Name: Bec's review of Bury the Lede by Gaby Dunn
Item: Bury the Lede
Rating: 2
Author: Bec

Gaby Dunn

From New York Times-bestselling author Gaby Dunn comes a story of an ambitious young reporter and the potential murderess who will change her life. Cub reporter Madison Jackson is young, scrappy, and hungry to prove that she deserves her coveted college internship at the premiere newspaper in town, The Boston Lede where she fetches coffee for the night crew and dreams of her own byline. So when her police scanner mentions a brutal murder tied to a prominent Boston family, Madison races to the crime scene, looking for the scoop of the century. What she finds instead is the woman who'll change her life forever: Dahlia Kennedy, celebrity socialite, now widow, covered in gore and the prime suspect in the murder of her husband and child. When Dahlia refuses to talk to anyone but Madison, they begin a dangerous game of cat and mouse that leads the young journalist down a twisted path. From Gaby Dunn (Bad with Money, I Hate Everyone But You) and Claire Roe (Batgirl and the Birds of Prey, Welcome Back) comes an all new original graphic novel about the thrill of the chase and the dangers of going toe-to-toe with a potential killer.

Bury the Lede

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The review will be live on the website 10/1/19. Here's the synopsis of the review:

Have you ever had that hard-hitting bug to become a journalist and crack a case wide open? Well, we have -- so Bury The Lede by Gaby Dunn, Claire Roe, and Miquel Muerto scratched our itch. A graphic novel under BOOM! coming October 8th, 2019 dives into the behind-the-scenes journalism narrative by Madison Jackson, "the intern." By the end of the novel, she won't just be an "intern." The narrative overall was spectacular. 

As a reader, I always want to see more. Bury The Lede gave me what I wanted: A hard-hitting thriller story about journalism. I left wanting a second part to find out what happens next in Madison's life. What is the next story? It also gave me an act of small courage to channel my inner journalist and crack a case (not a murder case!) One thing you have to show with art is the intensity of the plot since this is a noir detective journalism story. Claire and Miquel did that showing with Gaby's telling with the writing. You know when you see a great team together because the showing and telling are effortless. That is what happened here with Bury The Lede. 

Not only did it do an incredible job with the plot and themes, but it made the reader dive into the story and get into the mindset of a journalist. What a powerful thing to do! In terms of quality -- the comic might not work for everyone. You have to be into the detective narrative and be able to become engulfed in it. The narrative and voice, personally, were exciting to read. It left me wanting more and even after it ended, I wanted a second part already.

Gabriel Noel 

ARC given by NetGalley for Honest Review

Bury the Lede had a promising plot but was somewhat of a let down. The story was face-paced and I was excited to get to learn "whodunnit" but the ending seemed hastily finished and a little cliche. Madison is an unlikable character and while that may have been how she was written, it made it hard to connect and empathize with her. 
The LGBTQ representation was fairly well done, albeit that "you're bi? me too!" scene with police officer Dom. I think the addition of Dahlia's affair with another woman was unnecessary to the overall plot.
Overall a beautifully drawn but flat plotlined story.

Jelke Lenaerts

This book has a content warning for sexual assault.

I RECEIVED A GALLEY OF THIS THROUGH NETGALLEY.

I really liked this graphic novel but it did dissapoint me in a few areas. The art was great and the mystery aspect was very gripping and interesting. I wasn't able to put this down because I just wanted to know what would happen next. However, some the characters were very hypocritical, the romance/love-triangle thingy just felt very forced and not very well developed. The characters also fell a bit flat to me. The storyline felt a bit rushed at points and a bit incomplete towards the ending. It kind of felt like it was setting up a sequel but this is marked as a standalone so unless that's going to change this was pretty dissapointing to me in that area.

Melissa Eder

The ending was too abrupt and I didnt get....most of the plot going on? Also yikes for cheating and drug abuse that never hot adressed. I think if this would’ve been longer it would’ve been better. 1 extra star for the gorgeous art, otherwise thats a 1 star for me.

Trigger/content warnings: (view spoiler)[murder, blood, adultery, sexual abuse/child molestation (off the page) (hide spoiler)]

I loved the concept of this graphic novel so much more than it's execution. I love investigative journalist stories and honestly I wish there was more of it in the fictional world. In addition, I don't think I've ever come across an adult graphic novel that takes that genre on - hence why I was so keen to check this one out. 

But overall I just didn't feel engaged with the story. With the jolting plot-line and overall lack of character and background substance, I couldn't dive completely into the investigation.While I loved the queer relationships, I also had no connection to the characters what-so-ever. 

The villain didn't villain-y enough and I wish there had been more of Madison's family background involved in the story. 

I did love the artwork, it felt unique and much more mature than I am used to experiencing in a graphic novel. But in some ways, I felt like it almost added to the overall blandness of the story.

Overall, I feel as though there was a foundation here with so much potential that just didn't get reached. I'm curious to see what future graphic stories from Dunn are like, but this one just didn't work for me.



  Note: Review copy received via NetGalley. This does not impact opinions within this review.


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Happy reading! ❤

Hayley 📖🌈💜🌸

3.5 stars.
This was super interesting, not my usual graphic novel, but interesting none the less.

Sarah Sammis

Anna Bold

Cub reporter Madison Jackson is young, scrappy, and hungry to prove that she deserves her coveted college internship at the premiere newspaper in town, The Boston Lede, so when her police scanner mentions a brutal murder tied to the prominent Boston Kennedys, Madison races to the crime scene, looking for the scoop of the century. What she finds instead is the woman who'll change her life forever: Dahlia Kennedy, celebrity socialite, now widow, covered in gore and the prime suspect in the murder of her husband and child. When Dahlia refuses to talk to anyone but Madison, they begin a dangerous game of cat and mouse that leads the young journalist down a twisted path. From Gaby Dunn (Bad with Money, I Hate Everyone But You) and Claire Roe (Batgirl and the Birds of Prey, Welcome Back) comes an all-new original graphic novel about the thrill of the chase and the dangers of going toe-to-toe with a potential killer.

Bec &
Bury the Lede by Gaby Dunn

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