3.5/5 Disclaimer: I received an ARC from the publisher. This did not affect my review in any way, nor am I being compensated for this post.When Gina, First Second's publicist, emailed to ask me if I would be interested in taking part in this tour, I was thrilled. I love First Second's books, and I've enjoyed interacting with Gina (who is the kindest!). Of course I said yes!This time around, I wasn't really sure what to expect in terms of the book. I also received a copy of Battling Boy (Aurora W...

Recipe for one kick-ass teenage supergirl:1 part Hit Girl and Big Daddy1 part mysterious seven fingered villain1 part archaeology: Indiana Jones style1 part Veronica MarsBest shaken, not stirred.I don’t mean to imply that The Rise of Auroroa West is derivative–I don’t feel it is–but it had notes of so many other things I love that it made diving in quite enjoyable. Aurora West has a curiosity that just won’t quit when it comes to piecing together the story of her mother’s murder. A symbol and an...

Aurora West has it tough. By day, she's an ordinary teenager in Arcopolis. By night, she's training with her father, Haggard West, in his eternal war against the monsters...I loved Battling Boy and was hungry for more. Fortunately, the two Aurora West books were still in print and affordably priced. Once I forgave David Rubin for not being Paul Pope, I wound up enjoying it.The Rise of Aurora West is a prequel to Battling Boy, telling of Aurora coming into her own as her father's partner. It's fu...

Girl heroes!We love them.(You could probably tell that by the books we publish -- Zita the Spacegirl, Giants Beware, anyone?)We were delighted when we got the opportunity to tell the story of a girl hero in the universe of Paul Pope's #1 New York Times Best-Seller BATTLING BOY. It's such a good book, and it's reaching so many readers -- how awesome is it that we get to publish a story for them that shows just how cool girls are?Yay that!

"The Rise of Aurora West" is a superhero graphic novel set in a fantasy city called Acropolis. The city is overrun with monsters that steal people's children. The city's scientist Haggard West decides to use his technology to help the city, and he becomes a hero. When Haggard's wife, Rosetta West, dies, he dedicates his life to protecting others in the city. With the help of his daughter, Aurora West, Haggard defends the city from the monsters. All the while, Aurora tries to solve the mystery of...

A prequel to Battling Boy that everyone but me loved this past year, a YA world of monster fighting and school work. This book is a prequel to Battling Boy and focuses on a girl who has homework and then battles monsters with her legendary Dad Haggard… and in the middle of it all, how did Mom die. Pope did not draw this, David Rubin did, and it feels a little rough, and the small size of this volume makes the big action seen cramped. It's YA. The monsters are kinda eh. Story was co-written by Po...

I want to see what happens

This review originally appeared on my blog, Shared Universe Reviews. Last year saw the release of Battling Boy by Paul Pope. His longest comics work in years. Perhaps unsurprisingly to many, it was a great read and one of my favourite comics of 2013. The Rise of Aurora West is co-written by J.T. Petty and Paul Pope and it is illustrated by David Rubin. I can’t help but to compare this comic to Pope’s Battling Boy. I apologize for that but only briefly because the comparison has help me to reali...

The Rise of Aurora West is a prequel story to Paul Pope's Battling Boy. The focus of this story is Aurora West, the daughter of a two-fisted, rocket pack hero. Aurora West works closely with her father as he trains her to be a monster fighting hero, but at the same time, he is emotionally distant. This story explores why Aurora and her father have dedicated their lives to fighting monsters.I recommend reading this story if you are following the Battling Boy storyline. It provides a lot of motiva...

I felt a disconnect with this book between the story and the art. In terms of graphics, every page had so much going on, that I had to stop my reading to decipher the panels. It didn't help that everything was rendered in black and white, whereas I believe color could have made deciphering easier, especially since this was a small volume and the action was cramped. Also, the graphics were a bit cartoony, which is fine if you are illustrating a story that matches, but while I felt the artwork to

For numerous reasons, this graphic novel reminds me immensely of my all time favorite anime: Kill la Kill.There was action, an awesome smart heroine, a cool cast of characters, interesting and gruesomely ugly antagonists. Overall, a good read. :D

This spin-off of 'Battling Boy' is a lot of fun. Aurora West is sort of like a Batgirl type character to the world's monster killing Batman, Haggard West. In this first volume, she begins to mature into her own hero as she looks in to her own possible connection to her mother's death. The world Paul Pope has created is pretty darned odd. Similar to our own, but bent to the arrival of monsters, which infect things like a Gothic plague. I'm definitely going to have to pick up the next part of the

The main character is a bit of a super hero in training. The story takes place in a dystopian world where there are monsters that have to be kept under control. Aurora's father is one of the hero's who keeps the situation in check. He takes her on training missions. The monsters seem to have a way to get the upper hand and Aurora and her father must fix the situation. OK graphics, not great, not bad.

There were so many things this book could have been but never was. So many accidental pursuits of virtue and so many predilections of self-doubt. THE RISE OF AURORA WEST is a fun and entertaining graphic novel, but it's nowhere close to being as fun or as entertaining as it could have been.Aurora West, the only child of the eponymous city-hero Haggard West, is coming into her own at age fourteen: she's learning to drive, her schedule is full of school work and martial arts instruction, and her f...

This comic deals with monsters, kidnapping, murder, and an all around world where your life can be turned upside down if you are not careful. So be sure to read this comic before dropping this into a younger readers hand to make sure they can handle it.Life is not always easy when you are the daughter of a famous hero and monster slayer but amid her academic studies and her physical training at home Aurora West is doing her best even as she goes on patrols with her father. However when interroga...

Review courtesy of All Things Urban Fantasy.THE RISE OF AURORA WEST takes familiar superhero tropes and flips them to a new angle, like a Batman story told through Robin’s eyes. Though Aurora’s monster fighting skills are a credit to her training, she’s also the intellectually curious lens through which readers question her world. Where did this war against monsters begin? Where do they come from? And what really happened all those years ago on the night when Aurora’s mother died…Despite THE RIS...

Reread in prep for the next installment in the series.

The Rise of Aurora West, Battling BoyWritten by Paul Pope, JT Petty, Illustrated by David RubínFirst SecondSeptember 2014Acropolis has a nightly curfew, in the attempt to keep kids safe from the monsters who prowl the streets and the dark alleys. They have one hero. Haggard West, a rich scientist, avenging the death of his wife at the hands of one of these foul creatures. Joining him is his teenage daughter, Aurora West. By day she is trained by Ms. Grately in martial arts and by night she prowl...

This book appeared in our house as part of a care package to our daughter from a friend of ours. She'd ended up with an extra copy of the book and thought our kid might like it. This is the first part of the second segment of Pope's Battling Boy series, but stands alone perfectly well outside of that storyline.The creators have stated elsewhere that this book (and the Battling Boy series as a whole) was an attempt to make a monster-filled adventure suitable to young readers as well as old. They'...

I won a copy of The Rise of Aurora West in a Goodreads giveaway. It's a very nice digest-sized black-and-white graphic novel. Sometimes they're almost unreadable in this format what with the illustrations and dialog-balloons fading into the center binding, but this one works well. My initial impression was that the story suffered because it could not seem to decide if it wanted to be an adult narrative or more of a kiddie-book, but after reflection I decided that duality actually worked pretty w...