Charlaine Harris

This review is for part three of Dynamite's graphic novel adaptation of Grave Sight by Charlaine Harris. Parts one and two opened with flashbacks. Why should the final part be any different?

The flashback is from two years ago, outside the city of Beatrice, Nebraska. Harper locates the body of a missing old woman. Her widower is very grateful.

Then we're back in Sarne, Arkansas, in the present. Harper has run out on Deputy Hollis Boxleitner because she doesn't feel right about having sex with him in the house he shared with his murdered wife. She goes back to the motel where she and her stepbrother/manager, Tolliver Lang, are staying. She's attacked when she enters their room. It's Scotty, that teen jock from part two. Harper is fighting back when Hollis reaches them.

The next morning, Harper has a visitor. It's Mary Nell Teague, daughter of Sybil Teague, the widow who hired Harper to find her murdered son Dell's girlfriend, Teenie Hopkins. Mary Nell wants Tolliver out of jail, as Harper does. Mary Nell had called a lawyer named Toby Buckell, but he wanted an adult. She didn't call her mom's lawyer, Paul Edwards, because he and Dell had a big argument.

Visiting hours at the jail are two to three o'clock, so Harper decides to get some information from the Teague family plot. She's about to do a reading on Dick Teague, Dell's father, when a shot chips the tombstone and cuts her cheek. She calls 911. Unfortunately, it's Officer Marv Bledsoe, the jerk who arrested Tolliver in part two, who shows up.

Harper visits Tolliver and tells him she's got an attorney from Little Rock: Phyllis Folliette, a friend of their regular attorney.
Afterward, Mary Nell shows up and takes Harper for a ride, during which they discuss Mary Nell's family and the murdered Helen Hopkins, whom Mary Nell liked, but her mother wouldn't rehire after Mrs. Hopkins sobered up. She thinks Miss Helen stole something from her mother.

Harper meets Phyllis Folliette the next day. Phyllis asks Harper if she's related to the Cameron Conelly who went missing in Texas, and if Cameron was ever found. (Harper is her sister and she'll find Cameron some day.) They wait for Tolliver's cas to come up. The case is quickly over and Tolliver is free.

Despite the fact a storm is coming, Harper and Tolliver leave Sarne for Mount Parnassus. It's not a real place in Arkansas, but Mount Parnassus in Greece is where the Delphi Oracle was located. They're eating when they get a call from Sybil Teague, with a claim about Mary Nell and an urgent request they come to her house. This inspires Harper to figure out what the mysterious letters that the murdered Sally Hopkins Boxleitner found meant.

The Teague house is dark when they get there. Harper calls for Boxleitner, but he and the other police are dealing with two crimes. Harper and Tollver enter separately and stealthily. Someone shoots at Harper. Harper downs the shooter. The confrontation is on. It's ugly,

The bonus materials in this volume starts with an interview with Charlaine Harris herself. Cool! That's followed by reproductions of all of the covers, including the variant cover for volume one. Then there are general notes, a two-page tryout script, and two pages of pencils. The last page is head shots and brief descriptions of eight cast members. It was nice to find out who Mr. Vale was.

I like the art, the adaptation gives a good idea of what happened in the original book. I wish that some locations had been captioned so I didn't have to infer where they were for the important places section, but that shouldn't be a problem for the casual reader.

Do I recommend this adaptation for graphic novel mysteries, Charlaine Harris, and Harper Conelly fans? Yes,.… (mere)

I waited until I had been able to buy all three parts of this graphic novel adaptation of Grave Sight by Charlaine Harris before I read them. Just because I have a copy of the original book didn't mean that I was willing to wait between parts.

Harper Connelly has been able to find corpses and know how they died since she was struck by lightning when she was 15. Now she uses that power to make a living. Her stepbrother, Tolliver Lang, who saved her life when the lightning struck her, is now her manager. This book opens with a flashback to seven years ago. It's about how Tolliver found Harper when she was walking around. Her older sister, Cameron, went missing. A crying Harper wonders she can't find her.

Back to the present, Harper is practicing her gift in a cemetery outside of Sarne, Arkansas. Tolliver is with her. Deputy Hollis Boxleitner shows up. He warns them about the hard-type state police that have just come. The biggest state officer is quite rude to Harper after the questioning in town. He even called her a vulture.

Tolliver and Harper find Mary Nell Teague, daughter of the Mrs. Teague who hired Harper to find her dead son Dell's girlfriend, Teenie Hopkins, waiting by their car. Three teen boys across the street come over. The biggest is Scotty, who is apparently sweet on Mary Nell and doesn't like her asking Tolliver if he wants to have a coke with her. (Scott goes so far as to say that people who talk to the dead have the devil in them. Harper doesn't talk to the dead, she merely knows their last moments.)
Harper invites Mary Nell to have dinner with her and Tolliver.

At the restaurant, Mary Nell drops a bombshell about Dell and Teenie. During the dinner, Harper gets a call from the deputy. They meet for a drink. She talks about her dream house. Hollis asks her about her worse case. It involved a tornado. She asks him about himself. When they part, they kiss.

Harper is jogging the next morning when Scotty nearly runs her over and then comes out of his truck to confront her. Good thing Harper is prepared. Sheriff Branscom shows up and helps.

Harper goes to a local funeral home, where she met Elijah Gleason, so she can get a reading on the murdered Helen Hopkins.

Harper and Tolliver have burgers with Deputy Hollis Boxleitner. It turns out that Helen, Sally, and Teenie Hopkins used to clean at the Teagues' house. Sally had found something there before she was murdered, but Hollis doesn't know what it was, only what Sally wanted to look it up in.

Harper and Tolliver go see Jay Hopkins, Helen's ex-husband, bio father of Sally, treated Teenie as if she were his own. They need something from him and he agrees.

A police officer named Marv Bledsoe arrests Tolliver, claiming there's an open warrant for him regarding the Montana incident that opened book one. He makes another claim that's just as shady.

Harper discusses this and what Sally discovered with Deputy Boxleitner. Harper finds it, but the clue makes no sense.

Part two ends with Harper and Hollis getting frisky. Its' a good continuation of the story. I'm pleased I managed to get the Sheriff's last name and the first name of Mrs. Teague's husband from this one.

This time the bonus material isn't just about the art. Wiliam Harms writes about adapting the book to a graphic novel format.… (mere)

3.5 Nostalgic Stars

I haven’t read a Charlaine Harris novel in a little over ten years, and what stood out to me the most is that her female protagonists are still sensible and resilient. What also remains the same is her simple storytelling that just pulls the reader along easily with no fuss.

Here, Lisbeth Rose is a very good gunslinger, and she knows it. So when she takes a job escorting and guarding two wizards across the southern US and into Mexico, she does it not only for the money but to also ensure some secrets remain hidden. As Lisbeth and her two companions travel across the brutal landscape, one knows that their journey will be anything but easy.

This series is an untamed alternate history Western, where the US has been devastated by disease, loss, and an unraveling of the government and its territories. Toss in the Holy Russian Empire who now rules from California, along with plenty of magic and shootouts, this is a world where everyone’s just trying to survive any which way they can.

Overall, Lisbeth is an unconventional heroine, competent and deadly when needed, older than her young 19 years, firmly grounded in practicality, and not prone to nonsense from herself and certainly, not from others.

I enjoyed exploring Harris’s latest creation and plan to come back to see what’s in store for this shrewd heroine soon!… (mere)

The main character, Aurora Teagarden, is a librarian in a little Georgia town, although she doesn’t spend much time in the library in this 9th installation of the Aurora Teagarden Mystery series. Soon after learning she is pregnant, the settling in of her recently arrived younger half-brother, who has run away from his dysfunctional home in California, is interrupted when he and a few of his peers go missing and one turns up dead. The dichotomy of character types is well portrayed and I remained engaged throughout the story.… (mere)