The Laughing Cavalier by Baroness Orczy: B

From the back cover:
The year is 1623, the place Haarlem in the Netherlands. Diogenes—the first Sir Percy Blakeney, the Scarlet Pimpernel’s ancestor—and his friends Pythagoras and Socrates defend justice and the royalist cause. The famous artist Frans Hals also makes an appearance in this historical adventure. Orczy maintains that Hals’ celebrated portrait of The Laughing Cavalier is actually a portrayal of the Scarlet Pimpernel’s ancestor.

Review:
What a perfectly abysmal blurb that is. Egads.

The Laughing Cavalier, one of two prequels to The Scarlet Pimpernel, tells the story of a penniless foreign adventurer who passed down his exceptional qualities—such as “careless insouciance”—to his descendant, Sir Percy Blakeney, the hero of the more famous work. This fellow, a half-English rogue enjoying the life of a vagabond in The Netherlands, goes by the name of Diogenes and has for companions/minions two fellows calling themselves Pythagorus and Socrates. When Gilda Beresteyn, sister of one man and former love of another who together conspire to kill the current ruler, overhears of these plans, Diogenes and his men are hired to spirit her away so that the assassination atttempt may proceed without her interference.
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The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen 1 by Alan Moore and Kevin O’Neill: B-

From the front flap:
London, 1898. The Victorian Era draws to a close and the twentieth century approaches. It is a time of great change and an age of stagnation, a period of chaste order and ignoble chaos. It is an era in need of champions.

Allan Quatermain, Captain Nemo, Hawley Griffin, Dr. Henry Jekyll, Mr. Edward Hyde, and Mina Murray are those champions and together they comprise the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.

Recruited by the enigmatic Campion Bond, under orders from the mysterious “M,” these six adventurers are pressed into service by their empire in its time of need. Now they must face the nefarious Doctor and his vile plan for world domination. But things are not entirely as they seem; other factors, cryptic and corpuscular, are also at play. A remarkable drama ensues.
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The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms (N.K. Jemisin)


The Plot
After the death of her mother, Yeine is summoned to the capital of the world, the city of Sky where her grandfather rules. She finds herself installed as his heir — one of several who might inherit his position — and thrown into a situation where the politics only get murkier the more she finds out. She attempts to stay alive while she pursues her own agenda, to find out who murdered her mother.
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League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (Vol 1) (Alan Moore)


The Plot
Miss Mina Murray has been tasked by the mysterious M to collect a group of the world’s most famous ‘heroes’ to work on behalf of him (and perhaps the British government) in reclaiming the stolen wonder-item cavorite. But said ‘heroes’ are reluctant to join in or cooperate with anyone and things do not go as smoothly as they might.

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J’s Take on The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen Vol. 1


The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen by Alan Moore and Kevin O’Neill and some other people has a really good premise. England? In the 1800s? Well-known fictional characters forming a band of super-agents for the British government? What’s not to like?

Unfortunately, the execution leaves much, much, much, MUCH to be desired. I recall being intrigued by the movie, and liking it fairly well. Though it did have problems, even if I can’t now necessarily put my finger on the problems. Well, the comic/graphic novel has a lot of problems.

Plot: Wilhelmina Murray (whoever she is) takes on the mission of assembling a team. First she tracks down Quartermain (whoever he is.. I gather some sort of long-lived, possibly immortal, dead? adventurer dude) and together with Captain Nemo, they get Dr. Jekyll and the Invisible Man. Then they set out to find some substance called ‘cavorite’ that’s some anti-gravity substance. And if they don’t retrieve it, the evil Chinese will take over the world. Or something.
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