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Bone #1-9
Bone: The Complete Edition
This is a previously-published edition of ISBN 9781888963144.
An American graphic novel first! The complete 1300 page epic from start to finish in one deluxe trade paperback.
Three modern cartoon cousins get lost in a pre-technological valley, spending a year there making new friends and out-running dangerous enemies. After being run out of Boneville, the three Bone cousins, Fone Bone, Phoney Bone and Smiley Bone are separated and lost in a vast uncharted desert. One by one they find their way into a deep forested valley filled with wonderful and terrifying creatures. It will be the longest -- but funniest -- year of their lives.
An American graphic novel first! The complete 1300 page epic from start to finish in one deluxe trade paperback.
Three modern cartoon cousins get lost in a pre-technological valley, spending a year there making new friends and out-running dangerous enemies. After being run out of Boneville, the three Bone cousins, Fone Bone, Phoney Bone and Smiley Bone are separated and lost in a vast uncharted desert. One by one they find their way into a deep forested valley filled with wonderful and terrifying creatures. It will be the longest -- but funniest -- year of their lives.
1332 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1991
About the author
Jeff Smith
588 books1,371 followersLibrarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name. See other authors with similar names.
Born and raised in the American mid-west, Jeff Smith learned about cartooning from comic strips, comic books, and watching animation on TV. In 1991, he launched a company called Cartoon Books to publish his comic book BONE, a comedy/adventure about three lost cousins from Boneville. Against all odds, the small company flourished, building a reputation for quality stories and artwork. Word of mouth, critical acclaim, and a string of major awards helped propel Cartoon Books and BONE to the forefront of the comic book industry.
In 1992, Jeff’s wife Vijaya Iyer joined the company as partner to handle publishing and distribution, licensing, and foreign language publications. In the Spring of 2005, Harry Potter’s U.S. publisher Scholastic Inc. entered the graphic novel market by launching a new imprint, Graphix with a full color version of BONE: Out from Boneville, bringing the underground comic to a new audience and a new generation.
In 2007, DC Comics released Smith’s first non-creator owned work, SHAZAM! Monster Society of Evil, a four-part mini-series recreating a classic serial from comic’s Golden Age. Between projects, Smith spends much of his time on the international guest circuit promoting comics and the art of graphic novels.
Born and raised in the American mid-west, Jeff Smith learned about cartooning from comic strips, comic books, and watching animation on TV. In 1991, he launched a company called Cartoon Books to publish his comic book BONE, a comedy/adventure about three lost cousins from Boneville. Against all odds, the small company flourished, building a reputation for quality stories and artwork. Word of mouth, critical acclaim, and a string of major awards helped propel Cartoon Books and BONE to the forefront of the comic book industry.
In 1992, Jeff’s wife Vijaya Iyer joined the company as partner to handle publishing and distribution, licensing, and foreign language publications. In the Spring of 2005, Harry Potter’s U.S. publisher Scholastic Inc. entered the graphic novel market by launching a new imprint, Graphix with a full color version of BONE: Out from Boneville, bringing the underground comic to a new audience and a new generation.
In 2007, DC Comics released Smith’s first non-creator owned work, SHAZAM! Monster Society of Evil, a four-part mini-series recreating a classic serial from comic’s Golden Age. Between projects, Smith spends much of his time on the international guest circuit promoting comics and the art of graphic novels.
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June 24, 2014(This review is from 2006.)
I haven’t done a review for a while, so I thought I’d do something a little bit different. A week or so back, a friend loaned me the complete BONE graphic novel.
This is one I’ve been wanting to read for a while. Not only have I done very little reading in the graphic novel genre, but I’ve heard a lot of very good things about this one. I remember a friend reading issues from the then-serialized comic back during my freshman year of college. It was something of an underground hit that went mainstream, and all of the issues—some ten years worth, or 1300 pages—were released in a single volume a couple of years back.
It’s a very interesting read. It’s something of a cross between an old Loony Tunes cartoon and a serious, epic fantasy novel. It’s about a group of three ‘Bones’ from ‘Boneville’ who get lost and end up in a kingdom far from home, then get caught up in an epic struggle between good and evil.
It owes a lot to The Lord of the Rings. However, much of the writing is excellent, and there’s some fairly decent original worldbuilding. This is fascinating for me, because these are things that I don’t immediately associate with comic books. I know that I’m not doing them justice—and I’m sure there are lots of very excellent ones out there. However, I was surprised to read one that felt so much like a traditional epic fantasy, all be it one with three cartoony characters mixed in with the rest of the medieval-style fantasy cast.
I felt that the story broke down a tad near the ending. There were a couple of points where the plotting seemed forced, and I have quibbles with the resolution of a few climaxes. However, I find I must give a great amount of credit to the author—an independent artist named Jeff Smith. He not only did this virtually on his own, but managed to release something serialized that he could never change, had to plot and pace over ten years time, and had to bring together into one massive story at the end.
The restraints of the medium considered, he did an excellent job. There’s a good mixture of humor, pacing, and action—even if the character arcs of most of the characters are a tad weak. All and all, I can see why this has been named as one of the top ten graphic novels of our time.
I haven’t done a review for a while, so I thought I’d do something a little bit different. A week or so back, a friend loaned me the complete BONE graphic novel.
This is one I’ve been wanting to read for a while. Not only have I done very little reading in the graphic novel genre, but I’ve heard a lot of very good things about this one. I remember a friend reading issues from the then-serialized comic back during my freshman year of college. It was something of an underground hit that went mainstream, and all of the issues—some ten years worth, or 1300 pages—were released in a single volume a couple of years back.
It’s a very interesting read. It’s something of a cross between an old Loony Tunes cartoon and a serious, epic fantasy novel. It’s about a group of three ‘Bones’ from ‘Boneville’ who get lost and end up in a kingdom far from home, then get caught up in an epic struggle between good and evil.
It owes a lot to The Lord of the Rings. However, much of the writing is excellent, and there’s some fairly decent original worldbuilding. This is fascinating for me, because these are things that I don’t immediately associate with comic books. I know that I’m not doing them justice—and I’m sure there are lots of very excellent ones out there. However, I was surprised to read one that felt so much like a traditional epic fantasy, all be it one with three cartoony characters mixed in with the rest of the medieval-style fantasy cast.
I felt that the story broke down a tad near the ending. There were a couple of points where the plotting seemed forced, and I have quibbles with the resolution of a few climaxes. However, I find I must give a great amount of credit to the author—an independent artist named Jeff Smith. He not only did this virtually on his own, but managed to release something serialized that he could never change, had to plot and pace over ten years time, and had to bring together into one massive story at the end.
The restraints of the medium considered, he did an excellent job. There’s a good mixture of humor, pacing, and action—even if the character arcs of most of the characters are a tad weak. All and all, I can see why this has been named as one of the top ten graphic novels of our time.
April 6, 2024
I finally got round to reading Bone, the much listed on must-read-graphic-novel series, a saga about three mouse who end up in a nearby, but previously unknown realm where they get caught up in an ongoing battle for control of the primary and fertile valley between people, monsters and dragons! I had to bear in mind that the popularity of this series was tied to its appropriateness and depth for an all-ages audience and that it was not written with adults in mind, and despite the basic 'fairy-tale-like' reality and simple but interesting plotting it is still overall a great piece of world building although I feel the same story could have been told in about 500 less pages! From me, a 7 out of 12, Three Stars overall.
2024 read
2024 read
November 2, 2018
After being run out of Boneville because of one of Phoney Bone's schemes, the Bone cousins wind up in a valley in the mountains. It's a case of out of the frying pan and into the fire when war erupts around the valley and the cousins and their new friends are caught in the middle...
Back in the 1990s, this book was the talk of the town but I was too cool for a comic book about cute characters. Now that I'm much older and also uncool, I decided to finally give it a shot.
The art shares some similarities with Calvin and Hobbes, probably due to the Walt Kelly influence on both. It also has a Disney feel. I likened it to the Black Cauldron while I was describing the series to my wife. Much love for the design of the Rat Creatures, BTW.
At first, I wasn't super impressed with the story. Yadda yadda quest, yadda yadda dark one vs. chose one, etc. However, I quickly got attached to the antics of the Bone cousins and loved Gran'ma Ben. Both of my grandmas were tough ladies so she quickly became my favorite character. Thorn was a strong character, not content to buy all the bullshit people were spewing in her direction after being lied to all of her life.
The story was epic in scope. The Barrelhaven, the valley, and reality itself were at stake before all was said and done. I think the mythology of the world did a lot to elevate it above a lot of epic fantasy. You know, plus the Bone cousins. Bone has pretty much everything you could want in a tale: humor, action, unrequited love, poignant moments. I really can't think of anything bad to say about it.
Bone deserves all the awards it has won over the years, an epic tale for all ages. Five out of five stars.
Back in the 1990s, this book was the talk of the town but I was too cool for a comic book about cute characters. Now that I'm much older and also uncool, I decided to finally give it a shot.
The art shares some similarities with Calvin and Hobbes, probably due to the Walt Kelly influence on both. It also has a Disney feel. I likened it to the Black Cauldron while I was describing the series to my wife. Much love for the design of the Rat Creatures, BTW.
At first, I wasn't super impressed with the story. Yadda yadda quest, yadda yadda dark one vs. chose one, etc. However, I quickly got attached to the antics of the Bone cousins and loved Gran'ma Ben. Both of my grandmas were tough ladies so she quickly became my favorite character. Thorn was a strong character, not content to buy all the bullshit people were spewing in her direction after being lied to all of her life.
The story was epic in scope. The Barrelhaven, the valley, and reality itself were at stake before all was said and done. I think the mythology of the world did a lot to elevate it above a lot of epic fantasy. You know, plus the Bone cousins. Bone has pretty much everything you could want in a tale: humor, action, unrequited love, poignant moments. I really can't think of anything bad to say about it.
Bone deserves all the awards it has won over the years, an epic tale for all ages. Five out of five stars.
July 7, 2015
Book #7 for Jugs & Capes!
read a cleaner version of this review on CCLaP!
pre-read: I ordered this online and it arrived today -- not in a padded envelope, as is customary, but in a big-ass box. I should have understood then, but not until I sliced the box open did I realize just how massive this thing is. Good grief! I read on the subway, for heaven's sake; I need my books to be portable! So obviously I took a steak knife and some old Vice magazine covers and DIY'd it into three somewhat more manageable volumes. I haven't had to do that since Infinite Jest!
***
post-read: Here is something that I have never thought about before: what is the onomatopoeic rendering of a sword pulled fast out of its...what is it, scabbard? Give up? It's SHING! I mean, of course it is, right? But who knew?
That was my first roundaboutly clever way of saying omg omg omg Jeff Smith is a fucking genius.
Here is my second, and it involves a visual aid: Just prior to the below panel, Bone has been told (by several people) that "winter comes on fast in these parts." Then what happens? This:
Yeah. Jeff Smith, man. Fucking genius.
Now I will talk about the book itself. As with a handful of amazing books I've read lately ( The Instructions , for one; also Raising Demons ), if you'd given me a plot synopsis before I'd started, I probably would not have been particularly inclined to pick this up. A trio of strange smooth androgynous bone creatures accidentally become part of an ancient war between the Dragons, the people of the Valley, and the God of the Locusts, and go on a quest to find the Crown of Horns, dodging Rat Creatures and Ghost Circles, aiding and abetted by by a sexy young farmhand and her ornery grandmother? Um, no thanks. I hate it when regular words get elevated via random capitalization.
But this, man, holy fuck. This is unquestionably and irrepressibly riveting, engaging, fascinating. There's an awesomely compelling plot, solid mythology and history, terrific characters, an amazingly vast scope, fantastic art, a pitch-perfect balance at all times between pathos / humor, action / explication, dialogue / art, cute animals / bloody swordfights... Man. Wow.
A couple other things. In college I took a course on Lord of the Rings, and one of the things we discussed was how the language of the trilogy subtly reinforces the path of the books from sort of light middle-grade fantasy in the beginning to a high-art, mature epic by the end. I would say a similar thing happens in Bone, where it starts out all kind of silly fun and games, but the book and the plot and the characters all elevate and expand as things proceed, opening and blooming into this vast, mature epic scope.
Also, not only does this book pass the Bechdel Test (with flying colors), it's basically all women. The hero is a woman. Her great teacher is a woman. [Small by cryptic spoiler:] Even the villain is a woman! In addition -- this I didn't come up with myself; thanks Jugs & Capes girls -- there is basically no romantic subplot. How often does that happen in fantasy? I'd say close to never. But here, our heroine Thorn is way too busy being brilliant and strong and savvy and kicking ass and saving the fucking world to bother with something so trivial as whom to kiss. Yeah!
Okay okay, enough. But jeesh, what a brilliant, spectacular book. Who cares that it's too big to carry anywhere? Who cares that it's written for kids? Who cares that it's epic fantasy? It's just fuckin' stunning.
read a cleaner version of this review on CCLaP!
pre-read: I ordered this online and it arrived today -- not in a padded envelope, as is customary, but in a big-ass box. I should have understood then, but not until I sliced the box open did I realize just how massive this thing is. Good grief! I read on the subway, for heaven's sake; I need my books to be portable! So obviously I took a steak knife and some old Vice magazine covers and DIY'd it into three somewhat more manageable volumes. I haven't had to do that since Infinite Jest!
***
post-read: Here is something that I have never thought about before: what is the onomatopoeic rendering of a sword pulled fast out of its...what is it, scabbard? Give up? It's SHING! I mean, of course it is, right? But who knew?
That was my first roundaboutly clever way of saying omg omg omg Jeff Smith is a fucking genius.
Here is my second, and it involves a visual aid: Just prior to the below panel, Bone has been told (by several people) that "winter comes on fast in these parts." Then what happens? This:
Yeah. Jeff Smith, man. Fucking genius.
Now I will talk about the book itself. As with a handful of amazing books I've read lately ( The Instructions , for one; also Raising Demons ), if you'd given me a plot synopsis before I'd started, I probably would not have been particularly inclined to pick this up. A trio of strange smooth androgynous bone creatures accidentally become part of an ancient war between the Dragons, the people of the Valley, and the God of the Locusts, and go on a quest to find the Crown of Horns, dodging Rat Creatures and Ghost Circles, aiding and abetted by by a sexy young farmhand and her ornery grandmother? Um, no thanks. I hate it when regular words get elevated via random capitalization.
But this, man, holy fuck. This is unquestionably and irrepressibly riveting, engaging, fascinating. There's an awesomely compelling plot, solid mythology and history, terrific characters, an amazingly vast scope, fantastic art, a pitch-perfect balance at all times between pathos / humor, action / explication, dialogue / art, cute animals / bloody swordfights... Man. Wow.
A couple other things. In college I took a course on Lord of the Rings, and one of the things we discussed was how the language of the trilogy subtly reinforces the path of the books from sort of light middle-grade fantasy in the beginning to a high-art, mature epic by the end. I would say a similar thing happens in Bone, where it starts out all kind of silly fun and games, but the book and the plot and the characters all elevate and expand as things proceed, opening and blooming into this vast, mature epic scope.
Also, not only does this book pass the Bechdel Test (with flying colors), it's basically all women. The hero is a woman. Her great teacher is a woman. [Small by cryptic spoiler:] Even the villain is a woman! In addition -- this I didn't come up with myself; thanks Jugs & Capes girls -- there is basically no romantic subplot. How often does that happen in fantasy? I'd say close to never. But here, our heroine Thorn is way too busy being brilliant and strong and savvy and kicking ass and saving the fucking world to bother with something so trivial as whom to kiss. Yeah!
Okay okay, enough. But jeesh, what a brilliant, spectacular book. Who cares that it's too big to carry anywhere? Who cares that it's written for kids? Who cares that it's epic fantasy? It's just fuckin' stunning.
February 3, 2018
It's funny how we change and yet, somehow, stay the same. I've read comics (or graphic novels) at three points in my life so far. In each of these points, it's been a slightly different style. When I was a preteen, my local store sold mainly DC and so I read those. But it was mainly non-mainstream - Rocket Raccoon and Atari Force. In high school, I got mainly into Marvel (long live the original New Warriors, Firestar, and Jean Grey) until the Marvel writing really, truly declined. Now, when I read comics I'm reading Veritgo (so back to DC) or independent graphic novels stuff like The Complete Maus. I picked this up because several reviewers raved about it.
It's a cartoon epic fairy tale. It is what Disney princesses should be. It's an instant classic. It's pure genius. It's laugh out loud funny.
I guess one of the reasons why I stopped reading Marvel comics was the secondary status of many of the female characters as well as the fact that whenever a female got too powerful, she had a "power" issue - something that Magneto, at time if ever, really had. And there is a trend in fantasy fiction, be it comic, book or movie, for the chosen one to be male. Or if the chosen is a girl, she's a baby (think Willow) Here the chosen one is a girl who matures over the length of the epic. Her name is Thorn, btw, and she isn't the only strong woman in the story.
The main focus of the story isn't entirely Thorn, but the Bone cousins - Phoney, Smiley, and, most importantly, Fone. These Bones have been run out of Boneville due to an unfortunate political campign, and eventually met up with Thorn and her grandma Ben, who races cows. What then follows is part Lord of the Rings, part comic book action, mostly epic fantasy with slapstick thrown in at the right moments. (I personally loved all the Moby Dick jokes myself.
The epic combines the best part of an epic fantasy story with the best part of a good comic book. It deals with family love, loyalty, romantic love, friendship, the pysche, and cats. As well as dragons and the nature of good and evil. It is the type of book that you would love to see on the big screen, but you now if they ever did, Hollywood would F**K it up.
While the book is mostly child friendly (there are scary scenes and violence as well as jokes about nudity), it is really adult in most of its references.
Aww, skip this review and just read it, okay?
August 10, 2021
Bone follows the three Bone cousins as they are kicked out of Boneville and quickly lost in a wasteland before discovering the valley where the rest of the story takes place. Smith lays some of the ground work for the epic story to follow but the first three volumes are heavily influenced by cartoon strips like Walt Kelly's Pogo and old Looney Tunes type cartoons. There is lots of slapstick and jokes. The last two-thirds shift towards epic fantasy adventure along the lines of The Hobbit.
I absolutely love Smith's simple art style for the Bones. It's very expressive while cartoony while the humans are drawn more realistically. I quite like the juxtaposition of these cartoons interacting with humans. I can't express how much I enjoy this comic. Smith just hits every note both in story and in art.
Bone was originally self-published from 1991-2004 (when I first read it). It was one of the first comics to put out trades of all the issues, keeping the entire story in print for those that came upon the story after its start. It was instrumental in changing the industry as you didn't have to search through back issue bins and pay exorbitant prices to complete the story. Then Jeff Smith changed the game again in the mid 2000's when he entered an agreement with Scholastic to republish the trades in color as Scholastic's first book in its new graphic novel imprint. The trades had sold thousands through comic book shops, but Scholastic's reach was in the millions now that you could find it in book stores and libraries.
This was my first time reading the colorized version of Bone. I've read through my black and white single issues a couple of times in the past. I always thought of the colorized version as the Ted Turner version of old movies, something that would look unnatural and forced. I was completely wrong. The colors are natural and subtle. You can't even tell they were originally black and white unless you put them side by side. The two versions are different experiences and I can't say one is better than the other. Over time, I suggest reading them both, because Bone is always worth a re-read.
I absolutely love Smith's simple art style for the Bones. It's very expressive while cartoony while the humans are drawn more realistically. I quite like the juxtaposition of these cartoons interacting with humans. I can't express how much I enjoy this comic. Smith just hits every note both in story and in art.
Bone was originally self-published from 1991-2004 (when I first read it). It was one of the first comics to put out trades of all the issues, keeping the entire story in print for those that came upon the story after its start. It was instrumental in changing the industry as you didn't have to search through back issue bins and pay exorbitant prices to complete the story. Then Jeff Smith changed the game again in the mid 2000's when he entered an agreement with Scholastic to republish the trades in color as Scholastic's first book in its new graphic novel imprint. The trades had sold thousands through comic book shops, but Scholastic's reach was in the millions now that you could find it in book stores and libraries.
This was my first time reading the colorized version of Bone. I've read through my black and white single issues a couple of times in the past. I always thought of the colorized version as the Ted Turner version of old movies, something that would look unnatural and forced. I was completely wrong. The colors are natural and subtle. You can't even tell they were originally black and white unless you put them side by side. The two versions are different experiences and I can't say one is better than the other. Over time, I suggest reading them both, because Bone is always worth a re-read.
March 25, 2018
I loved this comic book. The art style reminded me of Belgian comics of my childhood and the story... I must say should be worthy of Tolkien.
June 8, 2011
I thought, okay, weird little guys with big noses, lost in the woods, this is going to be goofy humor with throw-away gags. (And what ARE these guys, anyways? I never did figure that one out - there's a whole other story waiting to be told about that.)
And then, it turned into an epic! With kingdoms, royalty in exile, and battles, and life and death danger stuff! AWESOME!
I liked this better than the Lord of the Rings. Shhh. Don't tell the Tolkienites.
And then, it turned into an epic! With kingdoms, royalty in exile, and battles, and life and death danger stuff! AWESOME!
I liked this better than the Lord of the Rings. Shhh. Don't tell the Tolkienites.
March 26, 2013
[Bad morning.]
I wasn't sure I'd ever review Jeff Smith's Bone. After all, is there much that can be said that hasn't already been said? Bone's so long been part of the canon of comics literature (such as one exists) that reviewing it at this point is like reviewing Watchmen or The Dark Knight Returns or Maus. Or for the non-comics-literate, a bit like if someone penned a review today for Huckleberry Finn. I mean, what's the point, really?
Still, I tell myself, there are those who haven't read the book yet. There are those who have read comics for years who haven't read Bone and ought to be ashamed of themselves. These are aficionados of the medium who need to be cajoled into reading something that will make them better participants in the medium. And there are those still new to the medium who might not be familiar with the canon and might not be aware of Good Places To Start. This review is probably mostly for them. And for people who might google the question, What's the first graphic novel I should read? (You hear that Google?)
Additionally spurring my interest in reviewing the book, I have a daughter. She's three and likes me to read to her in the evenings. I had read her The Little Prince and Just So Stories when she was two, but I thought she might get a kick out of comics before bed. She had previously seen book one of Gene Yang's Avatar: The Promise, which she loved because she was already familiar with the show. A father can only read so many times about Sokka and Toph getting the oogly-booglies from watching Aang and Katara getting frisky before that father just snaps—so I needed something fresh. Something new. Something I could stand to read repetitiously. So I pulled down Bone. She was almost instantly excited. And after she became interested and comfortable with the characters, she was wholly invested. Now Smith's characters thoroughly infest her imaginative play. She insists that she is Bartleby and her one-year-old brother is Ted the bug. I have become Jackal Bone, some fell hybrid between Phoncible P. Bone and, well, your common jackal. Though sometimes I am Kingdok and sometimes I am Roque Ja and sometimes I'm the Big Red Dragon. In any case, she and other kids love this book and rereading it several times to her over the last months has given me new appreciation for Smith's creation.
Also, there's the whole colour thing to consider. More later. Promise! First, a bit of history.
[There's always time for locusts.]
Bone was one of that first crop of creator-owned books that constituted a burgeoning movement away from the malaise of the corporation-directed folderol of the '80s. Smith spent thirteen years (from 1991 to 2004) publishing chapters of what would eventually be a 1300-page epic fantasy story. I hopped on in somewhere around the year 2000, when Smith was nearly 65% through. Waiting each month for the release of a new chapter was tortuous. I needed to see the conclusion and I needed to see it now. And then, as Smith approached his finale, several months would pass between chapters. It was grueling. Readers first approaching the book today are blessed with the option of purchasing the entire series in a handy, single-volume paperback version.1
But rather than just talk about the book, let's start with looking at some of Smith's art. Because while, yes, his characters and dialogue and verbal storytelling are wonderful, one of the foremost joys of the book is how he conveys his narrative through artistic choices.
This is a simple chase sequence, but it's composed masterfully. Fone Bone jumps from a snowbank onto a lower bank and makes a little progress while fleeing furiously from the rat creature who dives into the snow at his heels. (Excitement!) In the next panel, we see another rat creature face-first in the snow at Bone's heels a second time. (Hot pursuit!) Fone Bone comes to an impassable river and waterfall but looks down to find an escape. We and he think he's found a respite but are surprised to find rat creatures to be more driven by instinct than by reason. While the page ends with some humour, the real punchline is on the next page as the branch fails to support their weight and the three tumble into the falls below. The second panel on this page is majestic as we see silouetted the three small figures against a mere portion of the formidable falls. If we hadn't taken in the awesome danger Fone Bone is in by panel two, Smith drives it home by completely obscuring the three characters in the tumult of the falls' base. The volatile energy in that scene is terrific. Panel four brings us relief again as Fone Bone breaks the surface with a gasp. We know how lucky he was to make it but are almost instantly dismayed in the next panel to see the heads of the rat creatures breaking the surface as well, and the pursuit is begun anew. Unfortunately, wet Fone Bone slips on the icy rocks and the tension crescendoes on the final panel of that second page.
Here's another one:
While the prior example was fraught with action, this shows Smith using entirely different techniques to build tension. Across these three panels, there is essentially no movement save for Thorn's eyes and from Fone Bone as he struggles then reacts to what he's seen. Otherwise, Fone Bone, Granma Ben, and Thorn retain the same position across the panels. The source of drama comes from a bright lightning flash in the second panel. We (and Fone Bone) see the scene unveiled for what it is, for what was wholly obscured by the dark and stormy nighttime. Fone Bone moves from being annoyed at Granma Ben to startled by the lightning to terror at what he's just seen.
It's a beautiful scene and the book is full of this stuff. Over the years since I first finished the story in 2004 I had remembered the characters and their plot points, but I had forgotten this. I had forgotten what a master craftsman Jeff Smith is when he chooses how to visually tell his story. Bone employs a lot of dialogue and Smith is not shy about using words. Still, he shows over and again that he knows when to shut up and let his art speak for him and his characters. Even if Bone was entirely wordless and plotless, it would be worth your time for the art alone.
So then, what about words? Another thing I had forgotten was just how funny these characters can be even while in the midst of terrible, LOTR-level, world-collapsing events. People are dying left and right and there's a tremendous war on and Smiley Bone is still a silly bastion of joy and laughter. And to Smith's credit, that never feels trite or abusive. That the book is riddled with funny moments even in the midst of dark doings and ill tidings may be exactly what saves it from being as grim and dour and thematically grey as some of its fantasy-genre cousins. The reader never feels that lives aren't at stake but simultaneously never feels overwhelmed by that threat.
[It's true. There is.]
As well, Smith populates his story with expressive, unique, and noteworthy characters. That my daughter would adopt so many for her waking dreams is impressive and is evidence of the good job Smith does. All of the protagonists are well-rounded and individuated (save perhaps for Smiley Bone, who remains a bastion of zany aloofness throughout). Even the supporting characters are given personalities and motivations. We spend the most time with Fone Bone and his opposite lead, Thorn, and by story's close we see them grow through the challenges they've had to overcome. They are full-fledged fictional beings. Smith's villains are worthy as well. Though he doesn't so much follow after the footsteps of Miyazaki, making his antagonists sympathetic figures, he does at least make them interesting.
Bone's story is as full-orbed and ranging as its characters. What begins as light adventure soon turns to dark mystery. And then back to adventure. And then to epic journey and battle against cataclysmic evil. And all woven throughout with a sense of myth and spirit. There are forces at work in Fone Bone's world that are beyond the seeing eye and tap into energies outside the realm of the sciences. And I don't mean wizards and dragons. Even though those are there too. These things work to make Bone's world and mythos feel substantial, solid. And it helps that his story is exciting.
Which you already knew because why else would I describe the wait for new chapters as tortuous?
At the end of the day, if you haven't read Bone yet, you really ought to. If you like comics at all, you owe it to yourself. If you like adventure or fantasy, you owe it to yourself. If you want to read your kids something a little dangerous and a little exciting and a little funny and quite possibly the best thing your kids will have yet experienced, you owe it to yourself and to them. And if you've already read Bone but it's been a couple years, you owe it to yourself.
[Thorn's such a flirt.]
The Colour Edition
Several years ago, Smith worked with Scholastic to bring the book to a wider youth audience. Part of the marketing was to colour the book. (As originally published, Bone was a strictly black-and-white endeavor.) I'm not sure whether having the book in colour was one of Smith's abiding desires or if Scholastic believed they could better sell it to kids if it were in colour—but whatever the case, when you go onto Amazon or wherever to order your copy, you'll have a variety of formats to choose from. One of those is the colour edition.
[*sigh*]
I won't say that Bone in colour is an abomination, but only because I can't really justify that critique because I haven't read the entire thing in colour. Because what I did read was awful. Or maybe not awful. Maybe it was just uninspired. But when you lay uninspired on top of majesty, you've done something terrible. This colouring job is that. You may not think it's possible to suck the life out of a black-and-white comic by adding colour but you can. You really and truly can.
So please, for your sake and for your children's sake: buy and read Bone in black and white. It's beautiful and stunning and you won't feel embarrassed for the book while reading it.
The One Thing I Didn't Like Really at All
So this is weird and in a way pretty major, but I hated the ending. Now is the time for those who haven't read the book to stop reading. You already know I adore the book and think you should absolutely read this thing. It's canon and it deserves to be so. Everything hereafter is SPOILER.
Okay, so I was completely and entirely sold on Smith's world until the last chapter. The climax and even most of the denouement were stellar and right along with what Smith was doing with his story and characters. It all fit. Then, in the last pages, we see his principal characters make a decision that kind of goes wholly against who Smith developed them to be. I'm not sure why he chose that ending for his book.
In the story in my head, fifteen years earlier when Smith first thought of the story, he came up with an ending. Over the intervening years, his narrative grew and new ideas insinuated themselves. His characters grew in ways he hadn't originally charted out. They became something more than what he had proposed to himself in the beginning. And over the years he added plot points and dialogues and maybe even new arcs. So when he comes to his conclusion, it obviously needs to be different in at least nuance from what he had originally planned. And yet, for reasons foreign to my imagination, Smith decided to stick with his original ending, even though it clearly did not fit with the characters he'd created and the circumstance they find themselves in.
That's how it happened in my imaginary version of what went down to make this ending the ending that got published. I recall being disappointed when I first read that last chapter seven years ago. But whatever my reaction was, in my memory, I was merely annoyed. Reading it again now with my daughter, I was actually angry. I wasn't angry that these characters made the choices they did. I was angry that they did so inexplicably—that there was no justification for their final decision. It didn't fit with Fone Bone's character arc. It didn't fit with Phoney Bone's character motivations. It felt entirely foreign to everything Smith had done prior to that moment. And that just makes me sad for the project, that perfection could be so easily evaporated in a book's final pages.
And now I'm sad.
[Anger.]
_____________________
Foot Notes
1) My impatience for the final unveiling of a story is the primary reason I no longer buy single issues of any series and will even push off acquiring the collected volumes until a series wraps. If a series is good, I always regret reading it in fits and starts while it waits to complete. Bone, Y: The Last Man, Cross Game, 20th Century Boys, and Twin Spica.
Note within a note: The tough thing about my newly acquired methodology is that it's inhibiting to smaller publishers. For instance, Twin Spica's publisher Vertical saw such poor sales on the series that even in the month the twelfth and final volume was released, older volumes were out of print with no plans to bring the series back. Beyond merely being a shame because it's such a good series, this makes it bad news for those who would wait until a series concludes to begin collecting.
_____________________
[Review courtesy of Good Ok Bad.]
May 14, 2007
Smith's evocative and energetic drawings tell an enthusiastic and deeply-felt mini-epic. His simple chiaroscuro backgrounds create a fantastical but very real world. His strange cartoons mix with caricatures of realism to produce an easy-to-understand psychological reality.
However his very strong characterization sometimes falls prey to simple archetype, which weakens the story and the suspension of disbelief. Otherwise a thoroughly enjoyable, funny, endearing, and exciting read.
My Suggested Readings in Comics
However his very strong characterization sometimes falls prey to simple archetype, which weakens the story and the suspension of disbelief. Otherwise a thoroughly enjoyable, funny, endearing, and exciting read.
My Suggested Readings in Comics
October 29, 2019
I really enjoyed this graphic novel series. Before I read it, I thought it was a kid's graphic novel but once I read the first two volumes I was hooked. The story is simple, fun, and adventurous. This isn't just for kids but adults too. Great series!
March 20, 2007
A friend gave the Bone single volume collection to me a gift one year. I wasn't familiar with the series prior to that but had just finished a semester of graduate english lit courses that focused on cultural studies and serial fiction. Bone is Lord of the Rings meets Dickens. I loved it. The beginning pages hooked me with humor, the middle turned into serious plot with social commentary, then wrapped everything up but was a little too ladden with explanations, I thought, of the authors vision and Bone mythology. I would recommend this to comic and graphic novel lovers, serialized fiction lovers... anyone who likes to read really. It looks intimidating because the book is so hefty, but it'll rest nicey on any coffee table or nightstand wihout clashing with the decor of the room until you can read through to the end.
February 19, 2020
Sometimes I enjoy reading something different. I had heard of Bone, but had no real desire to read it. Shame on me. It is written in the same vein as the wonderful Elfquest or The Dark Crystal, it is a children's tale written in a dark fantasy world. The comic was published in 55 issues, but I was able to find this omnibus version.
It has won multiple awards and I can see why. The art style is very similar to the cartoon style of newspaper strips. It works well for the story and is quite good for what it is. The story? It is a rather epic story set in a world that grows with the telling. A quick synopsis:
Three Bones, all cousins, are run out of Boneville. The primary culprit is the greedy and cunning Phoncible P. "Phoney" Bone. He is followed by his loyal cousins Smiley Bone, the village idiot, and Fone Bone, who is one of the main heroes.
The cousins get lost and end up in a mysterious valley where they meet a local girl, Thorn, and her cow-racing Grandmother. From here mysterious events concerning dragons and a sinister entity known as the Locust Lord. The entire story, as well as the lore, is well done and is a very entertaining dark fantasy. Do not mistake for grimdark. "Berserk" this is not. Far better to compare it to the similar Elfquest magnum opus.
Bone has good humor throughout and the characters are entertaining. This is a welcome addition to my collection. A children's story with enough depth and creativity to appeal to adults. Bone was a joy.
It has won multiple awards and I can see why. The art style is very similar to the cartoon style of newspaper strips. It works well for the story and is quite good for what it is. The story? It is a rather epic story set in a world that grows with the telling. A quick synopsis:
Three Bones, all cousins, are run out of Boneville. The primary culprit is the greedy and cunning Phoncible P. "Phoney" Bone. He is followed by his loyal cousins Smiley Bone, the village idiot, and Fone Bone, who is one of the main heroes.
The cousins get lost and end up in a mysterious valley where they meet a local girl, Thorn, and her cow-racing Grandmother. From here mysterious events concerning dragons and a sinister entity known as the Locust Lord. The entire story, as well as the lore, is well done and is a very entertaining dark fantasy. Do not mistake for grimdark. "Berserk" this is not. Far better to compare it to the similar Elfquest magnum opus.
Bone has good humor throughout and the characters are entertaining. This is a welcome addition to my collection. A children's story with enough depth and creativity to appeal to adults. Bone was a joy.
September 2, 2022
Mi scuso in anticipo se questa sarà una recensione quasi completamente soggettiva, per via del profondo legame che ho con questa storia. Bone è il mio libro a fumetti preferito. Seguito sin dalla prima uscita in edicola. Ora finalmente riunito in un volume unico; meraviglioso.
Bone non è un fumetto perfetto, a detta di molti, ma a me non importa. E' stato un pezzo importantissimo della mia vita, non solo della mia formazione artistica, ho visto nella storia fantastico-umoristica dei tre cugini Bone tutto quello che avrei voluto fare io di una storia. Momenti assolutamente epici alternati a una comicità brillante e sempre con un ottimo tempismo.
Ho conosciuto Jeff Smith di persona quando anni fa venne a Lucca, e a volte è bello conoscere i propri eroi. Smith, la sua personalità, traspare nella sua opera con tutto l'amore che ha per essa, in ogni singola vignetta.
Tecnicamente parlando, il suo stile è armonioso, morbido ed equilibrato, gli inchiostri rendono una fotografia perfettamente in linea con tutte le diverse atmosfere della storia cosa sorprendente se pensiamo pure che Smith è autodidatta - e sebbene sia stato fatto un ottimo lavoro nella versione a colori, per me il gioiello resta la versione in bianco e nero.
Il worldbuilding forse è il vero punto forte della storia di Bone, perché traspare poco alla volta attraverso i protagonisti, ed è ricco di riferimenti a miti e leggende in maniera sottile, senza mai fare spiegoni - in questo Smith assomiglia molto anche a Neil Gaiman - ma non mi addenrtro nei dettagli per non fare spoiler.
Bone è più di una storia, è una leggenda. Lo consiglio a chiunque come uno dei migliori classici del fantasy mai realizzati.
Bone non è un fumetto perfetto, a detta di molti, ma a me non importa. E' stato un pezzo importantissimo della mia vita, non solo della mia formazione artistica, ho visto nella storia fantastico-umoristica dei tre cugini Bone tutto quello che avrei voluto fare io di una storia. Momenti assolutamente epici alternati a una comicità brillante e sempre con un ottimo tempismo.
Ho conosciuto Jeff Smith di persona quando anni fa venne a Lucca, e a volte è bello conoscere i propri eroi. Smith, la sua personalità, traspare nella sua opera con tutto l'amore che ha per essa, in ogni singola vignetta.
Tecnicamente parlando, il suo stile è armonioso, morbido ed equilibrato, gli inchiostri rendono una fotografia perfettamente in linea con tutte le diverse atmosfere della storia cosa sorprendente se pensiamo pure che Smith è autodidatta - e sebbene sia stato fatto un ottimo lavoro nella versione a colori, per me il gioiello resta la versione in bianco e nero.
Il worldbuilding forse è il vero punto forte della storia di Bone, perché traspare poco alla volta attraverso i protagonisti, ed è ricco di riferimenti a miti e leggende in maniera sottile, senza mai fare spiegoni - in questo Smith assomiglia molto anche a Neil Gaiman - ma non mi addenrtro nei dettagli per non fare spoiler.
Bone è più di una storia, è una leggenda. Lo consiglio a chiunque come uno dei migliori classici del fantasy mai realizzati.
April 4, 2018
Jedan od mojih omiljenih stripskih serija. Količina šarma, toplote i lepote koja krije ova na prvi pogled jednostavna priča je prosto neverovatna. Najjači deo cele knjige (stripa) su sami likovi i njihova interakcija. Iskreno mogu da pričaju o bilo kakvim glupostima pa će meni biti zabavno da čitam sto strana :)
Priče koje pratimo su u suštini dve različite; jedna o pokušajima familije Bone da se vrate kući i druga i daleko klasičnija fatazijska priča o sukobima dve rase i izabranom ko će pomoći da se sukob reši. Naravno to se na kraju sve izmeša ali je opet izuzetno zabavno iako ne suviše originalno.
Crteži su predivni, u većem delu slučajeva jednostavni ali kada zatreba budu takvi da oduzimaju dah. I način na koji je akcija prikazana je odlična pošto na momente se dobija utisak da su stranice žive i da gledma crtani film a ne da čitamo strip.
Plus humor je prvoklasan. Suptilan i iznenadan tako da sam sebe često hvatao da se smejem ko lud, a to se nedešava često i naročito ne u štivu koje nije predstavljeno kao humorističko..
Ako bi morao da uporedim ovo sa nekim filmom najsličniji bi bio Smrtonosno Oružije ako va treba neka ideja kakva vrsta priče vas očekuje po tonu.
Sve u svemu svaka preporuka čak i ako niste ljubitelj stripova.
Priče koje pratimo su u suštini dve različite; jedna o pokušajima familije Bone da se vrate kući i druga i daleko klasičnija fatazijska priča o sukobima dve rase i izabranom ko će pomoći da se sukob reši. Naravno to se na kraju sve izmeša ali je opet izuzetno zabavno iako ne suviše originalno.
Crteži su predivni, u većem delu slučajeva jednostavni ali kada zatreba budu takvi da oduzimaju dah. I način na koji je akcija prikazana je odlična pošto na momente se dobija utisak da su stranice žive i da gledma crtani film a ne da čitamo strip.
Plus humor je prvoklasan. Suptilan i iznenadan tako da sam sebe često hvatao da se smejem ko lud, a to se nedešava često i naročito ne u štivu koje nije predstavljeno kao humorističko..
Ako bi morao da uporedim ovo sa nekim filmom najsličniji bi bio Smrtonosno Oružije ako va treba neka ideja kakva vrsta priče vas očekuje po tonu.
Sve u svemu svaka preporuka čak i ako niste ljubitelj stripova.
October 14, 2008
4 1/2 stars. This is my final review of this fantastic (and meticulously detailed, cartoon-meets-realist) fantasy epic. Now that I've completed it, I had to dock one-half star for a (to me) incomprehensible ending. I'll save my discussion of that to the end though, so that I can lead with the rave.
Bleach the colors from Walt Kelly's Pogo (with Al Gator as Smiley Bone, Pogo as Fone Bone, and Pork Pine as Phoncible ('Sponsible?) P. "Phoney" Bone) and shove them into Elfquest via Australian aboriginal mythology*, then sprinkle with inside jokes and literary/comics allusions galore and you have this wonderful book. The characters and dialogue are so enjoyable, and the story so engaging that author Smith can even wink directly at the audience... "I just can't get over it! A princess! I mean, who'd have thought that our little Thorn -- living in a cottage with her grandmother out in the middle of an old, dark forest -- would turn out to be a princess?! Unbelievable!" (Dragonslayer volume), and get away with it.
*[footnote here - I assume Bone's "Dreaming" mythology and its accompanying ghost-circle stick figures are inspired by aboriginal world views, but as I know virtually nothing about aboriginal culture, I couldn't say for certain. If anyone can suggest a good entry point into this terra incognita for me, I'd really appreciate it.]
I discovered this book when I browsed the first volume in the library with my son (who's 6) and let him use his card to borrow it. I pretty much had to run back immediately to the library to get out the remaining volumes, because his 8 year-old sister started devouring this epic at the rate of 150 pages/day (and I too wanted to know what happens next). Both my kids enjoyed reading this to themselves (as did I), but let me tell you, play-acting the dialog in different voices is a whole new level of tremendous fun. I recommend a group reading, with assigned parts. Fun-fun-fun. Suffice it to say that once you start, this graphic novel is well-nigh impossible to put down. It says something for the tremendously underrated sophistication of comics as an independent literary genre (sequential art? graphic novel? can we please dispense with these annoying euphemisms?) that what took Smith twelve years to create, we Falks (including wee Falks) devoured in only about a week (and re-read, too, as my son continued to pick up random volumes to re-experience especially funny moments before I could return them today to the library, something which I suppose is akin to track-selecting off DVD copies of Casablanca or Airplane!, etc. to relive the best moments.
Be warned that the end of the penultimate volume and the last volume are a bit of a disappointment. First, in deviating in tone and content from the majority of that which precedes them, they are arguably inappropriate for littler people. Like Harry Potter, the intensity rises at the end, but here the transition is stark rather than gradual as medieval violence that was previously offstage or implied is suddenly rendered in gory detail (sharp teeth embedded in thighs, scythe-beheadings, eviscerations, etc.). Didn't faze my 8 year old (though I wouldn't have allowed her to read this part if I knew it was coming: stupid, stupid rat parent), but my 6 year old was only too happy for me to synopsize this for him and move his bookmark forward past the egregiously rough stuff.
From a literary vantage point, I have to complain that the end of this work sacrifices a semblance of internal consistency in order to cinematically accelerate pacing. Not a satisfactory (or necessary?) trade-off. As in The Matrix (a more or less contemporaneous work), Bone is a coming-of-age story in which the protagonist's maturation coincides with increasing abilities to directly impact the "real" world. In Matrix, this was Neo discovering himself to be wetwired into a vast virtual reality simulation, and then successfully hacking it until he could change simulation events in real time. In Bone, we have a pre-to-post pubescent girl named Thorn discovering how to intermix dreams with reality, using the content of the former to change the latter. Narratively, the problem with each plot involves the articulation of what, if anything, restricts these powers. In the first of the Matrix movies, such apparent omnipotence manifested itself by Neo's distorting the laws of physics -- ostensibly slowing time to make it possible to dodge or redirect bullets. We viewers may give the Wachowski brothers a pass here (all the pyrotechnics are part of the point of the film's appeal), but c'mon, folks, if I were able to change reality, then why not cause those bullets to become drifting flower petals or simply to vanish entirely? Perhaps the agents can thwart this in real-time themselves (which might lead I suppose to bullets flickering in and out of reality), but as depicted, the agents seem to be incapable of preventing the ceiling from suddenly morphing into a falling grand piano and crushing them (or for that matter, the agents simply exploding without resort to external firearms).
You can see where such reality-changing leads. Partly, it presents the Green Lantern problem, in which your ability to affect others is limited only by your ingenuity. Partly it also presents the Superman or God problem, in which all monolithic threats (that is, no horns of a dilemma, such as being forced to choose one among multiple victims to rescue) to the protagonist appear trivial. Set aside for a moment the bizarrely bad paternal example set by Supes in the recent film Superman Returns (no mean feat setting this aside; this was so mind-numbingly *wrong* for the film's intent and tone, it made me want to scream "WHAT WERE YOU THINKING???" at the movie screen). What really undercut the film's credibility for me was that the limits of Superman's powers were never adequately established. Why should a guy who seems to make quite an effort to land a plane at the start of the movie be able to use about the same amount of oomph to lift and carry an ISLAND OF (rare???) KRYPTONITE into space. That feat alone would seem to trivialize everything that's come before.
Back to Bone, it's no spoiler to tell you that Thorn's complete mastery is revealed when she takes to the air a la Superman. (There's emotionally satisfying commentary that accompanies this which I will not reveal.) The immediate problem to the narrative becomes why she doesn't continue unimpeded to her objective (she is given no reason to stop), and then of course, the follow-up problem, that if she can now thus impose her will on the waking world, what can't she do?
The book does not lack for exposition. In a way, the discussion of religion and politics that arises from Jeff Smith's characters discuss and consistently challenge the work's central mythology is one of the richer themes of the book. Throughout the series we are treated to tons of exposition regarding the novel's mythology: the relationship of the living to the dead, the origins of the world, the various animals and their histories, the "hum of the Earth," and the dreaming and waking states. Yet there is much readers are asked to take unacceptably on faith. Once the uber-villain has been destroyed, there follows an apocalyptic anti-climax full of sound and fury, but signifying nothing. Readers might wonder whether Mim, a dragon large enough to encircle the globe, was crazy or not, captive or not, alive or dead? Are the dragons constructive, destructive, or neutral agents and why do they act the way they do? Unfortunately, none of this is satisfactorily explained in the context of what (over 900 pages) has come before. Things just happen at increasing volume and velocity until they wholly independently stop. Not too satisfying, that.
Nor does Smith appear here to be ignoring a considered, if deliberately-ambiguous ending simply to rush to a conclusion, as following the confusing anticlimax, Smith pads his last volume with filler the equivalent of An Ewok Christmas. While the winter solstice episode was mildly amusing and entertaining, absent any attempt to tie up (or even address) the plot's loose ends, I'd have preferred to skip right to the epilogue which treats our protagonist's respective fates. Still and all, it pays to stay with the book for its last pages, as Smith makes up for his semi-cloying outtro by closing with a deliciously satirical commentary on the confluence of greed, religion, and politics in another wink at the audience. Surprisingly, this appears to have been written in 1998, not 2004. If so, Jeff Smith should get credit as something of a prophet.
All in all, if Bone falls a few crumbs shy of a feast it is amply filling nonetheless. Yea, brothers and sisters, as far as I'm concerned this text is worthy of canonization, repeat study, and devotion of at least a week of evenings. Even if it lapses into incoherence at the tail end, it's still an impressive and ambitious achievement in all-ages fantasy.
Bleach the colors from Walt Kelly's Pogo (with Al Gator as Smiley Bone, Pogo as Fone Bone, and Pork Pine as Phoncible ('Sponsible?) P. "Phoney" Bone) and shove them into Elfquest via Australian aboriginal mythology*, then sprinkle with inside jokes and literary/comics allusions galore and you have this wonderful book. The characters and dialogue are so enjoyable, and the story so engaging that author Smith can even wink directly at the audience... "I just can't get over it! A princess! I mean, who'd have thought that our little Thorn -- living in a cottage with her grandmother out in the middle of an old, dark forest -- would turn out to be a princess?! Unbelievable!" (Dragonslayer volume), and get away with it.
*[footnote here - I assume Bone's "Dreaming" mythology and its accompanying ghost-circle stick figures are inspired by aboriginal world views, but as I know virtually nothing about aboriginal culture, I couldn't say for certain. If anyone can suggest a good entry point into this terra incognita for me, I'd really appreciate it.]
I discovered this book when I browsed the first volume in the library with my son (who's 6) and let him use his card to borrow it. I pretty much had to run back immediately to the library to get out the remaining volumes, because his 8 year-old sister started devouring this epic at the rate of 150 pages/day (and I too wanted to know what happens next). Both my kids enjoyed reading this to themselves (as did I), but let me tell you, play-acting the dialog in different voices is a whole new level of tremendous fun. I recommend a group reading, with assigned parts. Fun-fun-fun. Suffice it to say that once you start, this graphic novel is well-nigh impossible to put down. It says something for the tremendously underrated sophistication of comics as an independent literary genre (sequential art? graphic novel? can we please dispense with these annoying euphemisms?) that what took Smith twelve years to create, we Falks (including wee Falks) devoured in only about a week (and re-read, too, as my son continued to pick up random volumes to re-experience especially funny moments before I could return them today to the library, something which I suppose is akin to track-selecting off DVD copies of Casablanca or Airplane!, etc. to relive the best moments.
Be warned that the end of the penultimate volume and the last volume are a bit of a disappointment. First, in deviating in tone and content from the majority of that which precedes them, they are arguably inappropriate for littler people. Like Harry Potter, the intensity rises at the end, but here the transition is stark rather than gradual as medieval violence that was previously offstage or implied is suddenly rendered in gory detail (sharp teeth embedded in thighs, scythe-beheadings, eviscerations, etc.). Didn't faze my 8 year old (though I wouldn't have allowed her to read this part if I knew it was coming: stupid, stupid rat parent), but my 6 year old was only too happy for me to synopsize this for him and move his bookmark forward past the egregiously rough stuff.
From a literary vantage point, I have to complain that the end of this work sacrifices a semblance of internal consistency in order to cinematically accelerate pacing. Not a satisfactory (or necessary?) trade-off. As in The Matrix (a more or less contemporaneous work), Bone is a coming-of-age story in which the protagonist's maturation coincides with increasing abilities to directly impact the "real" world. In Matrix, this was Neo discovering himself to be wetwired into a vast virtual reality simulation, and then successfully hacking it until he could change simulation events in real time. In Bone, we have a pre-to-post pubescent girl named Thorn discovering how to intermix dreams with reality, using the content of the former to change the latter. Narratively, the problem with each plot involves the articulation of what, if anything, restricts these powers. In the first of the Matrix movies, such apparent omnipotence manifested itself by Neo's distorting the laws of physics -- ostensibly slowing time to make it possible to dodge or redirect bullets. We viewers may give the Wachowski brothers a pass here (all the pyrotechnics are part of the point of the film's appeal), but c'mon, folks, if I were able to change reality, then why not cause those bullets to become drifting flower petals or simply to vanish entirely? Perhaps the agents can thwart this in real-time themselves (which might lead I suppose to bullets flickering in and out of reality), but as depicted, the agents seem to be incapable of preventing the ceiling from suddenly morphing into a falling grand piano and crushing them (or for that matter, the agents simply exploding without resort to external firearms).
You can see where such reality-changing leads. Partly, it presents the Green Lantern problem, in which your ability to affect others is limited only by your ingenuity. Partly it also presents the Superman or God problem, in which all monolithic threats (that is, no horns of a dilemma, such as being forced to choose one among multiple victims to rescue) to the protagonist appear trivial. Set aside for a moment the bizarrely bad paternal example set by Supes in the recent film Superman Returns (no mean feat setting this aside; this was so mind-numbingly *wrong* for the film's intent and tone, it made me want to scream "WHAT WERE YOU THINKING???" at the movie screen). What really undercut the film's credibility for me was that the limits of Superman's powers were never adequately established. Why should a guy who seems to make quite an effort to land a plane at the start of the movie be able to use about the same amount of oomph to lift and carry an ISLAND OF (rare???) KRYPTONITE into space. That feat alone would seem to trivialize everything that's come before.
Back to Bone, it's no spoiler to tell you that Thorn's complete mastery is revealed when she takes to the air a la Superman. (There's emotionally satisfying commentary that accompanies this which I will not reveal.) The immediate problem to the narrative becomes why she doesn't continue unimpeded to her objective (she is given no reason to stop), and then of course, the follow-up problem, that if she can now thus impose her will on the waking world, what can't she do?
The book does not lack for exposition. In a way, the discussion of religion and politics that arises from Jeff Smith's characters discuss and consistently challenge the work's central mythology is one of the richer themes of the book. Throughout the series we are treated to tons of exposition regarding the novel's mythology: the relationship of the living to the dead, the origins of the world, the various animals and their histories, the "hum of the Earth," and the dreaming and waking states. Yet there is much readers are asked to take unacceptably on faith. Once the uber-villain has been destroyed, there follows an apocalyptic anti-climax full of sound and fury, but signifying nothing. Readers might wonder whether Mim, a dragon large enough to encircle the globe, was crazy or not, captive or not, alive or dead? Are the dragons constructive, destructive, or neutral agents and why do they act the way they do? Unfortunately, none of this is satisfactorily explained in the context of what (over 900 pages) has come before. Things just happen at increasing volume and velocity until they wholly independently stop. Not too satisfying, that.
Nor does Smith appear here to be ignoring a considered, if deliberately-ambiguous ending simply to rush to a conclusion, as following the confusing anticlimax, Smith pads his last volume with filler the equivalent of An Ewok Christmas. While the winter solstice episode was mildly amusing and entertaining, absent any attempt to tie up (or even address) the plot's loose ends, I'd have preferred to skip right to the epilogue which treats our protagonist's respective fates. Still and all, it pays to stay with the book for its last pages, as Smith makes up for his semi-cloying outtro by closing with a deliciously satirical commentary on the confluence of greed, religion, and politics in another wink at the audience. Surprisingly, this appears to have been written in 1998, not 2004. If so, Jeff Smith should get credit as something of a prophet.
All in all, if Bone falls a few crumbs shy of a feast it is amply filling nonetheless. Yea, brothers and sisters, as far as I'm concerned this text is worthy of canonization, repeat study, and devotion of at least a week of evenings. Even if it lapses into incoherence at the tail end, it's still an impressive and ambitious achievement in all-ages fantasy.
April 21, 2022
Un "Il Signore degli Anelli" contemporaneo, con protagonisti, uno più simpatico dell'altro ed un'ambientazione che nulla ha da invidiare alle migliori saghe epiche di tutti i tempi.
Un mattonazzo di quasi 2,5 kg, ma con tavole molto belle a colori... un pezzo da collezione!
Un mattonazzo di quasi 2,5 kg, ma con tavole molto belle a colori... un pezzo da collezione!
March 22, 2011
There was a week when we had no electricity and I spent my nights by candlelight and a propane heater. It was freezing in my living room. Those were the circumstances under which I read Jeff Smith’s Bone. At several points I yelled at the page or laughed despite myself. It kept me staying up later in the cold darkness to read more of what was essentially an all-ages comic book. I can’t give it a stronger endorsement than that, but I can talk about what brings this book together.
Bone deceives you with charm. It’s a sprawling Fantasy story where the “badass” warriors are senior citizens, and the Hobbit-style overwhelmed adventurers are one-upped by cartoons. Early on characters wager over who can sell the most beer, and when Fone asks how things could be worse, and a literal blanket of snow falls out of the sky and onto his head. The first few hundred pages only hint at the range it will strive after, with images of something like a Grim Reaper, a frantic nocturnal chase scene, and prophetic dreams of the past. If you buy this version then you know it has to go somewhere – it can’t be lighthearted for all 1,300 pages.
Yet even as the great quest unfolds and grave consequences emerge, Bone refuses to be merely dramatic. It is not a comic book equivalent of all those treacle “Epic” Fantasies that descend into mere angst or suffering. When two characters bicker over ditching the quest, a third starts giving them static shocks until they lose their train of thought. The humorous or the humbling intrude as often as the perilous. Jeff Smith has no problem first establishing surprising gravity, and then keeping it in check. That allows him to endear characters and make them suffer fates that are mild in contrast to other Fantasies, yet lend them greater impact.
Most readers won’t remark on the variety in Smith’s art. In the black and white edition everything seems to fit together, yet he compiles several different styles. The eponymous Bone family members look like Fantasy via Charles Schultz, sharing characteristics with Snoopy the Dog (most evident when they’re yelling about something). Thorn, our female protagonist, looks like a Disney princess. Yet her grandma could be Popeye in drag. They are wildly different body structures, faces and uses of lines, pulled together without any coloration to help. It’s only more impressive when he expands to using solid blacks, taking us out of the lighthearted cartoon atmosphere for things like a nighttime chase scene where he flips his monochrome style. That same essential cartoon atmosphere helps lull you into expectations he can break, so that one bloody sword or one swollen eye are more jarring than a field of decapitated soldiers in another comic.
While not a mere comic book version of one, this is one of those “Epic” Fantasies. Our homeless Bones get dragged into intrigues about a magical evil threatening to return to the world, and the restoration of royalty, and other planes of existence. Less like the film equivalent and more like prose, Bone’s big journey relies on character rather than big fight scenes. Some of the creatures are suitably intimidating thanks to scale and physicality, and there are some staggering visuals, including one page featuring every kind of dragon (each from a different culture’s interpretation and native art style). Yet the characters carry everything. You only care about the giant mountain lion, Rockjaw, because he might really maim one of these little, vulnerable guys. Comedy and adorable art help endear them, but the regrets of the elderly and revelations as to why someone became selfish or withdrawn are just as effective. Characters are only compromised by occasional expository dialogue, a hold-over from when this was published serially and readers might miss a few issues. Above all, Smith excels at giving his characters at least one page in which to shine. Sometimes that’s Phoncible Bone delivering an indignant monologue about why he’s Ahab in the hero’s delusion. In another, it’s a minor character who you never gave thought to, seeking forgiveness before he faces certain death.
The most striking of the one-page moments belongs to Kingdok. This hulking rat-creature is a menace for much of the book. Yet at one point he’s left unconscious, possibly bleeding to death, and abandoned by his minions. The art draws back to show the starry sky and barren trees. There’s no one to help him. Kingdok doesn’t beg or even say a word. Smith doesn’t use this to turn the character around into some sympathetic giant or redeemed hero; if you see him again, he’ll probably try to eat you. It’s merely that in his existence, Smith has given him a moment where he’s more vulnerable than any of our heroes have been. It’s the sort of thing that doesn’t happen often in mature grown-up books, and so is more puzzling to discover here.
Don’t let that moment fool you: Bone does not turn to monotone severity. It is merely unafraid of severity. This is still the same book that pokes fun at Herman Melville and has a man serve a monster an invisible sandwich. Often its understated presentation helps moments of gravity. If you go a thousand pages seeing this cheery character, and then he is beaten and his eye is left swollen shut, it has an impact that much graver injuries lack in literary fiction. The point is the brightness of this world, the wit and the goofy lives they’d lead if not for these circumstances; compromises against the brightness are a natural part of it.
Bone deceives you with charm. It’s a sprawling Fantasy story where the “badass” warriors are senior citizens, and the Hobbit-style overwhelmed adventurers are one-upped by cartoons. Early on characters wager over who can sell the most beer, and when Fone asks how things could be worse, and a literal blanket of snow falls out of the sky and onto his head. The first few hundred pages only hint at the range it will strive after, with images of something like a Grim Reaper, a frantic nocturnal chase scene, and prophetic dreams of the past. If you buy this version then you know it has to go somewhere – it can’t be lighthearted for all 1,300 pages.
Yet even as the great quest unfolds and grave consequences emerge, Bone refuses to be merely dramatic. It is not a comic book equivalent of all those treacle “Epic” Fantasies that descend into mere angst or suffering. When two characters bicker over ditching the quest, a third starts giving them static shocks until they lose their train of thought. The humorous or the humbling intrude as often as the perilous. Jeff Smith has no problem first establishing surprising gravity, and then keeping it in check. That allows him to endear characters and make them suffer fates that are mild in contrast to other Fantasies, yet lend them greater impact.
Most readers won’t remark on the variety in Smith’s art. In the black and white edition everything seems to fit together, yet he compiles several different styles. The eponymous Bone family members look like Fantasy via Charles Schultz, sharing characteristics with Snoopy the Dog (most evident when they’re yelling about something). Thorn, our female protagonist, looks like a Disney princess. Yet her grandma could be Popeye in drag. They are wildly different body structures, faces and uses of lines, pulled together without any coloration to help. It’s only more impressive when he expands to using solid blacks, taking us out of the lighthearted cartoon atmosphere for things like a nighttime chase scene where he flips his monochrome style. That same essential cartoon atmosphere helps lull you into expectations he can break, so that one bloody sword or one swollen eye are more jarring than a field of decapitated soldiers in another comic.
While not a mere comic book version of one, this is one of those “Epic” Fantasies. Our homeless Bones get dragged into intrigues about a magical evil threatening to return to the world, and the restoration of royalty, and other planes of existence. Less like the film equivalent and more like prose, Bone’s big journey relies on character rather than big fight scenes. Some of the creatures are suitably intimidating thanks to scale and physicality, and there are some staggering visuals, including one page featuring every kind of dragon (each from a different culture’s interpretation and native art style). Yet the characters carry everything. You only care about the giant mountain lion, Rockjaw, because he might really maim one of these little, vulnerable guys. Comedy and adorable art help endear them, but the regrets of the elderly and revelations as to why someone became selfish or withdrawn are just as effective. Characters are only compromised by occasional expository dialogue, a hold-over from when this was published serially and readers might miss a few issues. Above all, Smith excels at giving his characters at least one page in which to shine. Sometimes that’s Phoncible Bone delivering an indignant monologue about why he’s Ahab in the hero’s delusion. In another, it’s a minor character who you never gave thought to, seeking forgiveness before he faces certain death.
The most striking of the one-page moments belongs to Kingdok. This hulking rat-creature is a menace for much of the book. Yet at one point he’s left unconscious, possibly bleeding to death, and abandoned by his minions. The art draws back to show the starry sky and barren trees. There’s no one to help him. Kingdok doesn’t beg or even say a word. Smith doesn’t use this to turn the character around into some sympathetic giant or redeemed hero; if you see him again, he’ll probably try to eat you. It’s merely that in his existence, Smith has given him a moment where he’s more vulnerable than any of our heroes have been. It’s the sort of thing that doesn’t happen often in mature grown-up books, and so is more puzzling to discover here.
Don’t let that moment fool you: Bone does not turn to monotone severity. It is merely unafraid of severity. This is still the same book that pokes fun at Herman Melville and has a man serve a monster an invisible sandwich. Often its understated presentation helps moments of gravity. If you go a thousand pages seeing this cheery character, and then he is beaten and his eye is left swollen shut, it has an impact that much graver injuries lack in literary fiction. The point is the brightness of this world, the wit and the goofy lives they’d lead if not for these circumstances; compromises against the brightness are a natural part of it.
January 21, 2008
If somebody had come up to me with this brick and said, "Hey, you should read this! It's like Walt Kelly having a J.R.R. Tolkien-inspired fever dream! For hundreds and hundreds of pages!" I probably would have blinked a couple times and changed the subject.
But this adorably geeky English teacher from one of the Carolinas presented it at a graphic novel forum at NCTE as the only thing the kids in his highly resistant 7th-grade classroom would read cover to cover. And it is oddly gripping, I must say.
But this adorably geeky English teacher from one of the Carolinas presented it at a graphic novel forum at NCTE as the only thing the kids in his highly resistant 7th-grade classroom would read cover to cover. And it is oddly gripping, I must say.
November 7, 2012
(Reprinted from the Chicago Center for Literature and Photography [cclapcenter.com]. I am the original author of this review, as well as the owner of CCLaP; it is not being reprinted illegally.)
It was through CCLaP critic Oriana Leckert's write-up for her Jugs & Capes essay series last year (book version finally coming next week!) that first brought Jeff Smith's epic comic Bone to my attention, plus of course the fevered recommendations I'd sometimes hear from the edges of the comics-loving crowd around me; so when the Chicago Public Library recently acquired a copy of the full 1,500-page omnibus edition, I thought it was finally time for me to sit down and check it out myself. And oh, am I glad I did, for all the passionate fanboy things you hear about it is true; done by a guy who grew up with dual obsessions for Walt Kelly's Pogo and JRR Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings, it's a massive saga that combines both, the tale of three silly cartoon characters from "the next universe over" who stumble one day into the middle of a realistically drawn fantasy epic among the neighbors they never knew they had. So as such, then, there are a whole number of things going on here to admire, that don't sound like they'd go together in one book but somehow do -- the surrealistic expressive perfection of such 1930s cartoons as Krazy Kat and early Disney, the sweeping landscapes of representational drawing, a contemporary sensibility when it comes to dramatic highlights, all married to a story complex enough for a 1,500 page narrative -- and while I'm not a particularly obsessive fan of either Pogo or Lord of the Rings, I sure found myself becoming one of Smith's attempt to bring them together, a project that can be equally loved in a subtle, knowing way by adults (think of the difference between watching Chuck Jones at ten versus thirty) and in a straightforward, surface-level way by the actual ten-year-olds. (And indeed, in what has come as a shock to the indie-zinester creator, one of Bone's largest audiences has turned out to be actual kids, so much so that Scholastic recently paid a hefty sum for the reprint rights, and are spending the next decade re-publishing the entire run now in full color and marketed directly to pre-teens.)
So then flush with heady excitement over this new find, I also pulled up on Netflix a documentary that's been made about Smith and the Bone phenomenon, 2009's The Cartoonist; although I'm happy to report that it turns out to be about a lot more than just that, in reality a great overlook at the entire indie-comics explosion that happened in the 1990s, everything from confessional art-school kids to a new superhero publisher, all the way to such hard-to-classify projects as Bone or Harvey Pekar's American Splendor. It turns out that Smith was part of a little clique of self-publishing cartoonists back then, who banded together in various smart ways in order to help each other stay afloat -- sharing expenses at conventions, promoting each other's work -- making this not just a narrow film about the comic itself and how it came about (although there's plenty of that too, including the revelation that Smith has been casually doodling the "Bone" characters since literally a child, and that in high school and college he really did put them through a series of adventures in their own world that are only briefly referenced in this newest epic), but also a bigger documentary about the DIY spirit, the changing face of small business, the trials and tribulations of self-publishing, and a lot more. Granted, the production values are not high -- it features lots of talking head shots, lots of personal offices being used as set backgrounds, and all the other things one associates with cheap quickie docs found in many DVD extras -- but the content more than makes up for it, especially when coming right on the heels of reading the book for the first time like I did. Both come very strongly recommended.
It was through CCLaP critic Oriana Leckert's write-up for her Jugs & Capes essay series last year (book version finally coming next week!) that first brought Jeff Smith's epic comic Bone to my attention, plus of course the fevered recommendations I'd sometimes hear from the edges of the comics-loving crowd around me; so when the Chicago Public Library recently acquired a copy of the full 1,500-page omnibus edition, I thought it was finally time for me to sit down and check it out myself. And oh, am I glad I did, for all the passionate fanboy things you hear about it is true; done by a guy who grew up with dual obsessions for Walt Kelly's Pogo and JRR Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings, it's a massive saga that combines both, the tale of three silly cartoon characters from "the next universe over" who stumble one day into the middle of a realistically drawn fantasy epic among the neighbors they never knew they had. So as such, then, there are a whole number of things going on here to admire, that don't sound like they'd go together in one book but somehow do -- the surrealistic expressive perfection of such 1930s cartoons as Krazy Kat and early Disney, the sweeping landscapes of representational drawing, a contemporary sensibility when it comes to dramatic highlights, all married to a story complex enough for a 1,500 page narrative -- and while I'm not a particularly obsessive fan of either Pogo or Lord of the Rings, I sure found myself becoming one of Smith's attempt to bring them together, a project that can be equally loved in a subtle, knowing way by adults (think of the difference between watching Chuck Jones at ten versus thirty) and in a straightforward, surface-level way by the actual ten-year-olds. (And indeed, in what has come as a shock to the indie-zinester creator, one of Bone's largest audiences has turned out to be actual kids, so much so that Scholastic recently paid a hefty sum for the reprint rights, and are spending the next decade re-publishing the entire run now in full color and marketed directly to pre-teens.)
So then flush with heady excitement over this new find, I also pulled up on Netflix a documentary that's been made about Smith and the Bone phenomenon, 2009's The Cartoonist; although I'm happy to report that it turns out to be about a lot more than just that, in reality a great overlook at the entire indie-comics explosion that happened in the 1990s, everything from confessional art-school kids to a new superhero publisher, all the way to such hard-to-classify projects as Bone or Harvey Pekar's American Splendor. It turns out that Smith was part of a little clique of self-publishing cartoonists back then, who banded together in various smart ways in order to help each other stay afloat -- sharing expenses at conventions, promoting each other's work -- making this not just a narrow film about the comic itself and how it came about (although there's plenty of that too, including the revelation that Smith has been casually doodling the "Bone" characters since literally a child, and that in high school and college he really did put them through a series of adventures in their own world that are only briefly referenced in this newest epic), but also a bigger documentary about the DIY spirit, the changing face of small business, the trials and tribulations of self-publishing, and a lot more. Granted, the production values are not high -- it features lots of talking head shots, lots of personal offices being used as set backgrounds, and all the other things one associates with cheap quickie docs found in many DVD extras -- but the content more than makes up for it, especially when coming right on the heels of reading the book for the first time like I did. Both come very strongly recommended.
March 2, 2012
Here is a radical statement: this cartoon comic strip is the one thing I have ever read that comes close to the epic fantasy greatness of The Lord of the Rings. What begins as a silly, Looney Tunes-like story about a couple of "bone creatures" getting run out of "Boneville" (sounds pretty childish, huh?) quickly becomes a complex, profound, and - there's no other word for it - EPIC tale about family history, religious cults and a crazy locust monster.
The way I see it, epic fantasy authors stumble in one of two ways. They copy Tolkien or they try to come up with something totally different, and neither of these strategies works. Don't ignore Tolkien - he's everything that's great about fantasy. Don't copy Tolkien - you come off like a hack. There's an argument to be made that Smith falls into the category of Tolkien-hack. After all, the Bone creatures are pretty much hobbits, rat creatures are orcs, the Lord of the Locusts is Sauron, and so forth... But there's enough originality within the mythology and system of magic to distinguish it.
A cartoon comic strip seems to be ill-suited for high fantasy, but it's not - not by a long shot. Richly detailed pictures take place of richly detailed paragraphs. And the humor is much more subtle and much less slapstick than I expected. Again, humor is something that Tolkien understood and could inject appropriately. You can read four thousand pages of George R.R. Martin and never crack a smile, and that wears on you. Even in the darkest moments of the final chapters of Bone, when there are armies of bad guys surrounding the few good guys, Smith knows where and how to crack a joke to lighten the mood just enough give a little hope.
And for goodness' sakes, don't buy the black and white version! Get the full color one volume edition. I know it's expensive, but Smith's panels deserve it.
The way I see it, epic fantasy authors stumble in one of two ways. They copy Tolkien or they try to come up with something totally different, and neither of these strategies works. Don't ignore Tolkien - he's everything that's great about fantasy. Don't copy Tolkien - you come off like a hack. There's an argument to be made that Smith falls into the category of Tolkien-hack. After all, the Bone creatures are pretty much hobbits, rat creatures are orcs, the Lord of the Locusts is Sauron, and so forth... But there's enough originality within the mythology and system of magic to distinguish it.
A cartoon comic strip seems to be ill-suited for high fantasy, but it's not - not by a long shot. Richly detailed pictures take place of richly detailed paragraphs. And the humor is much more subtle and much less slapstick than I expected. Again, humor is something that Tolkien understood and could inject appropriately. You can read four thousand pages of George R.R. Martin and never crack a smile, and that wears on you. Even in the darkest moments of the final chapters of Bone, when there are armies of bad guys surrounding the few good guys, Smith knows where and how to crack a joke to lighten the mood just enough give a little hope.
And for goodness' sakes, don't buy the black and white version! Get the full color one volume edition. I know it's expensive, but Smith's panels deserve it.
Read
January 23, 2021Delightful. I’d heard about Bone for years, and remember seeing the books at my library growing up. It wasn’t until now that I sat down and read it. What a great story. It’s Lord of the Rings by way of Pogo, a strange combination on paper but one that works wonders in practice. I like how it starts off sort of goofy, only to gain depth and grow more epic as the story moves along. The storytelling is very natural and straightforward with no narration. Like a lot of epic fantasy, the final third does get a little plot-heavy and convoluted, but I didn’t mind because Smith made me care about the characters. The Bones, Thorn, Rose, Lucius, Ted the Bug... these guys are so likable and I really cared about them throughout. The Pogo influence is strong, what with the Bones resembling some of Walt Kelly’s animals. I was also reminded of Calvin and Hobbes (which itself was influenced by Pogo), especially Phoney and Smiley’s relationship.
Smith’s art is fantastic. It never falters, and suits the story damn near perfectly. It’s playful, creative, and also very natural. His simple, clean lines and facial expressions convey so much. I understand there’s a color version of Bone out there, but I can’t see it being as effective or beautiful as the black-and-white version in this edition.
Bone is very popular and I’m late to the party. But if you haven’t yet read it, and you like fantasy and good storytelling, I highly recommend it.
Smith’s art is fantastic. It never falters, and suits the story damn near perfectly. It’s playful, creative, and also very natural. His simple, clean lines and facial expressions convey so much. I understand there’s a color version of Bone out there, but I can’t see it being as effective or beautiful as the black-and-white version in this edition.
Bone is very popular and I’m late to the party. But if you haven’t yet read it, and you like fantasy and good storytelling, I highly recommend it.
January 1, 2021
Questa lunga serie a fumetti vede per protagonisti i tre materialisti cugini Bone che, scacciati dalla loro città, si ritrovano persi in una valle con una forte spiritualità e coinvolti nella lotta fra il Bene e il Male che questa terra sta affrontando. Non occorrono molte pagine per affezionarsi ai cugini Bone e appassionarsi alle loro avventure. In un'opera piena di umorismo, con una nonna superforzuta, un indimenticabile drago con la sigaretta, mostri terribili che fanno ridere, divertente ma anche con momenti epici, lotte e sacrifici; Jeff Smith costruisce un fumetto perfetto che richiama allo stesso tempo i miti norreni, il Signore degli Anelli e il fumetto comico statunitense alla Topolino. Il risultato è una straordinaria amalgama di fantasy, avventura e comicità, piena di citazioni; un'opera preziosa e imperdibile.
June 4, 2020
Una curiosa mezcla de cartoon clásico y fantasía épica. Los bone son unas pequeñas criaturas que viven en Boneville. Un dia los habitantes del pueblo envian al exilio a nuestros protagonistas, tres primos que se perderán en un bosque a las primeras de cambio. Ahí empieza una aventura que tiene mucho humor y peligros.
Un pequeño clásico a descubrir.
Un pequeño clásico a descubrir.
August 5, 2023
Fun little childhood comic series I never got to finish back in the day. Was a fun and easy read for the last few weeks of school. The characters all have such good and unique personalities. Such a fun world too!
February 17, 2015
Komiksi ir mana pēdējo laiku (ne to laiku, kas piesaukti Bībelē) aizraušanās. Es burtiski sev esmu atklājis pavisam jaunu lasīšanas pasauli. Vēl neesmu nonācis līdz Betmeniem un citiem supervaroņiem, jo tie man tomēr šķiet nedaudz par bērnišķīgiem un nenopietniem, bet nekad nevar zināt, kur tas novedīs. Šo grāmatu paņēmu tikai tādēļ, ka visos nopietnos komiksu reitingos šis komikss kotējas apbrīnojami augstu. Nācās vien grāmatu pasūtīt un izlasīt.
Trīs Bone brālēni Phoncible P. "Phoney" Bone, Smiley Bone un Fone Bone pēc padzīšanas nodzimtās Boneville pilsētiņas nonāk tuksnesī. Tur viņiem uzbūk siseņu bars, brālēni ceļi šķiras, un noslēpumainajā Ielejā tie nonāk katra pa savu ceļu. Iesākumā šī ieleja šķiet miera osta, taču tajā mīt spēki, kas ir tikpat seni kā šī pasaule. Atsākas vecās nesaskaņas, Bone brālēni uzzina, ka Ieleja ir slavena ne tikai ar savām Govju skriešanās sacīkstēm, bet arī ar seniem tempļiem, žurkradījumiem, Siseņu pavēlnieku un pūķiem. Fone Bone pieķeršanās noslēpumainajai meitenei Thorn un viņas vecmāmiņai nostāda viņu uz varoņa ceļa. Viņam ar tādu ir jākļūst ja vien viņš vēlas izglābt Ieleju.
„Tas nu gan ir viens ķieģelis”, nodomāju, saņemot šo grāmatu. Atšķīris vaļā nodomāju, pie velna te ir tikai melnbaltas bildes? Neslēpšu, man dikti patīk krāsas. Mani sāka mākt aizdomas, ka ar šo tūkstoš trīssimt lapaspušu biezo ķieģeli būšu pamatīgi iepircies. Tomēr atšķirot un sākot lasīt nebija tik traki.
Galvenie personāži autoram ir izdevušies labu labie. Phoncible P. "Phoney" Bone - uzņēmīgs biznesmenis, kas vienmēr izdomā kādu shēmu, lai apmānītu cilvēkus. Cilvēki dusmojas, taču viņam piemīt līdera talants un ķēriens izmantot situāciju. Tas reizēm rada problēmas un nevajadzīgus piedzīvojumus, bet kas tad tas par ceļojumu bez piedzīvojumiem? Smiley Bone – absolūti bezrūpīgs, vienmēr smēķē cigāru, gatavs parakstīties uz jebkādu avantūru, ar prātu neizceļas, taču nav arī sīkumains. Fone Bone – vissaprātīgākais no brālēniem, viņam rūpa arī citi, viņš nav varoņa materiāls, bet dzīve viņu par tādu padara. Thorn – meitene ar neskaidru pagātni, dīvainiem sapņiem, augusi kopā ar savu vecmāmiņu fermā. Protams, ka viss nemaz nav tik vienkārši.
Pasaule ir īsts dārgakmens. Te ir gan vēsture, gan dažādi tās apdzīvotāji. Lord of Locusts vien ir ko vērts, tipisks ļaunā tēls, kas grib atbrīvot senus tumšos spēkus. Viņam patīk skaļi smieties un draudēt visiem ar bojāeju. Žurkradījumi ir asinskāri mošķi ar savu karali Kingdok priekšgalā, tie grib atņemt cilvēku zemes, pie reizes arī labi paēdot. Un vēl pilsētas, ciemi, meži, kalni un lejas.
Stāsts sākumā šķiet bērnišķīgs, tāds pusaudžiem domāts, nekā īpaša. Taču, kad ielasās, pēc pārsimts lapaspusēm notiekošais reāli ierauj un nākas atzīt, ka patiesībā šis ir viens episks varoņa ceļš. Ceļš nav pārāk lineārs, un varoņi nemaz nevēlas kļūt par varoņiem. Pretinieki ir nopietni spēlētāji ar saviem motīviem, viņu virsmērķis nebūt nav pasaules iznīcināšana skaļi smejoties (nu, labi, smieties viņi tomēr mīl), viņus vada skaudība, mantkārība, negausība un tieksme pēc varas. Fone Bone tas viss nav vajadzīgs, viņš vienkārši gribētu notīties no šīs ielejas, taču nespēj tā vienkārši pagriezties un visus atstāt.
Grāmata lasīšanai nudien nav īsti piemērota, viņa sver pāris kilogramus un ilgstoši turēt rokās ir īsts pārbaudījums. Kaut kā jau tiku ar to galā. Lasīšana notika pāris piegājienos. Beigās gan izlasīju pēdējās piecsimt lapaspuses vienā vakarā, lai uzzinātu kā tas viss beidzās. Lieku 9 no 10 ballēm. Ja patīk ne pārāk asiņaini komiksi ar labām beigām, tad silti iesaku.
Trīs Bone brālēni Phoncible P. "Phoney" Bone, Smiley Bone un Fone Bone pēc padzīšanas nodzimtās Boneville pilsētiņas nonāk tuksnesī. Tur viņiem uzbūk siseņu bars, brālēni ceļi šķiras, un noslēpumainajā Ielejā tie nonāk katra pa savu ceļu. Iesākumā šī ieleja šķiet miera osta, taču tajā mīt spēki, kas ir tikpat seni kā šī pasaule. Atsākas vecās nesaskaņas, Bone brālēni uzzina, ka Ieleja ir slavena ne tikai ar savām Govju skriešanās sacīkstēm, bet arī ar seniem tempļiem, žurkradījumiem, Siseņu pavēlnieku un pūķiem. Fone Bone pieķeršanās noslēpumainajai meitenei Thorn un viņas vecmāmiņai nostāda viņu uz varoņa ceļa. Viņam ar tādu ir jākļūst ja vien viņš vēlas izglābt Ieleju.
„Tas nu gan ir viens ķieģelis”, nodomāju, saņemot šo grāmatu. Atšķīris vaļā nodomāju, pie velna te ir tikai melnbaltas bildes? Neslēpšu, man dikti patīk krāsas. Mani sāka mākt aizdomas, ka ar šo tūkstoš trīssimt lapaspušu biezo ķieģeli būšu pamatīgi iepircies. Tomēr atšķirot un sākot lasīt nebija tik traki.
Galvenie personāži autoram ir izdevušies labu labie. Phoncible P. "Phoney" Bone - uzņēmīgs biznesmenis, kas vienmēr izdomā kādu shēmu, lai apmānītu cilvēkus. Cilvēki dusmojas, taču viņam piemīt līdera talants un ķēriens izmantot situāciju. Tas reizēm rada problēmas un nevajadzīgus piedzīvojumus, bet kas tad tas par ceļojumu bez piedzīvojumiem? Smiley Bone – absolūti bezrūpīgs, vienmēr smēķē cigāru, gatavs parakstīties uz jebkādu avantūru, ar prātu neizceļas, taču nav arī sīkumains. Fone Bone – vissaprātīgākais no brālēniem, viņam rūpa arī citi, viņš nav varoņa materiāls, bet dzīve viņu par tādu padara. Thorn – meitene ar neskaidru pagātni, dīvainiem sapņiem, augusi kopā ar savu vecmāmiņu fermā. Protams, ka viss nemaz nav tik vienkārši.
Pasaule ir īsts dārgakmens. Te ir gan vēsture, gan dažādi tās apdzīvotāji. Lord of Locusts vien ir ko vērts, tipisks ļaunā tēls, kas grib atbrīvot senus tumšos spēkus. Viņam patīk skaļi smieties un draudēt visiem ar bojāeju. Žurkradījumi ir asinskāri mošķi ar savu karali Kingdok priekšgalā, tie grib atņemt cilvēku zemes, pie reizes arī labi paēdot. Un vēl pilsētas, ciemi, meži, kalni un lejas.
Stāsts sākumā šķiet bērnišķīgs, tāds pusaudžiem domāts, nekā īpaša. Taču, kad ielasās, pēc pārsimts lapaspusēm notiekošais reāli ierauj un nākas atzīt, ka patiesībā šis ir viens episks varoņa ceļš. Ceļš nav pārāk lineārs, un varoņi nemaz nevēlas kļūt par varoņiem. Pretinieki ir nopietni spēlētāji ar saviem motīviem, viņu virsmērķis nebūt nav pasaules iznīcināšana skaļi smejoties (nu, labi, smieties viņi tomēr mīl), viņus vada skaudība, mantkārība, negausība un tieksme pēc varas. Fone Bone tas viss nav vajadzīgs, viņš vienkārši gribētu notīties no šīs ielejas, taču nespēj tā vienkārši pagriezties un visus atstāt.
Grāmata lasīšanai nudien nav īsti piemērota, viņa sver pāris kilogramus un ilgstoši turēt rokās ir īsts pārbaudījums. Kaut kā jau tiku ar to galā. Lasīšana notika pāris piegājienos. Beigās gan izlasīju pēdējās piecsimt lapaspuses vienā vakarā, lai uzzinātu kā tas viss beidzās. Lieku 9 no 10 ballēm. Ja patīk ne pārāk asiņaini komiksi ar labām beigām, tad silti iesaku.
May 25, 2024
What if you stuck Donald Duck type characters into a fantasy world with the scope of Lord of the Rings? The Bone cousins stumble into a valley and bring their own fish out of water chaos to a place rapidly descending into complete doom. Gods, monsters, men, dragons, the bone cousins. A well written and well drawn nine volume set that I read because it was on a list of the best comic book runs of all time, right beside The Saga of the Swamp Thing by Alan Moore, and The Dark Pheonix by Chris Claremont. This particular comic book run, Bone, is something like 1300 pages all said and done and was scripted, penciled and inked by one person, Jeff Smith. All in all, the run is a work of care and beauty, with genres blurred and fresh. Laughs along the way. Adventure and friendship. Created in the early 90s, still feels new today, thirty years later. It’s quite expensive to buy the set in color but try your local library, it’s a worthwhile read and something that is equal parts worth studying to understand how to write a story with all exposition put smoothly into dialogue, directly from the character’s mouths, showing you what is important to them and why. At the end it really made me want to pick up some of Carl Banks’ DuckTales and Scrooge comics to study them too. Bone is suitable for all ages, full of heart, grand in scope but you won’t feel it happening, as the epic story pulls you along panel by panel with ease, joy, wonder, all those adjectives.
January 29, 2022
i can't believe it took me so long to figure i liked girls
thorn was rIGHT THERE
SHE WAS RIGHT THERE
thorn was rIGHT THERE
SHE WAS RIGHT THERE
June 19, 2015
www.melissa413readsalot.blogspot.com
I have been wanting to read these books for years, but never bought them. I saw this tome of all 9 books on Amazon and have been waiting to buy it, when lo and behold, the library has it! I am so glad I got to read this graphic novel, finally!
I love the Bone cousins, Fone Bone being my favorite :) The cousins get kicked out of their home town, Boneville, because Phoney Bone cheated the town. He's not that nice of a Bone, but he does alright in the end. At any rate, they get lost in the woods and are trying to find a way to sneak back into town. This leads to an epic adventure of rat creatures, creepy people in robes, cow races, dragons, princesses and queens. There is a cast of gullible towns people at the bar that good ole Phoney Bone tries to swindle left and right. He does pretty good at it too.
Fone Bone falls in love with Thorn, who lives on a farm with her cow racing grandma. Smiley Bone is the funny one of the cousins and he is always coming up with something funny to say or do. They all have a cast of forest critters that talk to them and become good friends with, even a bug named Ted :)
I love all of the characters in the book. I love Lucius who owns the tavern, grandma is a hoot, the few townsfolk are a great crew as well. I love all of the critters they talk to and the little rat creature baby they take on. Smiley names him Bartleby.
They finally fulfill their quest and attempt to make their way home once again. The end was sad and a little bitter sweet. I loved it though and the journey with the Bones' was a great one!
I have been wanting to read these books for years, but never bought them. I saw this tome of all 9 books on Amazon and have been waiting to buy it, when lo and behold, the library has it! I am so glad I got to read this graphic novel, finally!
I love the Bone cousins, Fone Bone being my favorite :) The cousins get kicked out of their home town, Boneville, because Phoney Bone cheated the town. He's not that nice of a Bone, but he does alright in the end. At any rate, they get lost in the woods and are trying to find a way to sneak back into town. This leads to an epic adventure of rat creatures, creepy people in robes, cow races, dragons, princesses and queens. There is a cast of gullible towns people at the bar that good ole Phoney Bone tries to swindle left and right. He does pretty good at it too.
Fone Bone falls in love with Thorn, who lives on a farm with her cow racing grandma. Smiley Bone is the funny one of the cousins and he is always coming up with something funny to say or do. They all have a cast of forest critters that talk to them and become good friends with, even a bug named Ted :)
I love all of the characters in the book. I love Lucius who owns the tavern, grandma is a hoot, the few townsfolk are a great crew as well. I love all of the critters they talk to and the little rat creature baby they take on. Smiley names him Bartleby.
They finally fulfill their quest and attempt to make their way home once again. The end was sad and a little bitter sweet. I loved it though and the journey with the Bones' was a great one!
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