This is the second in The Unsinkable Walker Bean series. I had not read the first book when I red this one and I think maybe I should have. While I was able to mostly catch up, I feel I missed something. Maybe it was just me not catching on. In book two, the group is stranded on the islands and attempting to repair their boat to get them back home. They are being watched by island inhabitants. They come across ruins, strange fires, and even more strange riddles. This was a fun read with great illustrations, oops, I forgot to mention this was a graphic novel. I am giving this mystery a 3.5 star review rounded to 4 stars.

This is the only book that I have read in this series., so it took me a bit to catch on. I think that I would have like this better had I read the previous book.

The pacing was slow, the doppel-characters lead to some confusion (along with different timelines), and I was mixed on the artwork.

Walker Bean and his friends plus pirates are stranded on an island. A very strange island with ghost animals that wander around. They are working on building a boat but end up exploring and discovering some very strange ruins. And then there are mysterious visitors, strange fires, and riddles to solve. It all comes together in the end to produce a very interesting tale. Now I need to go find the earlier adventures of the Unsinkable Walker Bean and wait for further adventures.

This is second in the series, and it's definitely better to have read the first one before reading this one, to have a better idea of the story. The artwork felt too chaotic to me, and much seemed fuzzy as well. I'm not entirely sure if that is how it is, or just how my tablet processed it, but it gave me a headache trying to process everything. I wasn't a fan of the dialogue or plot much either.

The Unsinkable Walker Bean and the Knights of the Waxing Moon by Aaron RenierWalker Bean is back with his friends for more adventures. This time, he's looking for treasure and dealing with pirates. With a tough riddle to solve, can he figure out where the treasure is before the bad guys? And why does his friend Genoa seem so involved?

I have to admit that I thought this was a part of a different series when I requested it from NetGalley. But I thought I would read it anyway. It took some time to figure out what was going on as I hadn't read the book before this one. It was okay but took some time to wade through which I wasn't expecting from a comic. Would definitely be a lot of bang for your buck.



This book came out October 23

Four stars

ARC kindly provided by NetGalley; Opinion is my own

You must read the first a Walker Bean book to understand the plot of this one. There is a lot of action and adventure happening in this book. There is a lot of information in this book that helps explain some things from the first one. Some of it is complicated to understand so I'd hand this book to 5th grade and up. I really enjoyed the story and the artwork.

Adventure Awaits

This is a rich and idiosyncratic fantasy/adventure with an old school feel.

We have two ancient civilizations opposing each other, alchemy, high seas adventure, spirits, dreamwalking, semi-magical gadgets, a powerful alchemical treasure, islands with hidden caves, delusional explorers, scurvy pirates, and three young heroes on a great and wild adventure of discovery.

While this doesn't really do the book justice, because it really is a one-of-a-kind creation, it might help to think of this as a steam-punk Treasure Island with a psychedelic undercurrent and a salty tang.

The drawing is especially worthy of note. The style looks very 1920's, with heavy lines, lots of ink, and colors reminiscent of Sunday comics pages. There's more of "Little Nemo" than there is of Marvel in these panels. The overall look and effect in terms of mood, scene setting, backgrounds, and characters is sort of the American Colonial era, which fits with the nautical elements and the overall story. Panel design is creative, and the occasional two-page spreads are rich and inviting. Indeed, the level of detail is rather remarkable, to the extent that sometimes it almost gets in the way of the story by drawing the reader away from the main action. You're pretty fortunate if that's the main criticism you have of the artwork in a graphic novel.

This is a Volume 2, but it wasn't too hard to pick up the thread. You might have to read a few pages to figure out who's who and get situated, and then go back and start again, but that's a small price to pay if you're picking up the series in progress. (On the other hand it wraps up pretty tightly at the end, so you won't have a cliffhanger problem, even though it certainly feels like other volumes might come along eventually.)

I was a little hesitant about this at first because the style and the look is, for want of a better word, dense. But after a bit you'll be drawn into the author's world and carried away by the adventure. A nice, under the radar, find.

(Please note that I received a free advance will-self-destruct-in-x-days Adobe Digital copy of this book without a review requirement, or any influence regarding review content should I choose to post a review. Apart from that I have no connection at all to either the author or the publisher of this book.)

Felt like the Scooby gang back together again. I probably shouod have started with the first one but I found that I still very much enjoyed the darkness and story of this one.