Writer Shawn Granger was kind enough to send me a couple review copies of Family Bones, a comic series based on the real life death row couple Ray and Faye Copeland (Author Granger’s great grandmother happens to be the sister of Ray Copeland) who took in drifters to help with their farm only to murder them and bury the bodies when they were of no more use. The 10 issue comic series has been condensed into 2 graphic novels. For full details, I encourage you to head over to King Tractor Press website to learn more about it and to read a few free pages. For now, let’s review the series and give you a chance to experience the comics yourself with a contest to win both graphic novels!
The Review: The story is about a city boy named Sean who is sent to live with his Aunt and Uncle for the summer. Being the city boy that he is, he is totally lost when his domineering uncle gets him to start doing your typical farm chores, such as killing chickens for dinner and working the tractor. The uncle regularly beats him and causes his life to be a total nightmare. Sean befriends a sexy neighbor named Wendy who becomes his only escape from the torments of his family. As the two get closer, Sean begins uncovering some strange secrets about the multiple drifters who show up to help out on the farm….and who mysteriously go missing when it’s time for his uncle to pay them.
Somewhat surprisingly, the focus of the story is not on Faye and Ray, but rather the relationship between Sean and Wendy.You get the distinct ominous feel that these are serial killers, but the aunt and uncle don’t really do much in those terms. They kill a couple drifters, sure, but most of it is off-panel and it’s never the focus. The actual serial killers are sort of peripheral in that respect. The uncle is definitely shown to be a little off his rocker, with his repeated beatings of Sean and his temper tantrums, moreso than the aunt who comes across as sort of oblivious to everything that is going on (except for interesting scene in which she puts a bunch of baby mice down the garbage disposal). The story takes a little while to get going but once it does I was pretty engaged and interested to see where it went. I’d never heard of Faye and Ray so I came in knowing nothing about the history of them, but these graphic novels made me seek out more information after reading them.
There are numerous artists that work on the different issues making it very uneven in terms of a set artistic style, tone, and feel. Personally, I’m not a fan of switching up artists because I feel it hampers the story and characters. For example, one of the artists draws Wendy sort of modest, with naturally sized breasts, while another artist in one of the last issues draws her super exaggerated, with almost porn star-esque giant breasts. It’s just distracting and doesn’t imbue the character with a definite set of traits. Is she sweet, girl-next-door sexy or is she supposed to be some unattainable sex object? And with various artists, you’re going to have some you really like, and others that just ain’t that great. Luckily, most of the art isn’t distracting and it ranges from high detailed-contrasted black & white in the vein of Ghastly Graham Ingels to very minimalist, detail free drawings.
Overall, I enjoyed Family Bones. Some readers might be disappointed in that it doesn’t focus solely on Faye and Ray and their murderous adventures, but I liked the idea of this fish out of water nephew forced to deal with this crazy situation. Granger does a superb job of subverting big set pieces with simple lines of dialogue that hint at the disturbed minds of Faye and Ray. In one scene, Sean is forced to help deliver a calf. At first he is disgusted but after going through an intense ordeal of successfully delivering it, he realizes just how wonderful this new life is. Right up to the point when Faye tells him that they’ll eat the mother cow. It’s just a really wonderfully written and drawn sequence that builds and builds before Granger smacks the reader with the reality of the situation.
Family Bones is a pretty good graphic novel with some neat art. The writing is excellent and I give it credit for not taking the easy route and just following the adventures of Faye and Ray. At times it can be a little slow, the uneven artwork hampers the character design (especially Wendy), and the ending didn’t quite pay off for me, but overall, I liked it and am glad I got a chance to read it. Would you like to read it? Contest time!
The Contest: Alright, so if you want to get your mitts on Volume 1 & 2 of Shawn Granger’s Family Bones, then here’s how: name the television series and episode where this description comes from:
A mysterious big breasted lab assistant appears who happens to be a bumblebee…you’re hired!
Think you know the answer? Either e-mail us at splattercast@deadlantern.com or leave a response on the blog. First person to get both the TV show and the episode title correct wins Family Bones!
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