Master Fear of Flying
Travel and Medical
App
Discover your flying fear type with our questionnaire at masterfearofflying.com The interactive...
The Greedy Cave
Games and Entertainment
App
In a land far, far away there once was a vast continent called Milton. It was a land where the power...
DBT Diary Card and Skills Coach
Health & Fitness and Medical
App
DBT Diary Card is the only DBT iPhone app designed and created by a licensed and DBT intensively...
Paint FX : Photo Effects Editor
Photo & Video and Entertainment
App
-- Apply filters, effects, colors, enhancements, adjustments or edit your photos any way, anywhere...
Think Ladder
Health & Fitness and Medical
App
Thinkladder is a Cognitive Behavioural Therapy and meditation hybrid app. The app allows users to...
Nike+ Run Club
Health & Fitness and Sports
App
Your Perfect Running Partner – Nike Run Club Nike Run Club gives you everything you need to run...
Speak Like a CEO (McGraw Hill)
Business and Education
App
Secrets for better communication in any business environment. This free sample contains the first...
Millionaire Singles Match, Elite Online Dating App
Social Networking and Lifestyle
App
MDate is the leading millionaire match online dating app which caters to the league, successful rich...
Shadow Fight Battle Warriors 2
Games and Entertainment
App
Shadow Fight Battle: Super Hero Warriors Legend - The popular VS fighting game on Apple Store. ...
Emma @ The Movies (1786 KP) rated Stumptown: The Case of the Girl Who Took Her Shampoo: Volume 1 in Books
May 21, 2020
I found the characters to be mostly non-descript both in the story and visually. On my first read-through I kept having to pop back a few pages and rereading when I lost track of who was who in a scene. It sadly didn't get much clearer on my second read-through.
Our main character is Dex Parios, a PI with a gambling problem. From the very beginning she isn't painted as a very likeable person, it's more than just some of the personality traits, she's been created as a gungho, mildly sex-driven, incompetent woman. At one point I put the book down because she was getting beaten up again with seemingly no real point. There's an almost leering quality to her (as well as other characters) in the illustrations and the inference from the text, as the only character that we really get to know this doesn't make compelling reading.
The storyline runs around the disappearance of a girl, her grandmother who runs the casino Dex is in debt to asks her to investigate and bring her back. That was perfectly introduced, though it took up a lot of pages, but other parts of the story don't click. As I said, I've read the book twice and still can't remember the reason for the second major part of the story... it feels very cloak and dagger which is perhaps why it wasn't very engaging.
Illustrations in comics/graphic novels are either hit or miss for me. The lettering here is pretty standard and managed to be clear and well laid out which was a great boost as sometimes it can get very chunky making it difficult to read. With the illustrations themselves you've got a nice colour palette that changes with the scenes and definitely helps move things along. Beyond that though I'm ultimately not a fan of the finished style, there's not enough differentiation between the characters and, as I mentioned above, it made for a difficult first read.
As an overall story there's something in it but it's a real challenge to like the characters, there wasn't anyone who I was looking forward to seeing again. Dex is given what feels like token bisexuality, it's not expressly pointed out but it's hinted at in a variety of ways. Her sexuality in general is quite heavy handed and I wouldn't be surprised if later down the line we find out she's slept with most of the recurring characters.
After I finished my first reading of Stumptown I messaged a friend... "It was bad and now I'm not sure I want to watch the series they made of it"... I pondered on that for a while because I was tired and maybe I was grumpy while reading it, the second reading came the next day, but even being more alert and less distracted by unfamiliar content I didn't get anything better out of this volume.
Originally posted on: https://emmaatthemovies.blogspot.com/2020/05/based-on-stumptown.html