Six of Crows, with it's fast pace and admirable world-building manages to keep things entertaining. That being said, the book is not without its flaws. Not the least of which is the inclusion of a clichéd romance which at times made me simply skip over chapters of tedious and predictable flashbacks and read only the main story. The best of the lot is Kaz, who with his charisma and wit brings the story to a lively (if not foreseeable) conclusion.

Good Omens is a book that manages to balance the abstract beauty of Gaiman along with the dark comedy of Pratchett. In my opinion, while Gaiman may have the edge in terms of imagining the abstract and ethereal, it is Pratchett who succeeds in writing idiosyncratic characters that posses a subcutaneous layer of darkness. One ponders at the end of this story the question:

"Is the purpose of humanity to pursue being good? evil? or just human?"

With The Black mirror, a new member has been inducted into Batman's Rogues Gallery. I would go so far as to say that I have only ever encountered this level of psychological maiming in Batman stories with The Joker at the other end. However, in this story The Joker is the penultimate stop before you reach the final destination. A destination that is well and truly The Black Mirror held in front of not just Batman, but Gotham City itself.

I have not been so moved and entertained by vocabulary since P.G. Wodehouse. There are times when one feels lost, especially when faced with historical contexts and characters that are introduced in page 50 and then intricately woven into the scene at page 276, however, like the great wanderers we arrive at a new destination just as we feel that we are doomed to wander aimlessly.