Alan Ball (1) (1957–)

Finally, a way to get more True Blood action during the off season! I was expecting the graphic novels to be as painful to read as the original novels, but the first volume was surprisingly enjoyable! This way we get the visuals (Eric = yum), but we leave out the annoying southern accents.

A middle-aged loser turns his life upside down.

It's interesting that this, Fight Club and Office Space all came out in the same year. What's with people in 1999 hating their jobs/lives? Back then Lester Burnham seemed like the ultimate middle-class hero, but now he seems like an irresponsible shmuck (but a lovable irresponsible shmuck who's fun to watch).

Concept: B
Story: A
Characters: A
Dialog: A
Pacing: B
Cinematography: A
Special effects/design: A
Acting: B
Music: B

Enjoyment: A

GPA: 3.6/4

So, this story begins on a rainy night in Louisiana. An evil spirit, and Imp Shaloop, comes to Merlotte's and traps the staff and patrons. It is an old Choctaw spirit that eats souls with evil thoughts. He calls himself Ted and requires all of the patrons to tell the most shameful secret about themselves before he will let them go.

Sookie, Eric, Tara, Sam, Lafayette, and Jason willingly tell their stories. Bill is the last to tell his. But the spirit is a trickster whose real purpose is to show more take revenge on Eric because Eric refused to help the trickster spirit's mother when the spirit begged for help. The spirit also kills a number of the patrons in Merlotte's including the girl who was Jason's date. But since the characters killed by Ted, in the Star Trek terminology, are all "red shirts", we don't really miss them. There deaths just serve to ramp up the sense of danger. After the trickster collects all the stories, he forces Eric to feel all the emotions he collected which is very hard on a vampire. Then he lets them go. But Eric sticks around to talk to Sookie about something he really fears - a crazy vampire that he thought Godric had staked. Then the book ends on that cliffhanger.

The story was interesting and had some backstory about our favorite characters that help make them more well-rounded people. I would have liked more depth to the story but lack of depth seems to be a characteristic of graphic novels that I don't feel the art quite compensates for.

The full-color art was well-done except for one frame early in the book where the terrible scary monster was almost completely swallowed the by center binding of the book (pp 14-15). The characters mostly look like they do on the television show. I did have trouble recognizing Tara in a couple of the frames. I liked the composition of the frames and the color palette used. This would be a good book for fans of True Blood to have if they, like me, are waiting for the next season to come out on DVD. show less

Being a True Blood show and Sookie Stackhouse book fan, of course I jumped at the chance to borrow this from my pal. The artwork is colorful, rich, but some images were a little too vague in the face, especially for the background cast, while other profiles were dead-on.

Big thumbs up for the realistic tone and dialogue of the characters.

As for the plot, it's slightly silly but it fits a volume one for True Blood fans and accomplishes what it sets out to do -- gives fanboys and fangirls show more everywhere a chance to learn a deep dark secret about their favorite cast members. The secret has nothing to do with revealing characters for the book, but it does dig deeper into the televised show as a separate entity.

It feels different from the TV show, disconnected somehow, so that it doesn't further it much for fans for the storyline. All of them are in at Sam's bar one night when a mysterious creature walks in, where they must reveal an intimate secret they never told anyone about to satisfy their debt with it. Their is no major, central plot to the book, more of a character revealing and deeper inspection of those people have fallen in love with from the show.

Honestly most of the stories weren't terribly exciting. Almost all were from childhood moments, and each ended with a therapeutic gathering of the group reassuring the person it wasn't really their fault. If you're a big fan you'll want this one for completionist sake. If you're a casual viewer or only read the books, this colorful graphic novel will do little to rouse your interest. show less