Book picks similar to
Twelve Gems by Lane Milburn


comics
graphic-novels
graphic-novel
science-fiction

Grease Monkey


Tim Eldred - 2006
    The mysterious alien Benefactors who healed the planet also offered "uplift" to our dolphins and gorillas. The dolphins turned them down. The gorillas said yes. As a result, we're now sharing our world with language-using, tool-making simians. Tensions are inevitable, in both directions, but it's gradually working out.Decades later, teenage cadet Robin Plotnik has been assigned to Fist of Earth, a defense station high above Earth, keeping watch against further attacks by the interstellar Horde. Robin's a spacecraft mechanic-in-training, apprenticed to Chief "Mac" Gimbensky, a cranky but basically benign gorilla with issues of his own.Fist of Earth is a challenging place to grow up. Robin and Mac maintain fighter craft for the all-woman "Barbarian Squadron", which constantly competes for prestige with the other squadrons based on Fist of Earth. Robin's trying to romance a young librarian, and he's far from sure he knows what he's doing. Most of all, he's constantly struggling to figure out his moody, mercurial boss.Then he and his best friend become entangled in a burgeoning scandal over betting on the squadrons' standings. And just when things look like they've hit rock bottom, the worst thing imaginable arrives at Fist of Earth: an efficiency expert from Earth, determined to reorganize Robin's hard-won life, and the whole squadron system, out of existence.Fresh and engaging, crammed with likeable characters and science-fictional inventiveness, Grease Monkey is like a classic "Heinlein juvenile" in sequential-art mode.Introduction by Kurt Busiek, author of Astro City

John Carter: The Gods of Mars


Sam Humphries - 2012
    In 'Paradise' Valley of Dor, mortals feign divinity, enslave pilgrims. In once-yearly opening Chamber of the Sun, blue 'Goddess' Issus will soon sacrifice John's wife Queen Dejah Thoris. Old allies rescue new - green tusked Tars and Sola Tarka, Helium red-skins Kantos Kan, Navy chief, freed grown son Cathoris (original Carthoris), white Princess Phaidor, black pirate Captain Xodar, pretty Thuvia.Collecting JOHN CARTER: THE GODS OF MARS #1-5.

Venus


Rick Loverd - 2016
    China has laid claim to Mars, so the US and its allies have to make do with getting what it needs from the inhospitable world of Venus. But for a group of Americans making its way there, survival has become all too real. After their ship crash lands on the planet, the scrappy crew is forced to do whatever it takes to navigate the harsh landscape in their journey to find the science base they were flying toward. In the vein of great adventure survival stories like Lost and The Martian, there’s only one reality on Venus—adapt or die.

The City on the Edge of Forever #1


Scott Tipton - 2014
    Ellison originally intended!

Dear Julia


Brian Biggs - 2000
    Dear Julia, is the story of how he got there. Boyd's vivid memory of the past and shaky comprehension of the present give clues to the events that lead him to the edge: his childhood, his parents, and a particular trip to Tucson, Arizona where everything began to go terribly awry. Brian Biggs tells the tale with deft wit and a sharp eye, leaving crumbs both verbal and visual along the reader's path to the climactic end. Also available is the Dear Julia, short film directed by Alistair Banks Griffin.

The Expanse: Origins


James S.A. Corey - 2018
    As interplanetary tensions reach an all-time high, The Rocinante crew finds themselves at the center of a conflict that threatens to destroy all of human civilization. But before they were heroes, each member of the crew faced moments that would define them and bring them one step closer to the ship they now call home.  Featuring stories by author James S.A. Corey, written by Hallie Lambert and Georgia Lee and illustrated by Huang Danlan, this graphic novel explores the history of each character and what led them to The Canterbury, making it a must-read for fans.

Stargate Universe Vol. 1: Back to Destiny


Mark L. Haynes - 2018
    With almost all of the willing and unwilling crew of the ancient starship Destiny in suspended animation, only Eli Wallace is left awake to repair his own stasis pod before time runs out. While he races against time, a new and unexpected danger threatens the fragile plan designed to keep everyone alive and away from the aliens who had been pursuing them. What is the next chapter in the Stargate Universe saga?  Find out right here!  Come with us and join the fight to get #BackToDestiny!  This graphic novel collects Stargate Universe #1-6.

Ancestor


Matt Sheean - 2016
    Most consider it essential to modern human life, but for Peter Chardin The Service is the source of a special type of anxiety: His own free will feels like an illusion, dictated by the algorithms of the program. Enter Patrick Whiteside, a genius inventor and leader of a movement that believes The Service is an outdated method for human betterment. When Peter and his friends find themselves locked in Whiteside's remote compound they discover Whiteside is both more ambitious and more sinister than they could've imagined. But what are Whiteside's plans for humanity? And what if he succeeds? From the pages of BRANDON GRAHAM's ISLAND comes the debut science fiction epic by MATT SHEEAN and MALACHI WARD. Collects "ANCESTOR" from issues 3, 5, 7 and 9 of ISLAND.

How to Pass as Human


Nic Kelman - 2015
    Written in the form of a field guide, complete with sketches, graphs, flowcharts, and other reference materials, Android Zero (aka "Zach") has compiled a variety of useful information for future androids on how to pass undetected as human beings. Along the way, he also attempts to solve the mystery of his own creation with the help of Andrea, a human female who has taken an interest in him that may be more than friendly, and eventually leading him to "meet his maker" and discover the surprising purpose of his existence.

Blacklung


Chris Wright - 2012
    Blacklung is a story that lives up to the term graphic novel, that could only exist in sequential pictures densely textured, highly stylized, delicately and boldly rendered drawings that is, taken together, wholly original. In a night of piratical treachery when an arrogant school teacher is accidentally shanghaied aboard the frigate Hand, his fate becomes inextricably fettered to that of a sardonic gangster. Dependent on one another for survival in their strange and dangerous new home, the two form an unlikely alliance as they alternately elude or confront the thieves and cutthroats that bad luck has made their companions and captors. After an act of terrible violence, the teacher is brought before the ship 's captain and instructed to use his literary skills to aid him in writing his memoirs. He is to serve as scribe for a man who, in his remaining years, has made it his mission to commit as many acts of evil as possible in order to ensure that he meet his dead wife in hell. As the captain 's protected confidant, finding his only comfort in the few books afforded him, the teacher bears witness to monstrous brutality, relentless cruelty, strange wisdom, and a journey of redemption through loss of faith.

Prison Pit, Vol. 1


Johnny Ryan - 2009
    Prison Pit represents a marked departure from AYC or his Blecky Yuckerella weekly comic strip, combining his love for WWE wrestling, Gary Panter s Jimbo comics, and Kentaro Miura s Berserk manga into a brutal showcase of violence, survival and revenge. Imagine a blend of old-fashioned role playing fantasy games like Dungeons & Dragons crossed with contemporary adult video games like Grand Theft Auto, filtered through Ryan s sense of humor. The book begins with C.F. (his full-name would be too horrifying to reveal here) being thrown into the Prison Pit, a barren negative-zone populated by intergalactic, violent monster criminals. In this first volume, C.F. gets into a bloody slorge war (a slorge is a giant slug that excretes a steroid-like drug called fecid that all the monster men are addicted to) with ultraprisoner Rottweiler Herpes and his henchmen Rabies Bloodbath and Assrat. The ensuing bloodbath is an over-the-top, hyperviolent yet hilarious farce worthy of Ryan s inspiration, Kentaro Miura.

The Spider King


Josh Vann - 2016
    It takes all of the best aspects of medieval fantasy and science fiction, and smashes them together to create an unexpected twist on two well worn stories.

Patience


Daniel Clowes - 2016
    This 180-page, full-color original graphic novel affords Clowes the opportunity to draw some of the most exuberant and breathtaking pages of his life, and to tell his most suspenseful, surprising and affecting story yet.

The Silver Surfer: The Ultimate Cosmic Experience


Stan Lee - 1978
    All New, The Silver Surfer, an Ultimate Comic Experience.

Prism Stalker, Vol. 1


Sloane Leong - 2018
    Vep, a refugee raised away from her devastated home planet as an indentured citizen in a foreign colony, is taken by a private military firm to assist in settling the new planet. What awaits her will test the limits of her will as she grapples with the strange power the planet exerts over her....Collects PRISM STALKER #1-5