#ComicsWednesday: The Tea Dragon Society by Katie O'Neill

Greta is a young girl learning the art of blacksmiths. She finds a wounded tea dragon on her way home one day and befriends its owner. Throughout the story, she learns more about tea dragons from Hesekial and Erik.

She becomes close to their ward, Minette, a girl with a mysterious past. The story deals with loss, disability, love, and kindness. The illustrations are gorgeous, with pastel colors and soft lines. This short graphic novel is perfect to read in one sitting.

With whimsical illustrations and a charming story, The Tea Dragon Society by Katie O'Neill is a great fall read. It gently explores themes of growing up, caring for others, and doing what you love. This graphic novel was originally published as a webcomic, which is free to read online, and it made the transition to print beautifully.

- Libby, Youth Services

Staff Review: The Road to Jonestown by Jeff Guinn

As the temperature drops, what better way to spend your leisure time than with a gripping true-crime story? The Road to Jonestown by Jeff Guinn is a true-crime story for those who need more than a sensationalized re-telling of the crime itself. The Jonestown massacre looms in our country’s collective consciousness as one of the great disasters of the 20th century. The horrendous nature of the event leads us to look at the characters involved with equal parts fascination and contempt. This book brings the reader into the environment in which the massacre's instigator, Jim Jones, grew up, the people around him who believed in him and his cause, and his rise to power and gradual corruption. Guinn, a former journalist, uses his investigative skills to tell this nuanced story with gripping prose.

In the first part of the book, there are surprisingly few red flags foretelling of looming disaster. Jones had a tendency toward unusual behavior, but didn’t appear to be a complete sociopath early on. We do see a child who takes an unusual interest in religion (neither of his parents were religious) and who has the desire and ability to control people. Jones discovers he has a talent for preaching and manipulating people and he creates congregations to effect social change. 

Peoples Temple, which Jones established in his twenties, had the positive mission of helping the disenfranchised. In the eyes of his wife, Marceline, who stayed by his side until the very end, Jones’s mission was akin to Christ’s and even though she didn’t approve of his means, she witnessed the positive change he was making in the world. In the first half of the book, the Peoples Temple appears to be a force for good. According to Guinn, the Temple played a large part in integrating blacks and whites in the Jim Crow Indianapolis of the 50s. They opened nursing homes and created social outreach programs to help troubled youth. As Jones brings in the disenfranchised by helping them, he gradually unveils his primary objective: the creation of a socialist utopia where everyone gives up their personal property and takes care of each other. It appears that Jones believed in his mission and that he was fighting for equality. He wanted everyone to live as he said God intended—to resist the material temptations of our capitalist society, which glorify the individual, and to take care of each other.

As the story goes on and gets darker, Guinn remains objective and never claims to know Jones’s intentions. Whether or not his heart was in the right place early on, it becomes difficult to believe Jones is fighting for a better world as his cruel and deceitful behavior starts to add up. Physical punishment and humiliation, sexually abusing members, keeping members’ income, selling and taking the property of members, stashing away his fortune in foreign accounts, indulging himself in comforts he denies other members, threatening blackmail for those who try to leave—these are just a few of the acts we find Jones guilty of. Guinn remains objective in his exposition so that the reader can almost understand why Jones's paranoia, grasp of reality, and ego get out of control. A large percentage of his members remain committed to his socialist utopia and want to be examples to the world. They demonstrate, well before the disaster, that they are willing to die for the cause. Their unwavering devotion, mixed with Jones's belief that he is destined to make history, create a toxic cocktail.

Jones started the Peoples Temple in Indianapolis, set up another location in San Francisco, and, spurred by his paranoia of nuclear war, ultimately set up a colony in Guyana. When the media finally caught on to Jim Jones’s misdeeds, he hid in the Guyana camp, Jonestown. The final harrowing chapters in Guyana where a senator and members of the media are murdered and nearly 1,000 people commit mass suicide (whether willingly or not) are equally heartbreaking and allegorical. The Road to Jonestown is a demonstrative story, not as much about fanaticism as about power. Guinn points out that Jones was a demagogue “who ultimately betrayed his followers whether he always intended to or not.” Guinn doesn’t glorify or sensationalize any of the dirty details; instead he treats Jones and the Temple members fairly, revealing Jones as a person gradually corrupted and divorced from reality. With Jones as their infallible leader, most members followed his alternate reality. Guinn handles all these themes and asks the big questions with an eye for the telling detail, bringing both the characters and their setting to life.

~Ben, Adult Services

#ComicsWednesday: "O Human Star" by Blue Delliquanti

Mystery, romance, interesting characters, and fun world-building details combine to make O Human Star by Blue Delliquanti one of my top 10 favorite ongoing series. The story is set in a near future where science and technology have advanced to make robots and artificial intelligence a part of everyday life. This is neither a grim dark dystopia nor a naive utopia; rather Delliquanti imagines something believably optimistic. Plus, it's just plain fun to see Minneapolis as the center of the cool robot future. How often do us Midwesterners get to be at the cutting edge?

The story starts when Alastair Sterling wakes up nearly twenty years after his last memory to learn that his work in robotics and artificial intelligence has served as the basis for the fantastically advanced robot future, thanks to the efforts of his former partner, Brendan. I don't want to spoil things too much here, but everything rapidly becomes more complicated and Delliquanti flips the perspective between the disorienting future and the dramas of the past. This story provides a great exploration of questions of identity and humanity, and it's no surprise that it made it onto NPR's list of 100 Favorite Comics and Graphic Novels.

Probably the best part of this series for those of us in the Dubuque area is that we'll have the chance to meet the creator when Blue Delliquanti is the Guest of Honor at Carnegie-Stout's Cabin Fever Mini Con on Saturday, January 27. This means that you have plenty of time to read both print volumes of O Human Star and check out the latest updates online.

~Sarah, Adult Services