LOAC Essentials Volume 13 - Charlie Chan

Loac Essentials Volume 13: Charlie Chan, 1938 by Alfred Andriola
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

LOAC Essentials Volume 13: Charlie Chan collects the first year of Charlie Chan dailies, starting in 1938.

I went into this pretty cold, my only knowledge of Charlie Chan being that he's a detective that calls his son "Number One Son" and speaks in fake proverbs. My dad has called me "Number One Son" for years.

Alfred Andriola worked in Milt Caniff's studio and draws a lot of influence from the Terry and the Pirates creator. The art is good, better than a lot of what was going on in comic books and comic strips at the time. Once you get past the Chinese stereotypes, Charlie Chan is a pretty good character, father of eleven and smooth ass detective. He doesn't engage in violence, leaving that to sidekicks and associates.

The stories themselves are as good of mysteries as possible in the daily format. Chan solves all sorts of crimes, from mine sabotage, to murders, to weird stuff involving parrots. It's all fun stuff. Chan's powers of observation are astounding but not out of the realm of possibility.

Good stuff but not my favorite LOAC Essential volume by any means.

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