Since I belatedly reviewed Clubbing last week, I might as well have a look at Good as Lily, the fourth release from DC's Minx imprint. 

This is a high concept story if ever there was one.  On her eighteenth birthday, Grace Kwon is suddenly joined by copies of herself at ages 6, 29 and 70.  Cue shenanigans, as she has to conceal their existence and, ultimately, get rid of them by resolving various personal issues.

So far, the Minx books have tended to be better in concept than in execution.  This time, the creative team are writer Derek Kirk Kim, who has a string of awards behind him, and artist Jesse Hamm, plucked from underground obscurity.  And while it's not perfect, it's by far the best one I've read so far.  (Disclaimer: I haven't read Re-Gifters, so you never know.)

Obviously the premise is ludicrous, but it's more of a comedy-drama than an outright comedy.  The trick to these things, traditionally, is that the audience will suspend their disbelief for pretty much anything as long as you follow through the consequences with enough plausibility.  In other words, if you make one huge leap but you keep everything else grounded in reality, you should get away with it.

And that's basically what's going on here.  Grace is a well-rounded character, and Kirk makes good use of her multiples.  Not only are they proper characters in their own light, but they're convincing as different versions of the same character.  That means that each of them helps to flesh out the others.  Hamm's art, although maybe a little loose on occasion, strikes the necessary balance between making them distinct and keeping them similar.  And crucially for a story like this, his people can act.  It's depressing how many artists can't do body language to save their lives; Hamm gets it right.

The story is a little loose around the edges.  Things don't quite tie together as neatly as they ideally should.  The title, Good as Lily, refers to a fairly minor subplot about Grace's sister who died when she was six.  I suspect the idea may have been that, having come to terms with Lily, Grace is free to deal with her other issues.  But I'm really just inferring that from the fact that there was presumably some reason for naming the story after her; it doesn't come through very clearly on the page.  There are also some curious timeline glitches - why is Grace's pensioner counterpart apparently obsessed with contemporary TV shows?  And the initial set-up that brings the multiple Graces into the present is really pretty arbitrary.

So there's room for a bit of polishing.  But the book gets past those problems on the strength of its characters and its gentle humour.  It makes its points about the way Grace can shape her life without being preachy, and it's persuasive about the importance that seemingly trivial decisions can have, without being trite.  The characters and the themes work perfectly, which more than compensates for the shakier elements of the plot.

I'd call this a winner.  And hey, Minx has got two books by Aaron Alexovich coming out soon, and he did Serenity Rose.  So they've got my attention for a while yet.

Rating: A-

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