Avril Lavigne's Make 5 Wishes Vol. 1
Del Rey Manga
I honestly have a hard time imagining how this particular graphic novel even came to be. Artist Camilla D'Errico's concept sketches included in the back of the volume seem to indicate that she was working on a story called "Iku and Oni" at some point, using these character designs and basic concepts. The story she tells along with scripter Joshua Dysart seems like it could have been told perfectly well without Lavigne's involvement.
And what exactly is Lavigne's involvement? Well, the credits bill her as "starring" in the book, and she writes the introduction and ... that seems to be about it. (When Tokyopop published Courtney Love-related manga Princess Ai, Love at least got credit for co-creating the character).
So the cynical reading is that they just kinda slapped her name on the thing to boost sales, a move that worked, as Del Rey issued a press release saying the first printing sold out within four days, forcing them to go back to press for a second printing.
But it's hard to stay cynical about a book this charming for too long.
Lavigne actually only co-stars. The real star is troubled high-schooler Hana, a friendless, lonely, unnoticed girl who amuses herself by pretending to be different people online and striking up friendships with people she knows in real life but never speaks to, listening to Lavigne's music in her headphones to drown out the sound of her parents fighting and talking to Lavigne, a sort of imaginary friend who also acts like her conscience.
When Hana stumbles upon website make5wishes.com, she places an order and receives an adorable but scary little red demon—which looks like a combination between Disney's Stitch and a Chinese lion—in a box, and it promises to grant her five wishes. It does so, but monkey's paw-style.
While the titular pop star's presence will likely scare away some regular comics readers (though far fewer readers than it will attract), if you take Lavigne out of the equation completely, it's still a beautifully constructed book, with D'Errico's rough, manga-inspired pencils colored without any ink laid on top of them. There's also a pretty interesting story about the redemptive power of pop music in here as well, if you're willing to look for it. Even pop music that comes courtesy of the singer who gave us "Sk8er Boi."
The Professor's Daughter
First Second
If you thought women were second-class citizens in Victorian society, just imagine the plight of the poor, bandage-wrapped pharaohs archaeologists like Professor Bowells were digging up in Egypt and bringing back to England. Technically, a mummy is an antiquity, and therefore belongs to the country of the person who found it. In Imhotep III's case, he belongs to Bowells and England, despite the fact that he's so well-preserved that he can still walk and talk 3,000 years after having been entombed.
Imhotep's plight is the focus of the very first collaboration of French comics greats Joann Sfar and Emmanuel Guibert, the team responsible for Sardine in Outer Space, and First Second has just had it translated and published in the U.S. Here the pair switch creative duties, with Sardine artist Sfar scripting this delightful little romantic adventure comedy, and Sardine writer Guibert illustrating it all in a delicate watercolors.
It's an incredibly fast-moving adventure—the whole thing's just over 60 pages—which includes Imhotep courting the professor's daughter, a dramatic murder trial, a daring escape from the Tower of London and Queen Victoria being thrown into the Thames.
Sfar and Guibert play with the gender (and international) politics of the day, as well as the concept of ownership when applied to human beings (be they a mummy or a daughter), but that's all they do, play. There's no grand political statements made here—it's just a nice, fun romance between an Egyptian mummy and an upper-class English young woman.