Topside offered glimpses of a well thought out universe and beautiful art, but it didn’t quite hit the mark for me because there wasn’t quite enough backstory.


A wild outer-space fantasy about fixing your mistakes and the friends you meet along the way.

Topside CoverWhen Jo, a headstrong maintenance technician, makes an error that destabilizes her planet’s core, she only knows one way to fix things: leaving her underground home for a trip to the planet’s dangerous, unruly surface. Soon she’s wandering through deserts, riding on the back of giant beasts, and cutting deals with con artists and bounty hunters. Meanwhile, agents of the core are in hot pursuit. J. N. Monk and Harry Bogosian (co-creators of the web-comic StarHammer) present a wild outer-space fantasy about fixing your mistakes and the friends you meet along the way. (Goodreads)
Goodreads

I received an eARC of Topside from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.
I felt like this story needed a prologue, or even a prequel to envelop readers in the world that Monk and Bogosian created in Topside. I loved Bogosian’s illustration, but I struggled to understand why we were seeing what we were. Mechanical shark in a dress? Awesome. Married to a living lightbulb? Sweet! Magic shapeshifting child? Amazing. But I needed more plot-wise.

You can read my full review here!