Do you like body horror? Stories about the human organism being changed and twisted and mutated into bizarre, terrifying new forms? Stuff like the Prototype games, or John Carpenter’s The Thing? If you do, me too. That’s why Parasyte by Hitoshi Iwaaki is one of my favourite manga I’ve discovered lately.

What I’m particularly enjoying with Parasyte is the way the story makes you look at our world from the creatures’ point of view: Shin, the series’ central character, doesn’t so much fight for humanity as fight to keep his own.

As only the very best monster stories can, Parasyte makes you think about what it is to be human. If a bit of gore is a problem for you, your loss. For anyone else in search of something fast and fresh to feed on, I suggest you let Parasyte infest you today.

Sam

The most likely answer I can think of to this question, sadly, is that Mr Vaizey has been promised something nice for himself in the way of perks or promotion later as long as he keeps his mouth shut now. Which, if this is true, will make him the person current and future generations will know as the man who sold out British libraries and killed Britain’s free reading culture.

Prove us wrong, Mr. Vaizey. Please.

I mentioned briefly in my previous post that I (along with the Improper Books team) will be attending the Bristol Comic Expo next weekend. Please come and say HELLOOO if you’re going too!

This here is Jenny by the way. I know how much you guys love oogley boogley creatures of all kinds so I thought you should be the first to see! This is one of a few different postcards we’ll have at the table in Bristol, they all feature characters from our upcoming books.

Anyhoo, got to dash. More monsters soon! I’ll leave you with some early designs I did for Jenny a loooong time ago

You probably don’t know that I’m part of a small publishing collective called Improper Books. We make comics, books and apps, all of which have a touch of the fairy tale, the Gothic or the macabre about them, and today we launched our official website! Huzzah! You can check it out at www.improperbooks.com where you will find info about everyone in our little imprint family, current projects and upcoming events.

I think you will really like it.

Also, keep an eye on my blog where I will be putting up monster-related bits and bobs in the 2 week run up to Bristol Comic expo.

Hope everyone’s having a fab week (and if not, just be thankful you’re not trapped in a dark, damp, dripping, stinky cave like some people!)

Bye!

There’s a really simple, satisfying structure to this book that revolves around killing people. You find out pretty early on how many people are going to be killed by one of the characters (an assassin) so for the rest of the book you’re comfortable among the chaos, the pizazz, the shocks and revelations.

It’s a very clever way of constructing a plot, but the book is full of all kinds of lovely touches that will make any thriller fan grin. I love those satisfying moments that make me feel like a story is oozing joy from the pages, through my fingers, into my belly. Nice work, Joe Schreiber.

I suppose I should tell you a bit about the plot. There’s a crazy European Chick. Some people die. It’s delightful. I won’t tell you any more than that because I hate it when reviews give away any plot details of a thriller. The writer has worked very hard to give you the tingle of excitement that you get when you don’t know what’s going to happen next and you just have to find out. I’m the last person in the world who’d want to ruin that.

There’s a bit of blurb on the back of the book that in my opinion gives away too much, so don’t read that either. Just read the book. It also says on the back of the book that if you like ‘Kill Bill’ and ‘Kick Ass’ you’ll enjoy ‘Au Revoir, Crazy European Chick’. That might be true, but it’s a lame comparison. This book is far more interesting. If you really want a movie comparison, it’s a lot (a LOT) like ‘Collateral’, the Tom Cruise/assassin thriller.

As a writer of assassin thrillers myself, I welcome another angle on the genre. This one’s a gem. It’s loads of fun, genuinely exciting and funny. I think there’s already a lot of hype around this one, but for once the book deserves it. The shame is that the hype (so far) seems to ignore the depth of the book. It’s not just a book of blood, action, chase blah-blah-blah. It’s much better than that. A proper good read.

“You only get viruses if you click on links you don’t know, stupid,” Nahim hissed. “But you’ve given me an idea …”  When Nahim sends a virus to Polly and Amina, he has no idea that all three of them will be dragged inside the Internet.

How will they get home?  How will they fight the virus?  Who can help them?  If only Nahim’s ICT class partner Max was good with computers …

Would you like to win a signed copy of Virus?  Of course you would!  All you have to do is comment in the thread below telling me which website you’d like to be trapped inside, and why.  I’ll choose a winner at random on 13th May!

So, what are you waiting for?  Get commenting…

Sign in park says Don’t Hurt Trees…

…and this spectacularly violent cartoon says Please Offer Your Seat To The Elderly and Those Less Able To Stand Than Yourself -

- or you might just wind up Very, Very Sorry.

Thanks to my brother Jack for sending me the link to that last one.

Sam

I did this last night in front of the TV. It hasn’t turned out the way I wanted it to but it looks a little better this morning. I like the idea of doing a crew of knarled Pirate Trees but I seem to have got bogged down with the beard. It went down hill from there. I’ll have another go soon…