Queenie Chan & Dean Koontz
In Odd We Trust (2008)
Authors: Queenie Chan & Dean Koontz-Illustrations by Queenie Chan
Genre: Graphic Novel (Suspense/Thriller)
Plot Summary:
Odd Thomas is a talented nineteen-year-old. He makes extraordinary pancakes as a fry cook at the Pico Mundo Grille and he sees dead people, including Elvis, who likes to hang out in Pico Mundo. In this story, Odd sees the ghost of a murdered child, Joey Gordon, and tries to help catch his killer. Stormy Llewellyn, Odd’s pistol packing girlfriend, comes on board to help. Her long time friend, Sherry, was the housekeeper and babysitter for the Gordon family and the one who found Joey’s body. Sherry had been receiving threatening letters from an obvious stalker, and a similar one, pasted from magazine typefaces, was found at the murder scene. Odd Thomas, Stormy, Sherry, and the Chief of Police believe the stalker is not only responsible for Joey’s death, but is also planning to kill more children. Odd gets help from Joey’s ghost and Stormy’s marksmanship as they narrow their search for the killer. SPOILER: The killer was at the Gordon house to kill Sherry, but Joey returned from school unexpectedly, surprising the killer, before Sherry arrived.
Geographical Setting: Pico Mundo, CA
Time Period: Contemporary (2008)
Series: This is a prequel to the Odd Thomas series and the first one in graphic novel form. Technically, it is book four of the series, but is meant to preclude the others in Koontz’s Odd Thomas series.
Appeal Characteristics:
The story begins slowly, in first person, as Odd introduces himself and his hometown and explains to the reader about his ability to see dead people. Once Odd’s day at the Pico Mundo Grille begins, however, the story changes to the omniscient point of view as the reader observes the unfolding story. The pace changes and maintains a more roller coaster like feel once Odd, Stormy, Sherry, and the Police Chief meet up at the crime scene and the hunt for the killer begins in earnest. The page layout and design is very linear, reminiscent of early comic book layout, which makes it a good choice for people who have not been exposed to the wildly various layouts of the new generation of graphic novels. The black and white artwork, by former Tokyopop artist, Queenie Chan, is clean and crisp with a hint of manga-styled drawn characters with large eyes and lean faces. The shading of the artwork helps to set the tone, with more black, white, and light grey half tones in the beginning and the darker, black background frames as the menacing story line intensifies. Set in Pico Mundo, California the story, drawings, and themes: a town square, parades, and comfortable family homes, reinforce the idea of an all-American small town. This is not a graphic translation of an existing work, but an original story, which although dark, has touches of humor. Chan & Koontz, who share writing credit, distilled the prose to fit this form perfectly. There is no real depth to the characters but the title does supply some back-story for Stormy, Sherry, and Odd, who reappear in the Odd Thomas series, along with Police Chief Porter, and Odd’s boss, Terri Stambaugh.
Read-alikes: If the reader enjoyed the illustrations by Queenie Chan and the eerie, but not terribly gruesome storyline, they might want to try her series: The Dreaming. The Dreaming is one story, told in 3 volumes, that features twin fifteen-year-old girls who go off to a private boarding school in Sydney. Once there, they find that girls have occasionally gone missing from the nearby Australian bush. Both girls begin having the same dream, night after night, causing them to wonder if the dreaming is related to the school. The tone is darker and the artwork is more elaborate and Victorian in style than but readers who enjoyed Chan & Koontz’s storyline of a boy that can see ghosts might like Bizenghast, by M. Alice LeGrow. A gothic horror that shares the contemporary time frame of In Odd We Trust. Bizenghast centers on Dinah, an orphan being raised in Bizenghast, MA by her aunt. Dinah develops a mental disorder after recovering from the auto crash that killed her parents and she realizes she can see ghosts. As she struggles to keep her sanity, she befriends a boy named Vincent who calms her and helps her solve puzzles and perform tasks to keep Dinah from becoming a ghost in the mysterious mausoleum of dead souls herself. Local, by Bryan Wood and Ryan Kelley shares the contemporary setting of In Odd We Trust as well as a, storyline that focuses on nineteen to twenty-something adults. More realistic and believable than In Odd We Trust (IOWT), the tone is similar, as is the switch from first person to an omniscient point of view. Local focuses on Megan McKeenan as she travels across the United States, taking odd jobs, and experiencing creepy roommates and strange dates, while looking for a place that feels like home. Although there is no paranormal angle to the story of Megan McKeenan, it seems possible that her travels and experiences could easily put her in Pico Mundo, CA, where she would fit right in at Odd’s Pico Mundo Grille. The artwork is black and white, as in IOWT but there are less gray tones, which gives it a gritty feel. Another title, like , IOWT, that might appeal to people with limited exposure to graphic novels is Too Cool to Be Forgotten by Alex Robinson. LikeIOWT, the page layout is reminiscent of classic American black and white comics. The artwork is more Marmaduke than manga. In Too Cool to be Forgotten, balding, middle aged, Andrew Wicks goes to a new age healer to quit smoking and finds himself back in high-school. Robinson uses pop culture references, as do Chan and Koontz, but Robinson’s references help to anchor the story in 1985. Robinson’s story is humorous but not without a dark side, which exists in the possibility that Andrew might eliminate a lot more than his smoking addiction due to his return to the past. Luckily, he has his knowledge of Star Trek’s space/time continuum episodes to help him prevent that. Elvis’s ghost appears in In Odd We Trust and hangs out with Odd quite frequently. In Rich Koslowski’s The King, an Elvis impersonator takes Las Vegas and the music world by storm, thrilling Elvis fans everywhere. Dressed in the traditional glitzy Elvis show regalia, this King tops his costume with a golden helmet that covers his face. His act is so incredibly realistic and he is so talented that some people start to believe that he is the real Elvis. Paul Erfurt, a down on his luckinvestigative journalist, sets out to discover the King’s true identity. Like IOWT, this graphic novel is loaded with odd characters and situations. The black and white drawings are simple but expressive and the dialogue is natural, and sometimes unexpectedly philosophical.
Red Flags: Violence
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