Space bandits

Cody Blue is a criminal mastermind whose latest scheme--hiring all of the most effective members of the most successful criminal gangs across the galaxy to assist her in a series of heists--seems foolproof, until they betray her and leave her for dead. Thena Khole is a vicious hand-to-hand fighter smitten with a con man named Viggo Lust, with whom she pulls a series of schemes until she's abandoned and arrested. When both women are sentenced to serve in a penal colony inside a 100-mile-long crustacean drifting through space, they become fast friends, quickly escape, and set out for vengeance. Millar (Sharkey the Bounty Hunter) has built his career on making simple, tried-and-true-premises seem fresh and fun, and illustrator Scalera (Black Science. Vol. 9: No Authority but Yours) proves an excellent collaborator, as the two set a classic crime plot in an intergalactic society heavily influenced by the fashion and culture of Earth in the 1980s. VERDICT Watching Cody and Thena wreak havoc is a total blast in this fast-paced, Day-Glo romp.

Day explores widely varied themes of motherhood, identity, resilience, heartbreak, and spirituality in this book of poems. A far-reaching variety of relationships and emotions are dealt with in this collection, which Day calls a "reflection of a poet's life." One of the first telling examples of what's in store for the reader here is a confessional poem in which the author admits to not living up to her potential and calls for others to focus on her faux snakeskin boots to distract from her outward emotional state and the sense that she is "a woman who's not all she knows she can be." Other poems are dedicated to Day's close relationship to her children. She devotes lines to an idyllic beach scene featuring the speaker's daughter, Charlotte: While the little girl delights in the waves, the speaker marvels at her love for the girl, and experiences "wondrous awe in God above." Another daughter, Jennifer, garners her own ode, and is praised for her optimism, courage, and "bright, sweet mind." The poet makes no secret of how she admires her own mother's steadfastness, but also mourns how much her mother suffered. In the poem, pithily entitled "Mother," she recalls how her mother "sang so well, but rarely could, her song cloaked by a heavy hood," and later died in pain. Day excels in conveying emotional authenticity and touchingly depicts the bittersweet complexities of her relationship with her mother and captures the exuberance of youth when writing about her children. She also vividly describes tender moments of parental love, like when describing her daughter: "Her tiny glow with dotted hat and chubby legs of dimpled fat." Stock photos add further depth to the poet's experience by providing a visual representation of each poem's context. However, her verse that directly addresses terrorism and 9/11, coupled with a blurry picture of the wreckage, feels out of place with the collection's thematic arc. A poignant poetic exploration of a woman's emotional landscape over time. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.