Patricia Briggs Mercy Thompson: Moon Called Volume 1 TP [Paperback]

Mercy Thompson is one of the cooler heroines of urban fantasy -- instead of a glamorous-sounding "tough girl" job, she's a simple car mechanic. Who works for a faery. And turns into a coyote.

Okay, maybe she's not a "simple" car mechanic, but she is a pleasantly down-to-earth protagonist. And "Patricia Briggs' Mercy Thompson: Moon Called Volume 1 TP (Mercy Thompson 1)" is a solid adaptation of the first half of the first Mercy Thompson book -- lots of lycanthropic action, solid art, and some perplexing color choices.

When a young werewolf runaway named Mac wanders into her garage, Mercy takes the kid under her wing. She even rescues him from a couple of thugs who previously caged and experimented on him, leaving one of the thugs dead.

When she hands Mac over to Adam Hauptmann, the local werewolf Alpha, it seems like her part is over. But then she finds Mac dead on her doorstep, and finds Adam severely wounded. Her only chance of helping him -- and finding out who did this -- is to go in search of the ancient werewolf leader known as the Marrok.

"Patricia Briggs' Mercy Thompson: Moon Called Volume 1" is a textbook example of how to do comic book adaptations RIGHT -- the plot is lean, smooth and fast-moving, with no fat that needs to be trimmed. And David Lawrence balances out the action, dialogue and inner monologuing nicely ("All the testosterone might turn a girl's head...").

As for the art... don't worry. The ugly Brett Boothian cover is NOT representative of the art inside. Amelia Woo's artwork is spare, realistic and detailed, with lots of purple-toned nights, golden-hued indoor shots and grey flashbacks. It's obvious a lot of care went into this work.

The one problem with the art: Why is Mercy white? She's supposed to be half-Blackfeet Indian with coloring to match, yet she has pale skin and reddish-brown hair. To make it even MORE confusing, the half-Salish Charles is given olive skin and black hair, the same coloring Mercy has on the COVER. What gives?

"Patricia Briggs' Mercy Thompson: Moon Called Volume 1" suffers from some bizarre color choices, but otherwise is a solid adaptation of a gritty, suspenseful urban fantasy.

I originally read this comic as an ARC and then decided to purchase it immediately before I even finished it. Since I was reading the series via ebooks, I wanted something for Ms. Briggs to sign for when I meet her at San Diego Comic Con this July. I was going to try to get through the ebooks as fast as I could so that I could then also purchase a paper copy of my favorite installment. After seeing this comic, there's no longer a need. And even better, it fits in with the theme since it's about the comics at Comic Con (well, it supposed to be anyway). I'm now super excited so I can spaz to Ms. Briggs in person about how wonderful of a job the artist did. I can already tell this is one of the best. Talk about doing a series justice!

No doubt this graphic novel adaptation accomplishes the most important goal of all; it's very visually very pleasing to look at! That's the point of a graphic novel at all, right? I actually enjoyed the comic much more than the actual book. The book comes off as somewhat bland in parts (though the series gets better with every book), but seeing the action come to life on the pages gets my adrenaline pumping. The drawing style is fabulous and not over the top. I love the coloring and shading and spent a few panels simply admiring the images. I feel like it truly captures the Mercy Thompson world. Mercy's gorgeous, Adam's sexy, and Sam actually looks much better than I assumed he looked in the books. I thought the artist was very good with expressing the characters' emotions as well. A few of the transformation scenes were a little awkwardly drawn, but it didn't detract from my enjoyment.

I like that it's close to the book. I think that made me read it much faster. Unlike the book, it kicks off with action to draw you in. It was a nice technique to keep it engaging. I felt the pacing was just right. There wasn't a moment where I was bored and yet it stayed true to the plot.

I always have this trepidation of looking at fictional characters outside of the reading medium. 9 times out of 10 it just doesn't capture the images I've conjured up in my mind. I am so pleased that's not the case here.

We get a bonus section that's by a completely different artist. It's a completely different style that doesn't portray the dark urban fantasy feel, so I didn't really connect to it as much. Also, some of the proportions and angles were off. I recall at one point a character was drawn cross-eyed.

It ends with short of a narration of the panels to see how the artist conceptualized the panels. It was pretty cool to see their process, but not really necessary. My biggest enjoyment was in the meat of the story. I wish we could have seen Stefan, Warren, and Kyle in this volume though.

Because these look so good and flow so well, I plan to follow the comics for this series in conjunction with the books, as long as Ms. Amelia Woo continues to illustrate. It's very rare that I can say I prefer any other medium to the original, but in this case I very much prefer the comic to the novel.

(ARC provided by NetGalley)

"I'm Mercy Thompson da** it, and I'll do what I have to do!"

Mercedes "Mercy" Thompson runs a mechanic shop in the Tri-Cities area. Life is pretty ho-hum until Mac, a 16-year old werewolf, appears asking for a job. Mercy agrees, but there is something about Mac that is startlingly different. An attack on the local Alpha, Adam, the abduction of his daughter, Jesse, and the murder of Mac is just the beginning.

Patricia Briggs' Moon Called was an enjoyable Urban Fantasy novel. Mercy Thompson was a likeable character, the story was interesting, the werewolf mythos was different and intriguing. I also really liked Mercy Thompson: Homecoming, a graphic novel prequel to the story. So when I found that "Moon Called" had been adapted into graphic novel format, I was excited and immediately bought both Volume 1 and Volume 2.

Since this is a graphic novel, let's start with the artwork. Volume 1 includes the first four issues of the comic. The cover art is done by Brett Booth, who has been doing the Laurell K. Hamilton Anita Blake books (he does Issue #1), and Amelia Woo, who did some of the art in the later portions of "Homecoming" (she does Issues #2 - 4). Brett Booth's style just isn't my thing. His characters all look the same--and they all look like characters from Hamilton's Anita Blake series. Same beefcake physique for men; same brilliant white for vampires; same pouty, doe-eyed look for the women. Not my thing. Amelia Woo's cover art looked more like how I was accustomed to seeing Mercy from "Homecoming": a strong, confident Mercy, with dark hair and a body that looks like it would work on cars.

However, the actual art for the comic was a different story. I'm not going to say it was bad; it was pretty darn good. The colors were great, and definitely created a mood. The werewolves were nicely done, as was Zee. The action scenes were very nicely portrayed as well. But...it was hard to tell which werewolf was which. And then we have Mercy. In most of the panels, Mercy looks like a very white anime girl who looks like she would get knocked over just lifting up a wrench. Lean lines, light brown hair, barely tinted skin, and, of course, big boobs with teeny tiny waist. I always got the impression that Mercy looked more like Michelle Rodriquez than Emma Watson, Jena Malone, or Kristen Stewart; this comic, however, didn't show that side.

Of course, this is MY perception of the artwork; other people may not have the same interpretation of Mercy and will love it. That is great, and to those that love it, I am glad you do.

The characters themselves are great. Mercy is still our humorous, independent shapeshifter. Mac, Adam, Jesse, Zee, Bran, Sean...they all appear here and are great. Stefan doesn't appear, which kinda makes me sad; he was a riot.

Speaking of which, the graphic novel definitely didn't lose the humor. One of my favorite lines was when Mercy and Jesse were talking about eating cookie dough: "In this house we eat our cookie dough like civilized women--with a spoon". I don't know why; it just tickled me and got me to laugh out loud.

One of the biggest concerns when reading a graphic novel adaptation is the story: did it get chopped up beyond recognition? In this case, I would say no. David Lawrence does a great job moving from the written word to pictures--he even includes an interesting essay at the end describing the difficulties of his job (definitely worth a read). The story flows well, keeps all the important plot lines, and doesn't wallow too much in unnecessary narration. I really liked how it very much functioned without having to know the novel--I haven't read "Moon Called" in a long time, and yet I didn't feel confused very much at all. (Any confusion I did have was about interpreting text or panels--things that aren't the fault of adapting.)

And lastly, this graphic novel includes a chapter detailing what happened to Mac. I really liked it; it cleaned up some questions I had and was particularly poignant.

I really enjoyed this graphic novel adaptation of "Moon Called". The story and characters were just as great as in the novel. Sure, the artwork doesn't always fit what I expected, but that is why I am only knocking down 1 star. A good read for long-time fans or for those new to the series.

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