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Lackadaisy by Tracy J. Butler

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


I've been hearing about this webtoon for years so when I stumbled upon it in printed form I went for it. It's prohibition era St Louis MO reimagined if everyone were anthropomorphic cats and the art is lush and gorgeous. Also Butler has put in so much historical research and it shows. There's nothing worse to me when reading a historical story when the research is obviously lacking.

More over Butler also manages to capture the feel of the time period. Rocky is the main point of view character but oddly also the one we know little about. He plays violin in the band that provides the information for Mitzi May who owns the titular speakeasy (and she has lost her husband recently, maybe at her own hands the rumors say, and is barely keeping the speakeasy afloat). However, Rocky wants to be more to Mitzy and it opens with him trying to get more bootleg liquor for her, running afoul of another group of bootleggers.

This back and forth of revenge over this happening carries the plot to the end of this volume. We also learn a couple things. Rocky is obviously well educated at one point (given the things he says as he babbles and boy does he babble) and he is bat crap crazy. I don't know how or why he got into the rumrunning business and I also do not know how everyone doesn't slap this boy every day.

He also drags his young cousin Calvin 'Freckle' along for the first round of revenge. Freckle had wanted to go to the police academy but something went wrong. No one knows (yet) why and after a few hours with Rocky that's probably never going to happen.

Into this mix is Mitzi and the young flapper, Ivy Pepper (who takes a shine to Freckle) and Viktor her mechanic/bartender (who obviously used to do much rougher enforcer work for her husband) and the man Mitzi hopes will save the speakeasy, Wick, a wealthy man who brings with him his equally influential and wealthy buddies. There is also the other rumrunners slash pig farmers (useful for disappearing bodies) and some mobsters who occasionally use those services, the Savoys and Mordecai, an enforcer.

Needless to say everything goes down at the speakeasy at the wrong time. There is guns and violence and the story was a lot of fun. Also included in this volume are some of the one-off side story strips and a lot of early sketches. It's worth picking this one up. Can't wait to read on.



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Victoria's Electric Coffin 01 by Ikuno Tajima

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


This is a riff on Mary Shelley's Frankenstein of course. For me it was a solid 3.5 but I rounded down mostly due to the age of Victoria Frankenstein set against the alt history of Victorian era New York. Women had so little agency and she's barely a teenager with all this power. On one hand it's cool to see that, on the other it's hard to swallow.

David Douglas is a young boy in the NYC slums who gets sent to death row on trumped up charges and after he's put to death Victoria brings him back as Eins. Now, he bears much more resemblance to the book's monster than the movies as he's sentient and now relatively loyal to Victoria who has given him a 'second chance' at life (even if he basically has to be plugged in at night). She wants him to do good in this world but most don't want to see that happen, especially the police who still see him as David the killer.

Victoria has competition in the whole bringing the dead to life arena. That includes another ridiculously young prodigy.

The art is nice, the story isn't bad. I do hope that soonish we'll have them look into the murder that David was supposed to have committed. I am going to read on for now



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Because I Could Not Stop for Death by Amanda Flower

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


I tend to have a love-hate relationship with historical mysteries that use real people as the amateur sleuth. I keep reading book one but never move on. This is one I could see reading the next one and I think that might be down to the fact that while, yes, Emily Dickinson is the sleuth, she's not actually the point of view character. This is first person pov from her new maid, Willa.

Soon after Willa has come to work as a maid for the Dickinson's (in the last months of Emily's father's last days in congress) her brother, Henry is found dead in the stable where he worked. It's ruled an accident and Henry was blamed for burning the horse which incited it to trample him but Willa knows her problematic brother was kind to animals. To her surprise Emily wants to help her prove it was murder.

The story is split between Amherst and Washington D.C. Emily doesn't quite feel fully fleshed out (Willa does though) but that could be because I know so very little of her personal life. There are strong connections here to the pre Civil War thoughts on slavery and abolitionists and the Underground Railroad and slave takers (and judging by some reviews, the need to have more education on this rather than less is definitely in order).

While I did figure out the motive for Henry's death, there were surprises in this and I did enjoy it enough to want to see more. I thought it was a solid historical mystery centered on real world grim history.



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Four Faces of the Moon by Amanda Strong

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


I rounded this one up thanks to the afterword and timeline at the end and also some of my disappointment with this was explained by the author's bio. They're a stop-motion artist and it showed. I have been repulsed by those kind of characters since childhood, probably traumatized by the Thunderbirds as a kid in the 70s. I can barely stand Rudolph. So the art in this was a fail across the board for me and that's why I went for the fourth star. It's my deal not the artist's.

The other mildly disappointing thing to me is the history is something I have heard so many times (however freaking sad that is) but I remind myself that this is probably aimed at those younger than me and haven't spent decades studying Indigenous history, heartbreaking as it is and so that's another reason to four star this.

We're hearing the author's family history which mirrors so many other Indigenous stories. From the more benign trading alliance beginnings to the full on genocidal colonization and war to the outright slaughter of bison down to just a handful left in North America as another way of destroying the Indigenous people.

For me I wish Strong would have focused less on her grandfathers many times removed and more on her grandmother who managed to survive and reject both the Indian schools and the Catholic Church, both of which did so much harm to the Indigenous people. To me her grandmother is the most interesting character and the one who is in the spotlight the least.

The afterward does a light dive into the history which I thought would be nice for someone who doesn't know it well.



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Murder at the Majestic Hotel by Clara McKenna

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


The odd thing here is I read book 2 and now book 4 (it was in a box of books I won) without seeing 1 or 3 and since 4 entirely spoils 3, probably won't be reading it. That said, this is Stella and Lyndy's honeymoon in York and I'm glad of it because I want to go to York for the same reasons as Stella (the history!!)

However, when they get there a chocolatier has bribed his way into their honeymoon suite only to die of carbon monoxide poisoning. Naturally Stella can't let this mystery just slid past her because what if that had been meant for her and Lyndy? Also the man's nephew is attached to the young woman Lyndy's cousin is sweet on.

And then when it might be tied into anti-Royalist terrorism, and Stella newly part of the aristocracy, the whole thing hits too close to home.

I thought it was an interesting story and a well laid mystery. I loved seeing some bits of York (not nearly enough but eh it's not a travelogue) . I'm still not a giant fan of Lyndy but I do like Stella a lot. I should go look for book #5.



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Wild Girls: How the Outdoors Shaped the Women Who Challenged a Nation by Tiya Miles

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


I won this short history book via Goodreads giveaway which did not influence my review. I very much enjoyed this intersectional look at the way natural settings aid and alter these women's life. Oddly enough I knew more going into this about Harriet Tubman and Zitkala-Ša than I did Louise May Alcott (who arguably three of the best known women in this treatise). Harriet's story was up first and probably the most thoroughly explored. I confess I never thought much about Tubman and nature, though I knew more about her adult days than her growing up so I found that very interesting.

As for Alcott, other than what she wrote, I knew next to nothing and I suppose I only knew about Zitkala-Ša because when I was a doctor at Pine Ridge reservation I tried to absorb as much as I could find on Lakota history and culture. That said, there was a lot to learn and I enjoyed Miles's take on their histories.

She also goes on a lot of side journeys, visiting other women as she spins the main female focus of that chapter's story. These never feel extraneous or distracting. While the main focus is on nature and its influence on these women's lives, Miles does explore other things including racism which is naturally part and parcel of Harriet Tubman's life and also of very many others, including the girls at the Indian schools, which were often places of nightmares. I really enjoyed the chapter on the girls basketball team.

If you have an interest in nature and women's history, you'll enjoy this book.



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Act Like a Lady, Think Like a Lord by Celeste Connally

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC of this. It's a 3.5 read for me as from the mid point on I knew exactly where it was going (I read a ton of mysteries and this is not my first one with this plot) That said, I very much enjoyed Lady Petra, her lady-maid Annie, her cousin/friend Caroline and Duncan.

Lady Petra, like many historical mystery heroines, is a straight up feminist (almost a little too modernly so though I appreciate she is not homophobic which matters in this story). Again like many historical mystery heroines she is motherless and her father has indulged her including letting her ride his horses wearing her brother's pants instead of side saddle.

The mystery part takes a while to get going but I definitely predicted it. Petra's friend Gwen died two weeks ago but no one knew this. Feeling hurt and hounded at her father's home in the country by her mother's brother, a total misogynist, Petra attends the Dutchess's ball in London even though she knows she'll run into her former childhood friend, Duncan, the illegitimate child of a lord and grandson to the duke and dutchess whom she fought with three years ago after the death of her betrothed. (and a lot of this is info dumped in chapter one more than I would have expected).

Naturally he's going to be the love interest (though it was done with a too-light of hand imo) and at the ball Petra has to deal with no end of misogyny from both men and women because she declared she would never marry after the loss of her lover. Enter Doctor Drysdale and all too real ease at which troublesome women could be committed to asylums in the 1800s.

We're about half way in before there is a murder related to her friend Gwen's death and Petra with Duncan's help (such as she allows it as she blows hot and cold with him) starts to investigate it because she feels responsible for the murdered servant.

About the only thing I predicted that didn't happen (which I'm glad of) was I expected her underhanded woman hating uncle was going to bump off dad to get control of her and her money because he (like so many of the Ton) believed women shouldn't be allowed to inherit.

Even though it went as expected I still very much enjoyed the characters and hope to see more of them.



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The Night Witches by Garth Ennis

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


I am a fan of Ennis's work and while I think this was meant earnestly it missed the mark in some key ways. And to get it out of the way, this is from the time period in WWII where the Soviets and the Nazis were in conflict so yes there is tons of violence and rape (though I would argue that one added not much to this)

Our main point of view characters is Anna Kharkova, one of the female pilots who were known as the Night Witches because they would strike at the Germans in the middle in the night in substandard planes (basically this was a desperation move, not that the Soviets were ahead of their time for women's rights). The first 'book' is every other chapter her and that of a German soldier which I think was there to underline how nasty the Nazis were including being forced to (or wanting to) gang rape any female prisoners and this guy didn't want to. Honestly we didn't need his point of view. It ends with the first book and I don't think we needed on page rape scenes to hit it home Nazis were bad (then again watching the revisionist history going on right now....)

Anna is a tough character. She is determined and after a life changing event with her and another of her pilot friends, she becomes hardened and down right unlikable but I didn't mind that so much because it made sense with her level of PTSD

What bothered me most was there was no need to extend this beyond the war or at least as far as this went, which was far into the 50s and beyond as even the Soviets were hiding away what these women had done, not letting their names make into the history books. It seemed like an excuse to disenfranchise Anna more.

The other thing I didn't like much was the constant need to pair her up with some higher ranking male as a lover. It's weird. I am all for sex positive females but I think it's the way it's done that is the problem for me. In this is seemed more like whelp we need naked women in this somehow...

I appreciate someone trying to work to bring this time period into focus as these women have long been denied their rightful place in history. This sort of does it okay. The art, however, is phenomenal.




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Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI by David Grann

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


I wanted to rate this higher because it is obvious just how much research was done for this. However, Grann also felt the need to jam every detail into this (plus a few no one could know in an effort to make it more novel-like I'd guess, like how someone's paunch moved, or eyes glinted etc). I get it. He wanted us to really know all the players in this story. On the other hand, it slowed everything down (Like having to wade through Agent White's entire life story).

Long story short, this is an interesting topic one you rarely hear about. The Osage tribe was one of the wealthiest groups of people full stop in the 1920s because they had a savvy lawyer who kept their mineral rights when the US government was stripping them of the land that had been their ancestral homes and otherwise treating them like sub-human garbage (like all the other Indigenous groups). So when oil was struck in what looked like the junk land the Osage were the ones reaping the benefits, not the Whites. It upset the White populace in the area so much that the Osage were rich (and in fact employing White servants) that a subsection of them devised various ways to fix that situation.

One was horrifically legal. I wasn't kidding about the sub-human comment. The US Government had ruled that the Native Americans were too child-like and dumb to manage money so every Osage owning oil rights had to have a White man in charge of his money so naturally many never gave the Osage any money, regulated everything down to what they could buy to eat with that money and mostly just outrightly stole it. And still that was not enough. A few had decided to straight up kill the Osage to inherit the headrights to the oil and/or get the life insurance on them.

This follows Mollie Burkhardt and her family especially her sister Anne and her husband Ernest and his uncle William Hale, the benefactor of the local Natives and a law unto himself as far as the town was concerned. The Osage were dying of poison, being shot and even having their homes blown up. Hale started an investigation but only he seemed to be immune to the violence as investigators and people trying to legislate to help the Osage ended up brutally dead.

Eventually the newly formed FBI steps in and Hoover sends in Agent White who is an outsider to the town which is a good thing given the sheer amount of collusion and corruption.

There are plenty of twists and turns but it seriously could have benefitted from trimming it down. What I did love and maybe it's because it falls more to the side of history book vs true crime that it doesn't follow the true crime format of having the pictures just randomly jammed in the center of the book. They are dispersed throughout and that is wonderful. Also just how many pictures exist of these people in 1920 speaks to how rich they were. My family was immigrating here at that time and maybe one or two pictures exist because they were so expensive. There is a crap ton of pics.

I liked it but yeah, really could have stood to loose all the overwhelming piddly details.



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Maus I: A Survivor's Tale: My Father Bleeds History by Art Spiegelman

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


I have put this off for so long because there is only so much heart break I can take but now I'm furious. The flimsiest of reasons to ban this book (as if it hides their anti-semitism) had me seeking after it (probably from every library I can to make a point). The story is every bit as hard as you might expect it to be, being a story of the Jews in Nazi-era Poland.

Vladek Spielgeman is the survivor from Auschwitz who is relating the story to his son, Art, who is a graphic novelist/illustrator. It is a moving, tragic story within a story, first the historical backdrop of late 30-early 40s Poland but also the story of father and son and how they don't always, or at all, get along. Understandably Vladek is not an easy man to get along with, his trauma showing in hundreds of small ways.

The story (using mice for the Jews and cats for the Nazis and pigs for the christian Polish folk) starts when Vladek is young, building himself a future and even frankly discussing the two women he was with, one of whom he married and later became Art's mother. It's a story of their extended family and of Richlieu, Art's brother and parents' first child. We bear witness to the slow decline in how the Jews were treated, how and why more alarms weren't sounded and how hard it is to flee these troubled times. By the time things were visibly so awful it was too late.

Not only did Vladek, Anja (his wife) and the rest of the family face persecution, there is the breaking of the family as first the elderly were targeted, then the sick and so on. You feel the fear of parents trying to send away their children hopefully to safety. The various city-interment camps that came before Auschwitz, the hiding, the starvation, the wondering who could you trust.

Each chapter is framed with Vladek and Art frictioning along now that Vladek is an old sick man. There are deep scars on both men. The art still manages to be heart rending even if these art anthropomorphized mice.

This volume ends with Vladek and Anja being separated (as all men and women were) when a betrayal sends them to Auschwitz.

This book should not be banned anywhere. Is it hard and ugly? Of course it is. History IS. We can't keep pretending things didn't happen as they did. We can't learn from history if we hide it. Nothing is hidden in this and the vulnerability of Vladek and Art both are the heart of this story.



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