josta's 2021 reading tracker

[josta59]

G.I. Joe update: I finally just found a response to a fan question by the writer Paul Allor on Twitter five days ago. Someone asked, "This isn't the end of your run, is it? I'm a little behind and haven't seen anything solicited past #10."

Allor responded: "Nothing's been announced one way or the other, but this is the end of our first 'season.'"

Spoiler alert: None of the big baddies survived this very rushed issue. It was obviously meant to be an ending. Yeah, it's comics, and they could all come back somehow. But this is one reader who wouldn't return for that.

[josta59]

Just an update to say that I'm more than halfway through the Jormungand manga now, and it's become my favorite manga ever. I'm every bit it's target audience.

[Duncan]

I have some manga in my collection now. Um... not quite what I expected. I try to read it when my wife isn't around. :O

[Whiterook]

I have some manga in my collection now. Um... not quite what I expected. I try to read it when my wife isn't around. :O

LOL.... some of that stuff requires a cold shower after! Last time I was in a comics retailer, I was amazed!

[josta59]

Jormungand is now my favorite manga ever. Finished that, and now it's on to:

James the Brother of Jesus and the Dead Sea Scrolls, Vol. 1: The Historical James, Paul the Enemy, and Jesus' Brothers as Apostles, by Robert Eisenman

I started this book years ago, when I was still a pretty slow reader. I'm determined to finish it now. It's not well structured, so it's not easy reading, and the pages are big with small print. It's a dense read. I'm about three quarters through it now.

It's essentially about new ideas regarding Jesus' brother James, one of the founders of Christianity, coming from the Dead Sea Scrolls discovered in the mid-20th Century. The Scrolls reveal a much more contentious relationship between James and the Apostle Paul than the Bible lets on. This book explains that James and Paul were enemies with very different ideas about the church. It goes so far as to suggest that Paul murdered James and shaped the new religion into what he wanted it to be, with his own Rome-friendly version of the gospel story, which became the books of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. According to this book, most of the New Testament (but not James' letter) was written for a Roman audience, which partly explains why Christianity became so popular outside the Middle East and spread around the world.

[Whiterook]

That’s amazing stuff! Sounds great. And I get ‘ya on the dense writing... that’s tough to get through.