5 out of 5

Aw heck yes.  An evil-looking bird with a split face squawks; lightning strikes; a leather-coated, jeaned man says bye to his dog, remarks on the evil in the air, and takes off.   As he sets off along a rocky, mountainous path, he’s dodging that lightning, he’s dodging some suddenly overgrown, beast frog-looking things, and then when he’s punching lightning out of the way – yeah, I figured this book is for me.

Jim has a ton of fun on page tossing all sorts of calamity at his rider, who starts to have some terse talks with a devil-looking feller – give up; I’ll never give up – and given the title, we’re clearly accompanying this man’s ride through his own hells, which keep stacking up, page by page.  It’s a lovely sight, given all the detailing gusto by Jim for which we could ask (I would love prints from this book) and being a lot less motorcycle lovey-dovey than we could probably expect, and instead keeping the focus on moving forward, against more and more obstacles – obstacles which are recognizable; the day-to-day grind that keeps us down.

It ends with some badass ‘splosions, and the dog looks at us and says Bye.  Perfect.