{"id":30920,"date":"2024-11-14T09:00:05","date_gmt":"2024-11-14T09:00:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/?p=30920"},"modified":"2024-11-13T18:16:45","modified_gmt":"2024-11-13T18:16:45","slug":"snow-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/2024\/11\/14\/snow-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Snow"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\nBy Benjamin Rivers<\/strong> (Benjamin Rivers Inc.)
\nISBN: 978-0-9813495-8-9 (TPB)<\/p>\n

Life isn\u2019t drama. Life is ordinary: dull, repetitive, anxiety-provoking, tedious, unsatisfactory and just a bit less good than everybody else\u2019s.<\/p>\n

Until it isn\u2019t…<\/p>\n

Then we make it a story. In a story, you can mould reality into a shape you like and polish it to your own satisfaction. Then again, there are some stories which like to bend their own rules and aspire to being life-like…<\/p>\n

If you\u2019re a fan of high-tension thrillers or blockbuster epics, there doesn\u2019t appear to be much going on in Snow<\/strong>: a miniseries-turned-graphic compilation detailing overlapping and intersecting ordinary people living and\/or working on Queen Street West, Toronto<\/em>. However, that either means you have a very glamorous lifestyle or that you spend too much time submerged in fiction and not enough looking and listening to what\u2019s going on around you…<\/p>\n

Crafted by illustrator and games developer Benjamin Rivers (who somewhat shoots my argument in the foot by having turned this comics collation into both an Indy movie and computer game), Snow<\/strong> falls into stark, monochrome simplicity, centring on Dana<\/em>, a rather nervous young woman who works in a bookstore.<\/p>\n

Economically, times are tough and she\u2019s fixating on the number of shops and businesses closing in the locality. Dana doesn\u2019t like change and she doesn\u2019t like confrontation. Moreover, these days there\u2019s an aura of tension everywhere – even in her former comfort zone at the store. Her co-workers are mostly okay, but old Mr. Abberline<\/em> isn\u2019t looking well and Dana can\u2019t shift the suspicion that soon they\u2019ll all be looking for new jobs. Even best friend Julia<\/em> doesn\u2019t get it though: it seems so easy for her to shut out such concerns and just party…<\/p>\n

As she trudges along snowbound Queen Street to work and back, to the bar or Laundromat, Dana can\u2019t escape an oppressive sense of impending doom. Things come to a head abruptly after overhearing an argument in a closing-down, already shuttered CD store. She could just about ignore that and go home, but after hearing the gunshot, Dana, in her unrushed, gradual manner, abandons the instincts of a lifetime and goes to investigate…<\/p>\n

What she finds on entering the shop is the trigger to remaking her entire life, but change is so hard and comes so painfully slowly…<\/p>\n

Appearing cautious and careful, this deceptively simple and elegant saga offers a supremely understated exploration of how folk like you and me react to shocking events and their aftermath: treating the extraordinary with the dismay and respect it deserves when it impinges on real lives. Most importantly, just like life, although there are always questions asked, we seldom get all the answers we want or need before, in the end, life just goes on…<\/p>\n

Amongst the Bonus Material<\/em> included here is the movie poster for the film adaptation, annotated creator\u2019s notes and sketches, concept-&-character designs, an examination of the drawing process which resulted in the book\u2019s signature visual style and the author\u2019s reminiscent Afterword: Is It Still Snowing?<\/em>, as well as a handy street guide and map of the\u00a0\u2018The World of Snow\u2019<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Just like life, Snow<\/strong> is better experienced than fed to you second-hand or reprocessed, so please track down absorb this graphic novel if you\u2019re looking for something a little different from what comics think of as normal…
\n\u00a9 2014 Benjamin Rivers. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Benjamin Rivers (Benjamin Rivers Inc.) ISBN: 978-0-9813495-8-9 (TPB) Life isn\u2019t drama. Life is ordinary: dull, repetitive, anxiety-provoking, tedious, unsatisfactory and just a bit less good than everybody else\u2019s. Until it isn\u2019t… Then we make it a story. In a story, you can mould reality into a shape you like and polish it to your … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Snow”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[239,212,105,225],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-30920","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-drama","category-international-comics","category-mature-reading","category-mystery"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4AFj-82I","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30920","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30920"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30920\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30922,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30920\/revisions\/30922"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30920"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30920"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30920"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}