Girl Genius

This Christmas, I finally got what I’d been wanting to buy for a long while: the complete Girl Genius comic book set (well, all 12 volumes printed so far).

  

I love this series to the ends of the earth and back. I love this series for its twisty plots, the sense of humor and its excellent heroine.

It’s hard to explain the plot without giving anything away, but here goes.

For nearly twenty years, Europe has been ruled by Baron Wulfenbach, who seized power after the Other devastated Europe, turning much of its population into mindless revenants. Those who hate the Baron seek to find the long lost Heterodyne heir, a family of mechanical geniuses. Agatha Clay is living a peaceful life until the day thieves make off with her locket – and suddenly she’s waking up to find her hands covered in grease and half-completed mechanical projects surrounding her. Some think Agatha might be the long-lost Heterodyne heir. But many would rather kill first and take DNA samples later…

All right, that really doesn't capture just how much fun this series is. There are giant airships, revenants (like zombies, but better), clockwork princesses, jaegermonsters, lightning moats, homicidal castles, and the world’s most deadly merry-go-round. 

This another series where all of the supporting characters are wonderfully constructed, from the only sort-of-evil Baron, his consistently underestimated son Gil, to Agatha's personal team of Jaegermonsters. 

The best part of all this?

You can read the whole thing online.

For FREE.

Here, have a link!  http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/comic.php?date=20021104

(the first volume of the comic is black and white, but then it’s color throughout)

If you don't have time to dig in to the whole thing, here is a four page short story about Agatha and her warrior friend Zeetha, who insists on waking Agatha up before dawn for training, and Agatha has finally had enough.
http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/comic.php?date=20060515

The authors also sell all their volumes online, though they’re not cheap (thus it took me like three years to acquire them). But I’ve already got one friend here hooked, and I plan to pass them around to others. For those of you with kids, the authors recommend the stories for teens and up. There's language and a few corsets, and allusions to sex, but nothing shown.

Go on, give it a try. You didn't have anything to do this weekend... right?