I picked this book because I liked the cover and briefly read the description. Boy, I was in for a surprise! The story plot was skillfully written and the illustrations blew my mind! Absolutely in love with the book!

To some, it will be a tale of resistance and love, but seriously worth picking it up!

Thank you #NetGalley and Boom! Studios for giving me the opportunity to read this!
#EightyDays

thanks to netgalley and boom! studios for the arc in exchange for an honest review. i'm very late but better late than never right?!
"a pilot wants nothing more than to fly. or so he thought, until he crosses paths with a mysterious thief whose tricks draw him into unchartered territory and new adventure."
first of all, i'm new to the beautiful world of graphic novels, but i had an amazing time reading this. we love to see representation, especially in protagonists.
eighty days is set in the 20th- century in a land where the aviation controls most of the territory and its citizens. in general this is a story about resistance, love and freedom.

#EightyDays #NetGalley

First of all, the art in this was very beautiful, hard to follow sometimes due to the lack of color, but very beautiful. The story was compelling but not necessarily interesting. The main character aspires to be a pilot and is obsessed with the plane type he is assigned from his company. He is hired to transport someone and turns out they scammed him but it was just the start of a relationship between the pilot and scammer. The plot was weirdly holocaust-ic and it was really quite sad at the climax but it had a happy ending. I don't see myself recommending this to anyone unless they like war type stories or are a fan of art.

Interesting and pretty. I was so pleased with how lovely it was on my kobo as well. I enjoyed the flow of the story and the gorgeous art

Thank you to Netgalley for the opportunity.

What I love about this graphic novel

1) The stunning cover along with the illustration inside. It is beautifully drawn and so beautiful. I love the strokes of it however I do hope for more colors to be added in it.
2) The amazing plot of this book. The power hungry corporation, the war, the rebellion & the love story. I love how it came through as one. I also love how it started with the Jay pov in a some kind of journal then gradually to the other characters POV.

I received an ARC ebook copy from NetGalley in exchange for my honest review.

This was a fun book. It had an interesting premise and some very unique artwork. Overall I'm not the biggest fan of War books but I was drawn in by the beautiful cover and had a good time.

A queer romance set in the backdrop of psuedo World War II. Starts off about a pilot and a radio operator traveling through some made up countries while a fascist government (AVO) quickly starts taking over nearby countries. As soon as they figure out their love for one another, the book shifts to a new chapter that is completely war focused and the romance is dropped until the end while they are torn apart.

The book's plot is mainly about radio signals. One of the main characters is a radio genius. It completely lost me as it just descends into gibberish as a plot device. At first I was with it and then it just kept on going to the point of nonsense. The book also spends a lot of time traveling between these made up countries. That was all meaningless to me though because the countries were never nothing more than just a made up name such as "Easterly". A map of the world would have helped greatly to make these movements more interesting.

The art confounded me. Some pages looked gorgeous. Other pages were a swirl of smoke and speed lines to the point I couldn't make out anything on the page. I couldn't make out most of the action sequences. I think the author made everyone chain smoke just so they could add swirling smoke to every panel.

An unlikely pair, a pilot and a thief, find themselves as key members of the resistance. Avo has a monopoly over the skies and thus have near ironclad control. Jay and Fix are thrust into battle against Avo's control.

Eighty Days by A.C. Esguerra is an action packed, emotional graphic novel. Characters are fleshed out with complex motivations and personalities. Jay and Fix's relationship was so well developed; from beginning to end their romance was perfect.

The art style here is top notch. It brings you into this aerial-centric world with a historical feel. The combat scenes were fast paced and the emotional scenes hit hard.

Arc provided by NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Hello Again!

So in September, I really wanted to pick up a few more manga or graphic novels. I love reading these and I feel like sometimes I just do not pick them up as often as I want to. So with one week left of September, I have picked up two so far (and hope to pick up at least one more)! One of the graphic novels I picked up was an ARC of Eighty Days, which is out now, (thank you so much to the publisher for the ARC in exchange for my honest opinions)! I decided to pick this one up on a whim but without further ado, let’s jump in!

SPOILERS AHEAD

In a war torn land, a pilot is minding his own business (doing what he loves which is flying) until one day when he meets someone that needs to go somewhere. He flies them to their destination and on they way their learns a lot about this person (Fix) but also learns that he is a great navigator and radio operator in the sky. The two assume that they will never see one another again but soon enough they do, and Fix is in a jam. Of course, he helps Fix but soon enough they are both in over their head and they make a choice that they are in this together and joining the resistance. But joining the resistance comes with it’s challenges and one of these could be getting caught.

I really enjoyed this graphic novel. I was unsure what I would think about it but I ended up loving it so much I bought myself a psychical copy and telling my spouse about it. The art style was amazing and the characters all popped off the page for me, I was constantly concerned about certain people! Additionally, meeting each individual character was unique and even people who were supposed to be the bad guys caught my attention. I want to thank the publisher for giving me the E-ARC of this graphic novel in exchange for my honest opinions! I really enjoyed my time with this one and I can not wait to see what else might come from this author/illustrator!

Goodreads Rating: 5 Stars

The cover for Eighty Days was something that piqued my interest and thus I decided to try this. Not to forget I love to read war comics for some reason. The story is set in a world were aviation is regulated by Avo and not anyone can fly. Corvidae is a pilot, but soon finds himself in an adventure when he meets a thief called Vulpes. This makes Corvidae an outlaw eventually, since he falls in love with Vulpes and they both end up with the resistance. The story is strongly about two sides and the need to make the world a better place. Mostly it's about agents, death, war and shenanigans, but also about friendship, love, loyalty and the need to fight for what is right. For me the plot structure was too sporadic and hard to follow. It was unbalanced, because it jumped from setting to another and it was hard to grasp what was happening not to forget that there were lots of characters and not enough time to use them all.

The art looks nice and different. The ink style looks great and highlights the dark parts nicely with awesome dirt-like look. The style sets the story in its time. The skies with planes and bombs look amazing. This would look great in color too with watercolors especially. An interesting story with a nice look that still needs polishing with the story and how to move it.

I have to say that this took me quite a bit to get into but that's no fault of the writing. The artist did some truly beautiful work with this book but in some panels there is A LOT going on that it was hard for my eyes to grasp just what was going on. Being in black and white also didn't help alleviate my own confusion but the story and most of the panels was beautiful and engaging. I loved the characters of Jay and Fix. Two different people brought together by chance during a time of war, turmoil and betrayal. I'm not normally one for historical fiction but this was akin to the few war stories that I've read in my time and Jay/Fix were characters you couldn't help but root for.

4 stars

As a brutal authoritarian government encroaches on the continent a resistance movement forms. A pilot & a radio ops whiz join the fight as loyalties are tested & betrayals mount. This is an exciting, beautifully illustrated, & emotionally satisfying graphic novel.

[What I liked:]

•The art is beautiful & elegant, almost like stylized ink sketches. It captures movement & facial expressions in simple, minimal lines. It’s also wonderfully detailed when it comes to landscapes & aircraft depictions.

•The story is very touching, especially Jay & Fix’s relationship. Sable’s storyline is engaging as well. The story starts off slow, but once it gets going there is a nice balance of action & high stakes, & relational tension between complex characters.

•The world building is pretty good. The setup is reminiscent of 1930’s Europe & WWII, but with some variations (a slightly steampunk element, an evil corporation taking over instead of a fascist government, a caste system regulating transportation, etc.)


[What I didn’t like as much:]

•The text that isn’t dialogue (Jay’s logbook entries) uses sentence fragments stripped of articles, linking verbs, & pronouns. It’s difficult to understand & unpleasant to read, the opposite of smooth.

•Some of the action sequences are hard to visually read. There is so much going on on the page, just messy lines that all blur together. I couldn’t tell what was happening.

•The beginning is kinda slow. Not much happens for the first 15-20% of the book, although it picks up & is nicely paced after that.

CW: violence, war, sexism

[I received an ARC ebook copy from NetGalley in exchange for my honest review. Thank you for the book!]

Extremely jumpy, hardly any explanation or world building, plot is extremely hard to follow as we’re told basically nothing, characters barely talk

Look, I don't usually buy books before I'm even done with the ARC but Eighty Days was in my cart before I even made it halfway through. Between the art and the story, it was instant love and I knew I needed to have a physical copy to share (and shove onto all my friends). This world, although different from our own, resonates strongly with what many of us have grown up with in terms of power-hungry corporations and militant restrictions on how people live their lives or move about the world. Esguerra's art is ethereal and subtle shifts in their style help to capture the emotional impact of each scene. The beautiful illustrations complement that narrative, allowing the reader to fully immerse themselves into the narrative, empathizing with the struggles and hopes the characters experience.

Anyway, I love this book, bought it for myself, bought it for our library, will get another copy for the lgbt library once we re-open post-pandemic, and it's probably going to be gifted to some friends as well because I'm just that in love with this book.

Eighty Days by A.C. Esguerra is a stunning tale about love, freedom and resistance set in a 20th-century, aviation-based world. Drawn in a grayscale world, we have three figures who go on a long journey that leads to betrayal, war and rebellion.

Jay is a pilot working for AVO, a powerful transnational flight organisation. When he chooses to transport the "no-class" thieving Fix, who turns out to be a bit of a radio genius, loyalties shift. Just like my favourite character, AVO officer Sable, I found them to be unique main characters who go through beautiful character arcs.

In its 300+ pages, Eighty Days has a lot to offer plot- and character-wise. A lot happens in this unique geopolitical story, which may make it seem dense or confusing at times.

Another aspect I enjoyed was the main queer romance. Although it's definitely centred in the story, I never felt as if it took over. I was glad to find this diverse novel was written by a queer Asian-American writer.

I'd like to thank Boom Studios for providing this copy via Netgalley in exchange for an unbiased review.

Loved the characters, however I feel like plot was just so so and the art just wasn’t as good as I was expecting from the cover. It was an okay read though, and atleast worth trying!

To be honest, I have mixed feelings about this comic.

Like, I loved the story and the characters were loveable but the art style seemed unfinished to me? I like the idea of a black and white comic but so many panels were confusing and I didn't know what was going on and it bothered me so much. But I did like the romance part, it was very sweet.

All in all, a good idea but it could approve a lot. I just hope that the final version will be colored maybe?

4.5 Stars!

I love graphic novels so I was super excited when I got this. Turns out my excitement was warranted and I couldn't be happier with how it went.

The story telling style took some getting used to (hence the 4.5 stars) but once I got into the story, I simply could not put it down.

More often than not, books such as these focus too much on the art with the story being told feeling like some kind of afterthought. That was NOT the with this book as the art was great, and on par with the storyline.

Here, we got an intricate plot which kept me riveted till the very end. I enjoyed every second of it and will recommend it for fellow lovers of graphic novels.

This book was more of a "it's me, not the book" type of situation. I enjoyed the artwork and the storyline was solid enough but it just didn't hold my interest while reading it. I think this will be great for middle grade readers.

Thanks to the publisher, author, and netgalley for giving me an ARC of this book to review,

Thank you, NetGalley and the publisher for the chance to read this graphic novel!

As soon as I saw this on NetGalley, the cover instantly grabbed my attention, once I read the synopsis I hit request! The art style was stunning and the characters great, but the story itself lost me in quite a few places. I loved the last chapter, but on the whole the plot confused me.

Overall, this was a solid 3 star read for me and I'd still recommend it! I can't wait to read more by this author in the future.