Terry Moore

Echo Complete Edition by Terry Moore

Posted by le garage

Published by Abstract Studios: abstractstudioscomics.com Terry Moore, Artist and Writer.

I just finished reading Echo by Terry Moore for the second time. This is an unbelievable story about a young woman who is testing a nuclear beta suit that covers her body like skin and enables her to fly as fast as a jet plane. Her name is Dr. Annie Trotter and this is part of what HENRI ( Heinrich Nuclear Research Institute) is testing.

The man second in charge is Jack Cooper and they have decided that Dr. Annie Trotter is in the way of what they want to create with this material. They have made a decision to shoot her out of the sky and recover the material when it falls to earth in a secluded area called Moon Lake. What they didn’t count on was a photographer named Julie Martin taking pictures in the Moon Lake area and also a homeless man with a Jesus complex in the same area. When the suit breaks apart after Dr. Trotter is killed by a missile it forms itself into small pellets that fall all around the Moon Lake area, the majority of them hitting Julie and her truck with some other pellets hitting the homeless man.

When Julie touches her truck the pellets swarm together and form a thin breast plate on her that she cannot remove and the homeless man has less pellets but just enough to cover one of his hands.

Julie doesn’t realize it but she has become a nuclear weapon and HENRI will stop at nothing to recover the material even though it will kill her if they try to remove it. The homeless man thinks this material is a gift from God so he can remove the evil from the world with his hand as the Hand of God.

Dr. Annie Trotter, deceased, had a boyfriend named Dillon Murphy who works as a Park Ranger and is very familiar with the Moon Lake area. Dillon is also extremely upset when he finds out that the woman he loves is dead and HENRI has no body to show him. He runs into Julie Martin and is a witness when the army tries to take her into custody and without meaning to, Julie blows the soldiers to hell.

Julie Martin has a sister named Pam whose family was in a terrible accident and her husband and children were killed and she now resides in a psychiatric facility. She is extremely empathic and plays a part in this thrilling story.

The art and text in this giant graphic novel is fantastic and Terry Moore is responsible for it all. The science fiction writer Harlan Ellison says this about Terry Moore and Echo: “Terry Moore does an acre more straight-up memorable storytelling in one black & white issue of Echo than either of the two comic’s giants’ in a years’-worth of their prolix, boring, barren crossover ‘events. This, ECHO, is what we long for, would die for.”

Annie’s distraught boyfriend Dillon decides to help Julie Martin with her predicament, not fully realizing what he is getting into. Also, Dillon has a group of friends that are hardcore Bikers
and he enlists their aid. The head of the biker group, a giant of a man named Dan Backer has been watching HENRI and different events that have been taking place in their area and he suspects them of creating dangerous elements that they let loose in the area where his bike club roams.

Jack Cooper, from HENRI, hires a woman named Ivy Raven to track down Julie and take her into custody but doesn’t reveal all the facts to her. HENRI wants the material back to conduct an experiment that could destroy the world; building a machine that is called a Collider and they want to create a Black Hole.

Ivy Raven is not a woman to fool around with being related to an underground group of women called the Parker Girls which were introduced in Terry Moore’s first comic series called
Strangers In Paradise. I highly recommend reading Strangers In Paradise.

Ironically, a new series of Strangers In Paradise has just started running in the comic stores and it connects directly with the epic Echo. Issue #1 just came out a couple of weeks ago and can still be obtained at your local comic store. This is Volume 2 of Strangers In Paradise. Volume 1 of Strangers In Paradise is a top seller and consisted of a 90 comic run and is available on the internet on Amazon and eBay. Abstract Studios still has some back issues and has a giant trade paperback of Echo which you can obtain from them or your local comic store with some luck.

Once you start reading Echo, you will be hooked, as I was.

“People like us, who believe in physics, know that the distinction between past, present, and
future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion.”—Albert Einstein

Rachel Rising by Terry Moore

Posted by le garage

Rachel Rising by Terry Moore; Published by Abstract Studio, Box 271487, Houston, TX,77277

Imagine, if you can, digging yourself out of a grave in the ground, and not having any memory of how you wound up there or of who you really are.

Rachel Rising is an amazing tale, but I really did not realize it at first.  Let me clarify. We are talking about a graphic novel, drawn and written by Terry Moore.

You see, comics are so short and they come out every two months, so they can be difficult to follow.  Rachel Rising will be concluded with the 42nd issue, so there is a great deal of story to follow. It is complex, and I found myself, once I started buying trades 1—5, of which there will be 7 when the tale is complete, reading the story and flipping back through the pages because an event was occurring that triggered remembrances of something that happened much earlier. There are 6 individual comics in a trade.

I’m ashamed to admit that I started buying the single comics in the beginning and discontinued reading them at around issue 11.  However, if I had been able to conveniently flip back to earlier comics and reread certain sections, I would never have discontinued the series.

Rachel Rising is a wonderfully complex, detailed adventure that must be read in large chunks at a time.  I’m a writer and I remembered how wonderful were Strangers In Paradise and Echo, also by Terry Moore, so I decided to give Rachel Rising another chance.  When I bought and read the 5 trade paperbacks altogether, with total enjoyment, I was amazed. Terry Moore has outdone himself. The story is carefully plotted and drawn and Terry didn’t miss a trick.

The story takes place in a town called Manson, which has a history of conspiring against women of nature. Many were tortured and hung. But it is now present day, and the worm has turned, so to speak.

Rachel Rising is populated by a group of unique characters. There are the women who were hung and have come back, Rachel being one of them. Her friends are also unique.

Aunt Johnny is an undertaker and happily committed, in a lesbian relationship.

Then there is Doctor Siemen, who keeps company with his wife and claims she is agoraphobic. Actually, she doesn’t go out because she is quite dead.

The women of the past and present, and a killer little girl named Zoe, attempt to set things right in Manson. Justice must be done. This story has ghosts, dire wolves, a dog that becomes possessed with the spirit of Aunt Johnny, and an active mortuary. There is also a priest who, well, you’ll see.

Rachel Rises and hits the road, picked up by a Good Samaritan who is quite concerned about her state of being. She looks awful good for someone who spent 3 days in a shallow grave.

The first thing she does is go home and take a shower and then, at the sink she coughs up pieces of earth and notices a bruise around the front of her neck, like a rope necklace.

Then, shortly after a quick stop at the local car repair shop, Rachel drops in on at Aunt Johnny at the mortuary. At first Johnny doesn’t recognize Rachel.

Then Rachel gets Aunt Johnny to take a break and go with her to the gravesite. Aunt Johnny jumps into the grave and calls out Rachel’s name and Rachel says, “I’m here,” and finally Aunt Johnny recognizes her, in some sense of the word.

Then Rachel goes to a bar looking for her friend Jet, and has an encounter of the fourth kind with a woman who is going to be married soon, or so she thinks.

Rachel lays hands on her and sees her future and it is dark indeed. Rachel gives her and her husband to be some advice that makes the worms turn. All of this takes place within the first chapter of book one with much more than half of the book to go.

As I said, there will be 7 books in all, or 42 comics, if you choose to buy them that way. Comic #1 sells for about $100 now because of the popularity of the story, and the rumor that the story has been optioned for a television show.

But, by all means, read the comic books first. By the time you read this, all the later issue comics will be out and the latter ones you can pick up for a normal price. However, I recommend buying the trade paper backs which contain approximately 6 comics in each trade.

If you really like this story, and I think you will, there will be a special hardcover Black Edition that will be limited to 750 signed and numbered copies. It is due to come out in July, and if you pre-order, you will get a sketch with the book signature. I have Terry Moore’s hardcover book of the story called Echo which now sells on Ebay for $199. It originally cost $75. I’m not going to go into the story of Echo, but trade paperbacks are available also from Abstract Studios, on the Internet or your local comic shop. Echo is extremely well done.

Rachel has risen and she is not the only one come back to avenge the innocent women who were killed by the gentle folk of Manson. A great yarn which is illustrated and penned by Terry Moore. Terry’s a nice guy too. It is amazing what must be going on in his head. I wouldn’t want to go there by myself.