Calamity Kate #4

PUBLISHERS WEEKLY SEPT 23, 2019

A whirlwind plot and fierce, high-contrast artwork combine winningly in this gambol about combating supernatural foes and inner demons alike. After experiencing a loss and deciding to reboot her life, Kate Strand turns up on the doorstep of the Los Angeles home of her old friend Vera, whom she hasn't seen in years, immediately sharing how she determined to become the superheroine she'd always dreamed of being: a monster killer named Calamity. "I packed up, left my job... and drove west in an old Continental and just started hunting monsters," she explains. (They're quite the infestation, it seems, and one just "hit an elementary school in Alameda last week," Vera remarks.) But from grappling with new relationships to facing her competition (another monster hunter, called Javelin), along the way in her quest to defeat the legendary Seven Fabled Beasts of Yore, Calamity learns the hard way that maybe her low sense of self-worth and lingering unhappiness can't be killed as easily as the monsters swarming around her. Visaggio (the Eternity Girl series) is a dynamo at complex scripting through well-realized, quippy dialogue and focusing, amid all the dramatic action, on characters' emotions. It can get heavy, but for fans of modern-day fantasy, this playful saga proves its versatility with both its brawls and character study.