Sugar Skull HC
Publisher: Pantheon
Release Date: September 16, 2014
Price: $23.00
Creator: Charles Burns
Format: 64 pgs., Full-Color, Hardcover
ISBN: 978-0-3079-0790-5
Age Rating: N/A
ICv2 Rating: 3.5 Stars out of 5
 
Reading this series presents several challenges for the reader.  Devoted Burns fans will already know that his books require effort, and in this case the reader must read the first two volumes or it won't make a bit of sense.  Even with that background, the blend of an unpleasant reality with a differently unpleasant dream world makes for a challenge.
 
In this concluding volume, the central character Doug's background is finally explained, but that actually makes him a lot less likeable.  His retreats from reality feel more like escape, rather than a hallucination somehow inflicted on him.  If so, though, why would he escape to a place no better than his real surroundings?
 
The real-world story at least comes to a stopping point, but is it a conclusion?  The dream world story comes to neither, and thus the story will not appeal to everyone.  Fans of his earlier work will enjoy it, though, and now that the series is complete, new readers may find more entertainment in the first two volumes than was possible before.  So, for readers who have access to X-ed Out and The Hive, this new book will be of great interest.  For anyone who has not read the other two, it is an impossible jumping-on point.
 
For adults and older teens.
 
--Nick Smith: Library Technician, Community Services, for the Pasadena Public Library in California