Summer isn’t quite here, but it’s been hot and a chunk of North America is already on fire, so I thought I’d go straight ahead with my Summer Fun Time Reading recommendations. There’s Gilded Age tomfoolery, science fiction, horror, mysterious figures with antlers, UFOs, ghosts, cats with skulls on their backs, gangsters, monsters, regular joes, several crimes and a heartwarming love of comics! And if that’s not enough, I include a couple of viewing suggestions.

So don your wildest patterned caftan or madras shirt and shorts, open up your patio umbrella, take a sip from your Arnold Palmer, and let’s get reading! 

Bone Sharps, Cowboys, and Thunder Lizards: A Tale of Edward Drinker Cope, Othniel Charles Marsh and the Gilded Age of Paleontology. (G.T. Labs, 2005) Jim Ottaviani, writing; Big Time Attic (Zander Cannon, Kevin Cannon and Shad Petosky), art.

Maybe you like to read history in the summer. A lot of people do. But maybe you like to read some crazy history. Well, I have got something for you: Bone Sharps, Cowboys and Thunder Lizards. It tells the story of two rival paleontologists fascinated by “dinosauria” in late 19th Century America–with cameos by historical figures like Wild Bill Cody, Red Cloud, and P. T. Barnum himself. It tells the story of the Gilded Age of Paleontology–with pictures, which is always cool. And Bone Sharps has a nice balance of dramatization and historical research. There’s even an appendix in the back to help keep the colorful characters and their stories honest–well, as honest as these men could be. 

I Hate This Place, Vol. 1.  (Image, 2022)  Kyle Starks, writing; Artyom Topilin, art; Lee Loughridge, colorist; Pat Brousseau, letterer. 

I Hate It Here is one of my new favorite comics. I like stories about monsters. And stories about UFOs. Spooky stories about ghosts. And stories about heists that fall apart. I like mysterious figures with antlers in the woods.  I also like stories about Lesbians that aren’t only about their relationships. There’s also a good chance that I’d like those orange Hostess cupcakes featured in I Hate This Place, but I haven’t tried them yet. If you like all these things, too, there is a good chance that you’ll enjoy I Hate This Place. In I Hate This Place, married couple Gabby and Trudy move to a cattle ranch Gabby inherited from her late aunt. But all those things I mentioned above? The ghosts, monsters, UFOs, heists, and Antler Man? They’re all happening at the ranch and all at the same time. Now Gabby and Trudy need to figure out what’s going on at the ranch and how to get out alive. You’d think that all those disparate elements wouldn’t work well together, but Starks, Topilin, Loughridge and Brousseau make them work so well.

Junji Ito’s Cat Diary: Yon and Mu (Kodansha, 2020) Junji Ito, writing and art. 

It took me a while to read Junji Ito’s Cat Diary. Junji Ito’s work (rightfully) creeps me out. I would look at at the cover in the comic book store and turn away. The tension between the real life cat stories and the nervous, creepy Junji Ito eyes and teeth was too disturbing for me. But I finally did take the book out of the library. I brought home the collector’s edition with the glow-in-the-dark cover, which I definitely recommend. The glow-in-the-dark art is quality and its glow is fearsome. Ito’s stories about becoming a cat person are entertaining and he uses his talent for disturbing horror to illustrate his own imagination overtaking him, particularly with his cat Yon. And he uses that same skill to depict his transformation from someone indifferent to cats into a cat person who wants all the cat attention and love.

My Home Hero, Vol 1. (Kodanshi, 2023)  Naoki Yamakawa, writing; Masashi Asaki, art.

My Home Hero is an excellent option for a summer crime read. It’s also an excellent option if you are say, suffering isekai fatigue,* and looking for something a little different. For my part, I started reading it when I saw it recommended by comics critic Deb Aoki. My Home Hero is a crime thriller set in contemporary Japan. There is no magic. There are yakuza. Tetsuo Tosu is a manager at a toy company and an amateur mystery novelist. He and his wife Kasen have a daughter Reika who has moved out. One day at lunch with Reika, Tosu sees signs that her new boyfriend Nobuto is abusing her. After overhearing Nobuto bragging about his plans for Reika, Tosu kills Nobuto. This is just the start of the trouble for Tosu and Kasen as they try to protect Reika, keep Tosu’s crime hidden, and get out alive while they are implicated ever more deeply in the yakuza’s world. There are a lot of twists, turns, close calls, and cunning tricks. I especially appreciate how Kasen holds her own. Some people have compared the manga to Breaking Bad, and yes, Tosu is apparently a regular guy who commits acts he could not have imagined before. But it feels a little more like Gillian Flynn to me–possibly even Patricia Highsmith, though Tosu is no Ripley. My Home Hero is also available as an anime series streaming on Crunchyroll.

Public Domain, Vol 1. (Image, 2023) Chip Zdarsky, writing and art.

Public Domain is a interesting comic for Chip Zdarsky to be making. He’s written Howard the Duck, Spider-Man, Daredevil and Batman. And Public Domain feels very pointedly about not just comics and comics history, but about Marvel, Marvel Studios and Disney. It is interesting that he writes a comic about the ways that comics creators are screwed by the large companies that own the rights to their work. But then Zdarsky is nothing if not a sassy comics creator. In Public Domain, Syd Dallas, the co-creator of popular superhero the Domain, prepares to go to the premiere of the latest Domain film. It’s the biggest movie on the planet. Meanwhile, his adult sons, Miles and Dave don’t want to go. But Miles’ editor at the National Globe assigns him to interview the star of the film. Syd seems just happy to see his creation on the big screen. But Miles and Dave have more complicated feelings about their dad, his creation, and how his work has been treated. When they finally come together, Syd learns that he might own the rights to his creation. Did I mention there are a lot of parallels with how comics writers and artists have been treated by large entertainment corporations that are profiting from their superheroes and using them to create a formula ensuring predictable future box office profits? What better time to read Public Domain than summer blockbuster season? 

I also  have some quick suggestions for summer time fun viewing–besides the My Home Hero anime. I recently watched an online documentary about a mod for the video game, Doom: YouTube streamer Power Pak’s MyHouse . Wad: Inside Doom’s Most Terrifying Mod (2023). Even if you don’t like Doom, I recommend it. The video rides the line between documentary and horror, what is real and what is art. It’s a documentary about something real and somehow that makes it a more strangely disorienting watch. Inside Doom’s Most Terrifying Mod captures the vertiginous feeling that so much found footage horror strives for, but struggles to achieve. After all, the answer to the question of whether something is real or not defaults to “not” in fictional found footage. With Inside Doom’s Most Terrifying Mod, the game is real. The documents presented exist. You can take the book Power Pak discusses out of the library. But it’s hard to say how much of the story presented is real and how much is art. The mod Power Pak is sharing his experience with feels like outsider art, but how consciously created was it? And because it is following the story, because it’s a documentary, it takes an unexpected turn at the end. The unease and disorientation dissipates and the story becomes sweet, even heartwarming.

My other recommendation is also a documentary, but it is explicitly about horror and horror history rather than horror-tinged. Lately, I’ve been watching Queer For Fear (2023) with the Gutter’s own Alex MacFadyen. It covers both Queer writers and filmmakers and queerness in English-language horror movies and stories. We’re only a couple episodes in, but so far it’s thought-provoking and I’ve learned some new things, including the word, “tousy-mousy.” Queer For Fear is thoughtful and presents a good variety of perspectives. The series starts with Mary Shelley and Bram Stoker and moves forward. Sure, most people who watched this watched around Halloween, but I’m watching it now, because there’s just something fun about horror in the summer.

*Look, I have enjoyed That Time I Got Reincarnated As A Slime (and the reverse isekai, Miss Kobayashi’s Dragon Maid) as much as anyone. But sometimes you want something that isn’t a normal person from our world who becomes a hero in another and there are a lot of gaming stats and leveling up involved.

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Carol Borden might get some of those orange cupcakes to take on a road trip this summer. But not to a haunted ranch.