Numbers 8 & 9- Phantom Road & The Beauty

 

Another new series (to me at least) from Jeff Lemire.  This time he has Gabriel Walta on the rather distinctive artwork.

Dom is a trucker, just going about his usual business when he accidentally picks up a hitch-hiker and a strange cargo.  It appears to be  a rock but when he and his new passenger touch it, they're somehow joined psychically to it and moved onto the Phantom Road of the title- an in-between space inhabited by monsters.  their only way back to normality is to deliver the cargo.

This is a fun mash-up of some fairly common tropes.  It feels a lot more original and new than it actually is due to Lemire's script with it's twists and rather surreal turns.

The supporting characters in the real world are just as compelling, and with their own links to the road. |

I've already bought and read volume 2- but I'm playing catch up. these were a cheat read over a week ago. And a very good cheat read it is too,

Highly recommended, as is anything by Jeff Lemire.

 

My next cheat read was this little beauty. This features one of the best high concepts I've seen in any fiction recently.

What if Beauty was an STD.  No matter what you look like, your perfect figure, and tightened youthful skin could be yours after one sexual encounter?

Who could resist?

That's the basis for this story. Unfortunately, the long term effects for the disease have started to make themselves known with some very public and very dramatic deaths.

A pair of police officers detectives Vaughn and Foster are drawn into the conspiracy surrounding the disease as they investigate the first spate of deaths. They soon find themselves facing corrupt politicians to the top levels of society, and trying to escape a terrifying bounty hunter.

Jeremy Haun and Jason Hurley's script is perfectly complemented by Haun's artwork John Raugh's vivid colours.

This is a one shot novel as far as I can tell.  It certainly reached an effective conclusion, but I know |I would be intrigued to know what happened next. 

This is a great mash up of conspiracy theory, cop work and full blown horror with a brilliant concept underpinning it all.  Well worth a few quid of anyone's hard earned cash.

It's fairly explicit with some full nudity and some graphic violence so this definitely isn't one for the kids.  As far as I can tell this is