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A review by saidtheraina
Sailor Twain: Or: The Mermaid in the Hudson by Mark Siegel
2.0
I wanted to like this more than I did.
It's an epic tale incorporating northeast amerikan myth, literary legends, lustful temptation, slavery politics, and workplace ethics. And it's received a lot of acclaim. Personally, though, I didn't connect.
The art was extremely uneven for me. There are beautiful panels, but caricatured human figures felt like an odd choice for the charcoal aesthetic. Some of the shading work or lack of which got downright dissonant in context. It felt like a mock-up for the color, ink version still to come. But I know I'm in the minority on that.
But really, I've been won over by a lot of disappointing art. Books I've balked at at first, I start and get pulled into the story. And this book should have done that. And it didn't. I kept being distracted by the quality of the art, and a good enough story would have distracted me from that.
I also felt like the women here were overly simplified. They didn't feel real. It's a little too like a fever dream.
I don't know, I wanted to like it. But I didn't. And maybe I'm not the intended audience. So maybe I shouldn't hold my dislike against the book. It clearly has its fans.
It's an epic tale incorporating northeast amerikan myth, literary legends, lustful temptation, slavery politics, and workplace ethics. And it's received a lot of acclaim. Personally, though, I didn't connect.
The art was extremely uneven for me. There are beautiful panels, but caricatured human figures felt like an odd choice for the charcoal aesthetic. Some of the shading work or lack of which got downright dissonant in context. It felt like a mock-up for the color, ink version still to come. But I know I'm in the minority on that.
But really, I've been won over by a lot of disappointing art. Books I've balked at at first, I start and get pulled into the story. And this book should have done that. And it didn't. I kept being distracted by the quality of the art, and a good enough story would have distracted me from that.
I also felt like the women here were overly simplified. They didn't feel real. It's a little too like a fever dream.
I don't know, I wanted to like it. But I didn't. And maybe I'm not the intended audience. So maybe I shouldn't hold my dislike against the book. It clearly has its fans.