Review: In Real Life

Just finished In Real Life, the graphic novel by Corey Doctorow and Jen Wang, selected for Mission Comics and Art's book club meeting which (sadly) will be lacking yours truly. The visual equivalent of a short story, IRL tells the story of Anda, a teenage female gamer who develops a social conscience through her experiences in-game. IRL has a rather simple plot, structured around bullying and gold farming, the practice of hiring cheap labor to mine in-game objects for real cash value, (which of course is not reflected in the pay of the labor force), The exploration of how a perceived injustice on one level (i.e., in-game), may reflect an injustice on another (i.e., in reality) is well-constructed. The characterization is a bit shallow, but sufficient for the short format and appropriate to the personalities of many teenagers. The art has fluid, rounded lines; the portrayal of the female form in the real world sequences is neither idealizing nor grotesque - there are more straight lines and generic shapes in the online world.

Yale, Yale, Yale

I don't think I'll do this on a regular basis, but I'll forget the details if I don't post now. I'll just have to post the investigation into Trinidadian Benedictine identity theft. After a day in the quiet confines of the Mechanics Institute Library, where I finished reading the Canaanite mythological corpus so that I could return the book on Wednesday, I mounted the hill to the University Club via Powell. I was temporarily is blocked by the incessant crimson of the cable cars. Then I arrived at the University Club, where there was to be a Yale group singing - without a brawl. It turns out that one of the female members of Red, Hot, and Blue, was the friend of Andrew, who is a fellow CSB alum. The only girl in jeans there was a friend of Andrew's friend; she had gone to a familiar local school on the other side of the bay.