Librarian's Corner: Preacher

Preacher

by: Garth Ennis & Steve Dillon 

We're doing things a little bit differently on this month's Librarian's Corner. Normally, I like to spend a while telling you about a book that I recently read and enjoyed. This month though, I'm going to be talking about an entire series!
Now for those of you who don't know, I work in a library (gasp, really?), and my library has an amazing collection of graphic novels. One of those (or really, 9 of them, this is a series, remember) is Preacher. Now, don't go jumping to conclusion, this isn't a religious comic. Well, I guess it is, but it's not that kind of religious comic.

Preacher is about the Reverend Jessie Custer, who's starting to become disillusioned with his position (and his flock) when something... supernatural happens. Before he knows it Jessie, his girlfriend Tulip and their friend Cassidy (who just happens to be a vampire) are on a mission to find God (who's missing) and hold him accountable for the state in which He's left humanity. So yeah, I guess it is about religion, but I told you, not in that way. Along the way they run into a whole cast of characters who want to stop Jessie. From the Saint of Killers (who's mission is to collect the souls of anyone who dies a violent death) to an organization called The Grail (bent on bringing about Armageddon, for the good of humanity, of course), and even an unfortunate young man who goes by the moniker Arseface. 
 
I picked up Preacher: Gone to Texas last November without a single clue what it was about, because I had heard that one of the main characters was a vampire. I'm a total sucker for vampires and will read just about anything that has 'em. I ran to the library to see if we had a copy, and was thrilled to discover that we actually had the whole series! I grabbed Gone to Texas, and started reading. It took me a year to work my way through the series. Partially because I knew that there were only 9 books (technically "trade paperbacks" collecting issues 1-66 of the comic books), and I wanted to space them out nicely.

I love the series, and once I got into the last few books, I couldn't help myself. I was picking up one every few days and powering through them. I just had to know what was going to happen to these characters I had grown to love (and hate, I hated some of the by the end). Who would I recommend this story to? Anyone who has questions about God. No, seriously, this isn't a series for those who might be offended by some slight (haha!) blaspheming. And before I go any further into my recommendations, I should mention that this series is for mature readers only. Seriously, I don't like to tell kids not to read things, but this really isn't for the littles, grown-ups only please.

So, to summarize: Preacher is about a gun-toating hard drinking, Texas preacher named Jessie Custer, who is on a mission to find God. He teams up with his tough-as-nails girlfriend Tulip and an alcoholic fun-loving, Irish vampire names Cassidy and they travel across the country (and to France, that one time) to find God and hold Him accountable for abandoning humanity. Sh*ts about to get real here folks. So if you like sharp-shooting Texas cowboys, and hard-drinking Irish vampires, and chicks who are not about to take cr*p from anyone, then Preacher might be the series for you. Plus, there are lots of pretty pictures!


That about wraps things up for this month's Librarian's Corner. Sorry for the 2-day delay. I meant to have this post up by the 22nd, at the latest, but... I've mentioned that I work in a library, and sadly, one of my co-workers passed away yesterday. She was an integral part of our tech-services department, and will be dearly missed. 
Anyway, thanks for being patient and sticking with me. I promise that December's Librarian's Corner will be more prompt! Speaking of, I'm always looking for suggestions, so if you have anything you'd like me to read and talk about, let me know! You can leave a message here in the comments! And, if you've read/want to talk about Preacher, leave a comment! We'll have a discussion, it'll be fun, I promise! So that's it for now folks. See you in December!

Stay tuned!