I’m really digging Gotham Academy right now. There is really nothing else like this book that the big two companies are putting out right now. If you need some thing different, this book is a breath of fresh air. Becky Cloonan and Brenden Fletcher are surprising me with their storytelling. It hits on all the right points as it builds up to the page turn at the end, bringing you back for more next month. Karl Kerschl’s art is so amazing. I highly doubt we won’t ever have a fill-in eventually, and when we do, I dont know how they plan to do it. But it will definitely be a tough job for the replacement.
Olive is reading the book of Millie Jane Cobblepot, she hears something down the hall. She makes her way down, when she sees the Batsignal along with some people dressed as bats running through the yard, and it kinda freaks her out. The next morning, in class, Olive is SO tired. She didn’t sleep last night, and worse yet, Pomeline and Heathcliff are sitting right next to her, making out on his desk. Of course, Olive whispers something, because WOULDNT YOU?! Pomeline responds by telling her to mind her own business, when their teacher walks in, and assigns them to work on their next project together… Yay! That’ll fix it.
At lunch (these Gotham kids still get better lunches than you and I did), Maps is trying to get Olive to sit with her and Kyle, but she tries to avoid it by sitting next to this strange staring kid, but accidentally spills his Berry Bat all over his notebook, where he was drawing a picture of Maps! Kyle asks to talk, but Olive makes up an excuse and leaves. Maps asks the weird kid to draw her Serpents and Spells character.
Olive meets up with Pomeline at the library to work on their assignment. A Riddler looking librarian shows up, and directs them to the book they need. Olive searches for it and finds it, along with a creepy dude with red eyes… Olive is freaked out, and they realize the book they got is the same book they are reading; Millie Jane Cobblepot. But this one is different. It has a map drawn inside. Pomeline takes the book, texts Heathcliff, and leaves with the book after taking another jab at Olive and her mother.
In class, Colton pranks her again, and Olive goes off on him. She just can’t catch a break.
She watches Kyle practicing tennis from under the bleachers, when her teacher finds her while walking the dog, and taking an illegal smoke break. They talk, and she tells Olive that she needs to talk to Kyle. It seems that Olive’s mother died over the summer, and that is why she is so understandably on edge this school year – meanwhile the dog digs up a femur and nobody notices… So we have a body buried on school property… Nice.
Olive returns to her dorm, but finds Maps there instead of her roommate, Lucy. They traded because Lucy was freaked out from the “ghosts” in the walls. Olive, again, hears something, and sees the bat people running across the yard again.
They follow through the graveyard, and come across a tree with a chasm underneath. The bat people are performing some ceremony, like kids do, when suddenly, Olive recognizes the book at the center of their ritual. It’s Millie Jane Cobblepot’s Diary. Olive knows who it is now. It’s Pomeline and her friends. Olive takes the book, and when Pom tells her to give it back, Olive tells her she has no idea who she’s dealing with. And the candle fire lights up, and whirls around Olive, but she doesn’t seem to notice.
For a non-action book, these guys really know how to build up drama, and do it in a believable way.
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