Cinebook The 9th Art: Alone 8 -The Arena

Authors: Fabien Vehlmann; illustrated by Bruno Gazzotti

Age: 10 years and up

Size: 21.7 x 28.7 cm

Number of pages: 56 colour pages

Publication: January 2018

Alone 8 - The Arena

ISBN: 9781849183826

Price: £7.99 inc. VAT

Captured by a mysterious army just as they escaped a Campton overrun with ‘zombie’ children, Dodzi’s group, along with what’s left of the Clan of the Shark, discover an entire civilisation, ruled over by children who have been in the In-Between-World for a long, long time.

Strict rules, a caste system, bizarre superstitions... All new obstacles for the group to overcome – although Saul is being treated like a messiah. And over it all hangs the threat of the sinister Midnight Child...

I read through this and found I had no idea what was going on! Nothing wrong with the book but the last volume was out in June of 2017 so the nine (9) months delay has killed the spontaneity and flow of the story.  Marvel and DC –and other companies- have lost sales through this same kind of problem. I went back to my review of Alone 7 and found blogger had somehow (again) deleted my whole review!

I am not reading 1-7 again!

The art and characterisation are good and I do know that this series hooked me originally but after 9 months the emotional investment in characters and story are faded.  

Please, Cinebook –learn from the lesson in delays in books that the other companies have: long delays cost you readers.  Even a major Love & Rockets fan like me just gave up because of delays in that book.

So nice art and story but I’m totally lost –I read a couple hundred books a year so you’ll have to excuse me.