didn’t expect much from the con itself.

Fortunately, retailers from across the region had brought boxes full of trade paperbacks and seemed determined not to take them back to their respective shops. So I could overspend without feeling like I was overspending, which is actually pretty dangerous, now that I think about it. But heck, I found crazy cheap copies of stuff like Scooter Girl, The Complete Geisha, Peanutbutter and Jeremy’s Best Book Ever, and my favorite find, Even a Monkey Can Draw Manga.

Ed, it should be noted, is insanely gregarious. As a result, I could just kind of ride along in his wake and end up talking to many more people than I normally would. While there weren’t tons of creators there, Ed somehow managed to find all of the really interesting ones. And he got an incredibly adorable sketch for his book from this guy. (I do wish I hadn’t seen Jim Rugg inking additional art for the Street Angel collection, because now I’m going to have to buy the damned thing.)

Alas, there was something of a freak shortage. Just a few people in costume, and none of them really looked that bad. The Hal Jordan Green Lantern actually managed to pull it off pretty well. (Spider-Man, on the other hand, didn’t have the ass for it. Not that I was checking, or anything.) I did love the slightly-larger-than-life Spider-Mannequin at the Previews booth, slumped over in a chair like he’d passed out drinking.

All in all, it was a delightful day trip, and Ed, Rose, and Steven are really wonderful company. It makes me even more determined to go to SPX this year, so I can meet more bloggers. (By the way, if you’ve ever wondered what I look like, Rose and Steven took pictures.)

I can’t believe the Freedom Force sequel played the “bitch crazy” card. I’m deeply distressed.

I’m really not much of a con-goer, and I don’t have any particular purchases in mind, but I’m twitching with excitement over this weekend’s Pittsburgh Comicon because I get to meet some of my favorite bloggers.

Speaking of favorite bloggers, happy anniversary to Johanna Draper Carlson, who’s been writing Cognitive Dissonance for a year now. Beyond being insightful, intelligent, and an excellent source of reading recommendations, Johanna’s a really delightful person.

And since I’m in blogger love mode, I’ll point you towards Christopher Butcher’s latest offering at comics.212.net. I’m one of those comics shoppers who did the Snoopy dance on Wednesday, walking off with some of my favorite mainstream titles and Lost At Sea AND the totally unexpected arrival of a volume of True Story, Swear To God, which I’ve been meaning to try for a while now.

By the way, the owner of the shop I use is thinking of setting up a “sample corner,” where he puts out issues of smaller-press and indy books that people can read in the shop. He’s always trying to expand the shop’s inventory horizons, and he thinks this would be a good way to measure demand for books that haven’t yet set north central West Virginia on fire. (I know! A cosmopolitan enclave like that? Sorry to shatter your illusions that there’s an Isotope or Jim Hanley’s Universe on every corner.) It sounds sort of like an ongoing Free Comic Book Day or a trial library in the shop. I think it sounds like a good idea, just an extension of the fact that he encourages browsing, but if anyone out there has any experience with this kind of experiment or any feedback, let me know, and I’ll pass the message along.

The pile of books I’d like to review is getting dangerously tall. The cats eye it warily, rightly suspicious of its structural integrity. I look at it with mounting panic, realizing that I have to actually crack into it or panic will morph into resentment.

So in an effort to break the logjam, I’ve decided to try something a little different. I’m going to look at two recently sampled manga titles specifically for whether or not they inspired me to pick up further installments.

Tramps Like Us, by Yayoi Ogawa (Tokyopop), Vol. 1

What’s it about? Tough, smart Sumire Iwaya gets hit with personal and professional disappointments in fairly short order. Her boyfriend, threatened by Sumire’s success and higher status, cheats on her. At work, she’s demoted when she decks her boss after a drunken come-on. Things pick up when she acquires a pet. The pet is actually a handsome young man, “Momo”, who’ll happily trade dignity for shelter (and proximity to beautiful Sumire).

Pros:

• It’s fun to see a female protagonist who isn’t desperate to please or conform.
• The dynamic between Sumire and Momo are a nice balance between sweet and strangely unsettling.
• I like Momo’s manipulative nature is so well-suited to the pet-owner dynamic, as is his jealousy of Sumire’s suitor.
• Sumire’s acknowledgement that the situation is bizarre actually makes it seem less so.
• I’m glad to see Ogawa focus on the quiet moments of Sumire’s life in addition to the stressful ones. It really lets the reader see what she gets out of Momo’s presence in her life.

Cons:

• I can’t really think of any, aside from the fact that nothing about the art strikes me as particularly remarkable. It’s perfectly competent, though.

Verdict:

I’ll definitely buy future volumes of this, as I’m curious about how Sumire and Momo’s relationship will evolve. I’m not going to rush out right now, or anything, but it’s a prime purchase candidate for some future Saturday at the bookstore.

The Wallflower, by Tomoko Hayakawa (Del Rey), Vol. 1

What’s it about? Four vapid, squeamish boys try to score free rent for a mansion by promising the landlady they’ll pull a Pygmalion on her spooky, reclusive niece. The quartet finds their subject truly horrifying. Sunako is completely withdrawn, revels in violent splatter films, and takes pride in her complete avoidance of anything resembling grooming. She’s as horrified of the pretty boys as they are of her, and it’s revealed that her withdrawal was the result of a handsome boy’s rejection. A battle of wits and wills ensues, as Sunako resists the boys’ makeover efforts.

Pros:

• While she clearly needs psychological help, it’s hard not to root for Sunako in her desire to be left alone.
• When the book actually indulges in a quiet moment or two, it can make some insightful observations on its characters.
• There are some nicely fanciful visuals, particularly related to the attempts to transform Sunako.

Cons:

• The four boys are fairly indistinct and rather boring. I found their delicate sensibilities more annoying than amusing.
• I found Kyohei, the only boy who stands out, profoundly obnoxious.
• The comedy is often fairly shrill.
• If I never see a projectile nosebleed again, it will be too soon.

Verdict:

I probably won’t pick up further installments of The Wallflower. It doesn’t seem entirely coherent in terms of storytelling or character development, and it doesn’t exactly work with my delicate sensibilities.