Strange Attractors by Charles Soule and Greg Scott.
The City is an Engine. Heller Wilson has found the key. From acclaimed writer Charles Soule (27, Strongman, Swamp Thing) comes a mathematical thriller about Chaos, Probability, and the race to stop a citywide disaster. In 1978, Dr. Spencer Brownfield saved New York City from itself, bringing the city back from the verge of collapse and ruin. And for thirty years, his small, unnoticed adjustments to the city's systems have kept the city afloat. Or so he claims to Heller Wilson, a young graduate student that Dr. Brownfield has chosen as his successor. But are Dr. Brownfield's claims about The Butterfly Effect and how his "complexity math" apply to the city's patterns of life real, or are they the ravings of a man broken by the death of his wife and daughter, desperate to find some kind of control over the world around him? Part sci-fi, part philosophical exploration, part thriller, Strange Attractors examines what you can control in your life and what you can't, and how important it is to recognize the difference.
The Nao of Brown by Glyn Dillon
Nao Brown is 'Hafu': half Japanese, half English. She suffers with OCD, but not the hand-washing, overly tidy type that people joke about. Nao suffers from violent morbid obsessions and a racing, unruly mind. She works part time in a 'designer' vinyl toy shop, whilst struggling to get her own design and illustration career off the ground. She's looking for love - the perfect love. But in meeting the man of her dreams, she realises that - dreams can be quite weird. Nao meditates in an attempt to quieten her mind and open her heart and it's through this that she comes to realise that things aren't so black and white after all. In fact, they're much more...brown.
The Sandman Overture #1 by Neil Gaiman & J H Williams III
Batwoman: Worlds Finest (Vol 3 Hardcover) by J H Williams III, W Haden Blackman and Trevor McCarthy.
Batwoman's search for Medusa brings her together with the Amazing Amazon, Wonder Woman, but even the teaming of the World's Finest might not be enough to bring down the mythological monster - leading Bones, the DEO, Abbot and the Religion of Crime to all descend on Gotham City to take part in the fight.
Locke and Key by Joe Hill & Gabriel Rodriguez
... tells of Keyhouse, an unlikely New England mansion, with fantastic doors that transform all who dare to walk through them...and home to a hate-filled and relentless creature that will not rest until it forces open the most terrible door of them all...! Acclaimed suspense novelist and "New York Times" best-selling author Joe Hill creates an all-new story of dark fantasy and wonder, with astounding artwork from Gabriel Rodriguez.
X'ed Out and The Hive by Charles Burns
X'ed Out: Meet Doug, aspiring young artist. He's having a strange night. A weird buzzing noise on the other side of the wall has woken him up, and there across the room, next to a huge hole torn out of the bricks, sits his beloved cat Inky. Who died years ago. But that's no longer the case, as he slinks through the hole, beckoning Doug to follow. So he does. Now there's no turning back. What the heck is going on? To say much more would spoil the creepy, Burnsian fun, especially since - unlike Black Hole - X'ed Out has not been previously serialised anywhere and will have readers guessing at every unnervingly meticulous panel. Drawing inspiration from such diverse influences as Herge and William Burroughs, X'ed Out is an engrossing new comic book fever-dream, from a true master of the form at the height of his powers.
The Hive: Doug is still in the netherworld. He's working a cleaning job in the Hive's stinking hallways, trying to ignore the screams, and reading romance comics to the breeders. But as the stories unravel on the page, frame by frame, mirrored memories plunge him back into his waking life. And that's where the real nightmare is. In Burns' trademark hard-edged style, "The Hive" is horrifying and completely absorbing: an incredible new installment from one of the most exciting artists in the comic's world.
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Well there you have it. For me 2013 was all about independent comics making a huge impact on the scene. The majority of output from DC Comics and Marvel has left me cold of late.
Damian K. Sheiles
