A Midterm Night's Scheme

Chicagoland Detective Agency #6

by Trina Robbins, Tyler Page (Illustrator)

Help! Just before the science fair, a set of magic potions disappear from Luna's locker! The Chicagoland Detective Agency takes up the young witch's case. If Raf, Megan, and Raf's talking dog Bradley can handle space aliens, mummies, and ghosts, this case is child's play!

But when a potion goes awry and a hooded stalker and a wannabe master criminal intervene, the case takes a wild turn into a full-blown catastrophe. Will love-smitten supersleuth Megan and jet-pack inventor Raf be able to straighten out this mess in time? Or will Bradley's nose save the day once more?

Genres: Graphic Novels

64 pages, Paperback

First published October 1, 2013

About the author

Trina Robbins is an American comics artist and writer. She was an early and influential participant in the underground comix movement, and one of the few female artists in underground comix when she started. Her first comics were printed in the East Village Other. She later joined the staff of a feminist underground newspaper It Ain't Me, Babe, with whom she produced the first all-woman comic book titled It Ain't Me Babe. She became increasingly involved in creating outlets for and promoting female comics artists, through projects such as the comics anthology Wimmen's Comix. She was also the penciller on Wonder Woman for a time in the '80s.

Trina has worked on an adaptation of Sax Rohmer's Dope for Eclipse Comics and GoGirl with artist Anne Timmons for Image Comics.

Trina designed Vampirella's costume for Forrest Ackerman and Jim Warren.

In addition to her comics work, Robbins is an author of non-fiction books, including several with an emphasis on the history of women in cartooning.

She is the first of the three "Ladies of the Canyon" in Joni Mitchell's classic song from the album of the same name.

Trina Robbins won a Special Achievement Award from the San Diego Comic Con in 1989 for her work on Strip AIDS U.S.A., a benefit book that she co-edited with Bill Sienkiewicz and Robert Triptow.

Reviews

[Petter Ruenes · Rating 2 out of 5]

Introduction:
My original plan was to get "El Deafo", but I couldn't get a hold of it so I went with this book. It's about a detective agency that has to help a witch recover her potions that have been stolen from her. The agency has a talking dog that helps solve cases, and meanwhile the case is being solved the witch falls in love with the lead detective and puts a love potion in her drink, but it fails so she falls in love with the dog. In the end they find the culprit and the case is solved, the lead detective is not in love with the witch, but the witch finds another girl that she falls in love with naturally, without the potion. I found the story rather poor and they made it too obvious in the very start who the culprit was, as he told us he wanted to be a criminal mastermind...

Text-to-Self:
At the end of the story is a login page, and on the following pages are status updates written by the characters in the book describing the events that happened. It is called MyBlogFace and has many of the same characteristics such as Facebook. Like a lot of other people I use Facebook, what we use the social media service for varies, but personally my main use is done through the messenger system to keep in touch with friends and relatives that I don't meet that often, or to make plans with friends. I do not really use the status updates that much. The book shows a truth that I don't particularly like, the truth that most of our lives, no matter what age, start to evolve around a social media service, owned by a company that makes money on us. I don't like this direction, but it is so dominant that it is starting to show in children's literature as well, because that's today's reality.

Text-to-Text:
I was trying to think of another series, but I kept coming back to this one. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets puts Harry Potter and his friends on the task of finding out what happens to everyone that gets turned into stone, and the location of the chamber of secrets. In Chicagoland they also have to solve a mystery that involves potions being stolen from a witch. In both books they achieve their goals, and in both books there is twist. SPOILER! In Harry Potter we learn that the snake was controlled by Voldemort, and we learn more about his past as Tom Riddle. In Chicagoland the witch and another girl from the school start a relationship.

Text-to-World:
The thing that surprised me while reading this book was that it actually included same gender relationships. I wasn't surprised because I was offended by it, but I had simply never seen it in children's literature before. I think it is nice that also children's literature can portray this, as it has become a more natural part of our society. Although a lot of countries do not officially approve same gender relationships, I think there has been an increasing amount of support for this kind of relationship in the last ten years, and I think it only will become more approved and less unusual. I am happy that we are moving in a direction that appreciates the diversity we have among us, and I personally don't care if my friends prefer same gender relationships or are hetero, it still makes them my friends.

[Pinky · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Chicagoland Detective Agency is at it again, this time trying to solve the mystery of the missing magical potions amidst the science fair. Clever subplot involving a love potion - Megan accidentally falls in love with Bradley the talking dog. Funny and a bit radical.