Joe is a young man with no home, no purpose, and almost no friends...though he does have a very special cat. With a simple injection, Joe's cat can be anything: a weapon, a tool, or even a cuddly companion. But what--if anything--can transform Joe? Whatever it is, it can probably be found in King City, an outrageous semi-futuristic city full of spy gangs, alien porn, and reasonably priced diners.
Book Description
Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
This bit of tongue-and-cheek third-generation fight manga is wondrously fun, but difficult to classify. The hero, Joe, employs a magic cat, Earthling J. J. Cattingworth the Third, to do his fighting, lock picking and spy-gizmo work. (PETA members, beware—Joe makes the cat "work" by flinging syringes full of drugs at it.) Joe and his friend Pete do jobs for various shady characters, until Pete falls in love with a water-breathing alien he is charged to deliver to a club for nefarious purposes. Meanwhile, Joe is spying on mob bosses who eat cannibal sushi. Joe and his cat meet a Sasquatch named Lukashev who spent his youth "as part of a super-naut program, along with a chupacabra and a dinosaur from the future." The fun with words points to an older audience, but the humor has juvenile moments (at one point, Joe uses the cat as a periscope by looking up its butt). The art, while not sophisticated, has a funky sense of movement that suits the hilarious whole. Where Graham really succeeds is in making readers care about these oddballs, especially when Joe risks his life to save his ex-girlfriend from a bad guy (if you can imagine throwing a drugged cat at a mobster as a dramatic moment). (Apr.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
From Booklist
Graham's serial pits twentysomething Joe, a punster whose cat can, given the appropriate injection, morph into just the right tool for the occasion, against a diabolical organization that deals in "chalk," an illicit drug. King City, a futuristic but wholly recognizable place of big buildings, bad neighborhoods, and elusive beauty, is crawling with problems Joe and his cat must confront; chief among them is helping Joe's friend Pete escape the bad guys after Pete helps a captive of theirs, a beautiful young woman who requires ample water and medication, to go into hiding. Graham's manga-inspired images juxtapose light and shadow evocatively and present readers with dizzying points of view into scary alleys and from high places about town. Joe's double-jointed patter keeps the mood light despite many dangerous attacks by black-suited bad guys and counterattacks by cat-as-weapon. How chalk is "farmed" is gruesome and compelling. This episode ends with the cliff-hanging arrival of the beauty, now apparently in control of the situation, at least until Joe's cat gets some restorative soup. Francisca Goldsmith
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
KING ME!,
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This review is from: King City Volume 1 (Paperback)
i just finished reading King City by Brandon Graham... holy crap! this book is the joint! Joe is a Cat Master, like a Green Lantern, except instead of a power ring, he wields a cat that can manifest multiple different powers depending on the injections he gives it. although well-trained, Joe is a listless thief (a cat burglar, if you will) and drifter until he gets caught up in some drama and it gets real!
Masterfully crafted by do-it-all creative monster Brandon Graham (Multiple Warhedz, Escalator), one of those guys who combine manga storytelling techniques with urban style and humor. Although he does include some serious situations, Graham never strays too far from the fun, wittiness that many comics lack!
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Excellent madness,
By
This review is from: King City Volume 1 (Paperback)
I love this book, with its futuristic blend of New York/Seattle into the dangerous, bizarre King City, from Joe's initial injury from a well-placed "snot rocket" through the ex-soldier's struggles with flashbacks of zombie killing, to the dramatic rescue where Joe's training takes over and he attacks with a hot bucket of cat. Joe is so human in the midst of all the peculiarity, even to picking his nose (well that's what got him into trouble in the first place) that you can't help hoping he succeeds in whatever nefarious enterprise he falls into next.
4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
King City by Brandon Graham,
By
This review is from: King City Volume 1 (Paperback)
King City is an entertaining romp with a unique style that's Blade Runner meets Where's Waldo. Espionage, Action, Adventure, Breakfast, and plenty of funny business. Get one.
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