1922 / Audiobook / 172 pages / UK
**
The celebrated ghost story teller's less popular novel, this was supposedly written for children, but I don't know how bored they'd have to be, even a century ago, to keep reading this uneventful saga of idle gentry hanging around in the woods with his imaginary friends.
Hergé, The Adventures of Tintin: The Blue Lotus (Le Lotus bleu)
1934-35 (collected 1936) / Ecomic / 62 pages / Belgium
***"Seventy-seven suffering Samurais!"
The opium plot continues from the previous book, but you'd be forgiven for forgetting what's supposed to be going on as Tintin dons another cunning disguise, gets captured and escapes enough times to fill out the serial. It's interesting to see a work of this vintage being sympathetic to foreigners by sending up racist expats, taking the time to debunk urban legends about the Chinese and having Thomson & Thompson fail to blend in with their stereotypical Fu Manchu cosplay. Those untrustworthy Japanese are a different matter and get what's coming to 'em.
Jean "Moebius" Giraud and Philippe Druillet, Mœbius 5: The Gardens of Aedena
1978-88 (collected 1988) / Ecomic / 76 pages / France***
These self-introduced retrospectives seemingly went to the artist's head and gave him the self belief needed to manoeuvre himself right up his own arse and conceive the Mœbius Universe. That's his theory, anyway – the main story here's as freestyle as ever, but it's a pleasant pastoral detox from the zany dystopias. Other stories are a crime pastiche and Fantastic Voyage with AIDS; the method behind the curation eludes me sometimes.
Fave: 'The Gardens of Aedena.'
1993 / Ebook / 124 pages / USA
***
It's 1914 and Europe is thrown into tumult by the war between the liberal-bourgeous modernists and young radicals with their New "Music." One Finn can't be bothered to keep up any more, so writes some accessible music about swans.
David Fanning, Nielsen: Symphony No. 5
1997 / Ebook / 138 pages / UK***
The most painstaking bar-by-bar analysis I've seen so far – certainly the first where the background music overtook the commentary when listening along – the fan writer makes no apologies for imposing his own skewed interpretations of which passages he reckons represent malevolence and healing or when the triangle and oboe are duking it out. That made it easier to follow than a technical analysis alone, and there are diagrams to help with that part.
