Oh, excellent. I think you'll really enjoy it. Pat obviously put a tremendous amount of effort and polish into creating it -- it really is an amazing piece of work. The second book is also a worthy follow-up. Now we just have to wait for the third......
I tend to fight anything with mass appeal too. Mainly because I get so sick of hearing how great it is and can't stand the idea of reading/watching it. I have become a late bloomer myself for a few things.
Though I tried reading Harry Potter... that was certainly not one of those things for me. But TV shows are more often what I pick up late, as I'm very weird in what I like to read (and freely admit that me not liking Harry Potter is more my unique tastes rather than it not being any good. I'm an odd one who likes books more people would deem to be horrible or strange).
I did this at one point... I've gotten now to where I check out the back of the book or something to see if it's likely to interest me, rather than listening to other people at all. I'll happily take book recommendations from friends, but the final decision is always made by me looking at the blurb when I get to the library.
The only problem with that is that the blurbs are often written by marketing people who may have no true idea of what the book is REALLY about. Many blurbs are written specifically to get your interest, but may bear little relation to the real plot or real storyline. I find friends' recommendations are the best way to find stuff you might like, particularly if you tell them other things you've enjoyed.
That is exactly why I find them more useful; my friends all have their own images of me in their heads, and they base their recommendations on that image. The marketers have no idea; they write the backs to appeal to the target audience. Skim for keywords, and you find out which target audience it's for. I know what I like, and I can figure out which of those target audiences happens to include me, even when I'm not officially a part of that group. :)
Oh, I didn't start reading without the backstory. :) It was actually issue 200 (or 201 -- whichever one was the first of "Guys"), and that one was just so informal and fun that I wondered what I had been missing. So I went back to issue one by starting with the first phonebook, and realized this was a work of a lot more scope and depth than what I'd seen in issue #200. I picked up all the other trades as well until I was all caught up.
(I almost quit reading when I got to the anti-women rants in "Reads", and Dave really went off the deep end towards the end of the series, but as far as I'm concerned the first two-thirds of the series is generally some of the best comic book work ever created).
Oh yeah, I was just thinking, the change between #200 and #1 must have seemed quite a leap :)
I like the middle third of Cerebus. It's too big and complicated for me to think about in its entirety, and really I think my life is too short and already full of enough unpleasant things that I don't need to go seeking them out :) But my husband is working on a book about Cerebus and dealing pretty well with all the complicated and fraught stuff. so I do appreciate it is a good and useful topic for debate and critical thought. It's just one that I'm more or less happy to leave to other people (though I do love Church and State through to Jaka's Story and Melmoth).
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cheers,
Phil
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Though I tried reading Harry Potter... that was certainly not one of those things for me. But TV shows are more often what I pick up late, as I'm very weird in what I like to read (and freely admit that me not liking Harry Potter is more my unique tastes rather than it not being any good. I'm an odd one who likes books more people would deem to be horrible or strange).
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cheers,
Phil
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But that's just me. :)
cheers,
Phil
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(I almost quit reading when I got to the anti-women rants in "Reads", and Dave really went off the deep end towards the end of the series, but as far as I'm concerned the first two-thirds of the series is generally some of the best comic book work ever created).
cheers,
Phil
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I like the middle third of Cerebus. It's too big and complicated for me to think about in its entirety, and really I think my life is too short and already full of enough unpleasant things that I don't need to go seeking them out :) But my husband is working on a book about Cerebus and dealing pretty well with all the complicated and fraught stuff. so I do appreciate it is a good and useful topic for debate and critical thought. It's just one that I'm more or less happy to leave to other people (though I do love Church and State through to Jaka's Story and Melmoth).
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cheers,
Phil
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Hey, thanks for dropping by.
cheers,
Phil
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