PARA #2 of 6 32 pages, full color, $2.95/$4.60CAN

Creator/Script - Stuart Moore Pencils - Pablo Villalobos Inks - Mostafa Moussa Colors - Mike Garcia Letters - Richard Starkings Painted Cover - Stephan Martiniere

Penny Farthing Press www.pfpress.com

A really good mystery will get you going on one track and then throw a curve another way. And just when you think you have a handle on things, bang another curve! That is how I felt after reading part two of this series. Sara Erie lost her father nineteen years ago in an accident in a massive underground atomic particle accelerator. She has managed to convince the man in charge of going back down to find evidence of what happened to take her along. She is also involved with his grad student, Roger Max. An FBI agent, Donna Sanchez is also assigned as this is a government facility and she suspects Sara's clearance is forged. The initial trip brings some surprises - no bodies, no radioactivity and the word PARA written all over the walls in blood. Sara has dreams of frogs, hundreds of them - and they talk in some strange indistinguishable manner. What's up with that?

So, trying to figure out where Stuart is going with all this is a fun exercise. The team is going back down and bringing a paranormal expert with them this time. Meanwhile Sara has had another dream of her father asking her an important question and of Roger explaining Para - before the frogs show up and she wakes up. the excitement builds as they go back into the super collider facility. the new man wanders off on his own to find a large robot looming over him. The FBI agent finally gets results from a check she is doing on Sara. The three scientist meanwhile find the control room is far from inactive, in fact the beam generator is still on! They learn that the previous workers, nineteen years ago, where further along than anyone thought but they may not be able to learn much more. They theorize based on what they see that a door was opened, perhaps to another world or dimension - but what if anything came through? And is the door still open? Can her father and the others be somewhere, still alive? The end of this chapter left even more questions unanswered as tragedy strikes.

It doesn't get much better than this. The pace has picked up considerably and while some things are still puzzling the unfolding plot leads us deliberately on the path we are eager to follow. As always, the production values are top notch with Penny Farthing Press. Everything down to the colors and letters is fine tuned and Pablo's pencils are terrific. I have yet to see a bad comic from PFP and this one is among the best.

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