Sunstone vol. 1
As this wound up making a last-minute arrival on my “Best of 2014” list, I figured it was due for some elaboration on just why that happened. It’s a mature work of erotic fiction that skillfully fleshes out the personalities of its two female leads in a respectful, intelligent…
“WAIT! DON’T LEAVE YET! THIS BOOK HAS LOTS OF HOT LESBIAN BONDAGE SEX!”
Not my words, actually. That phrase is taken directly from the book itself and showcases another one of its virtues: Irreverence. Because why shouldn’t a series about two women exploring their sexual desires be funny as well as illuminating.
Ally and Lisa are two successful women in their respective fields, software designer and chef respectively, yet something has always been missing from their love lives. You see, Ally is a natural dominatrix yet has never found someone truly accepting of her advances. Lisa, on the other hand, is submissive and has some experience with self-bondage as well. They happen to meet in an internet chat room and after several long chats about themselves, both agree to meet and see if their desires can be fulfilled.
From there it’s a week of anxiety on both sides of the fence. Ally shares the news with her friend Alan, who also helps her order a special bed for the event. Lisa tries to indulge her writing hobby to take her mind of the anticipation, but the sexual anticipation starts to creep into her work. It’s through experiences like these that we really start to get a sense of what makes these women tick and why they’re looking for these specific kinds of sexual experiences. That these issues are being addressed at all in a mainstream comic and in a manner that doesn’t come off as too gratuitous or exploitative (in a comic from Top Cow — the home of “Witchblade” for god’s sake) is nothing short of remarkable.
What impressed me even more about this series was how its creator, Stjepan Sejic (who had a long run illustrating “Witchblade,” incidentally), avoids cheap drama as a means of creating tension in the story. “Sunstone” is about two women embarking on a new direction in their lives, and the writer/artist sticks to exploring those fears on the page. There’s no, “But my family would disown me if they found out what I was doing,” moment and the fact that they’re in a lesbian relationship only provokes a questioning/disapproving look from one of Lisa’s co-workers. Yes, Ally and Lisa aren’t announcing their relationship to the world, but it’s refreshing to see the focus of this story placed squarely on their own feelings and not muddied up with cheap drama. Seeing whether or not they can actually have their desires fulfilled and whether or not their relationship will bloom into something more is plenty exciting in and of itself.
Yet this story also does an excellent job of bringing humor into this relationship without undercutting it for a cheap laugh. We see it in Ally’s excited call about her upcoming meeting with Lisa to her friend Alan, in the middle of the night. Another great sequence has the two women trying to decide on what to wear for their first encounter with one outfit causing Ally to affect a German accent, and another being rejected by Lisa for being “Too Scooby.” Alan also winds up providing an amusing male presence throughout the story, being both a friend and sounding board for Ally, and a source of its best one-liners. Overall, the humor keeps the mood from becoming too serious and helps to further round out the personalities of the cast.
Then there’s the art from Sejic which is magnificent in how it conveys the thoughts and feelings of the story’s cast on the page. The anxiety, the fears, the joy, and ecstasy Ally and Lisa feel in their relationship are all clearly evident in their expressions. There’s also a wide variety to them as Sejic is not one to re-use the same basic model for his characters over and over again. Sejic has a wonderful design sense as well, evident from the two-page spread early on which shows his protagonists’ histories strung together like a corset. Other panel arrangements manage to pull off suggestiveness in the way Lisa experiences a kind of sensory deprivation in one encounter, while another has Ally realizing just how alone she is in her house after everyone has left. It’s great, complex work that leaves me in admiration of what the artist has done here.
Even better is that he goes on to tell the reader all about how he did it. In contrast to just about every other comic out there, the extras in “Sunstone” have Sejic providing a text-with-art explanation of just how this series came about. The short version: Artistic experimentation on DeviantArt after being burnt out on “Witchblade.” It was fun to read, informative, and an example of something I’d like to see in all of the comics I read (or just the creator-owned ones at the very least). There’s also plenty of art in this section as well which continues the irreverent streak demonstrated in the main story. Also, if you’re willing to squint it’s likely you’ll see a lot of the pages that will make up vol. 2 here too.
If I have one real issue with this volume, it’s that we don’t get to see enough actual bondage in Ally and Lisa’s encounters. For a series built on exploring that particular fetish it’s a pretty notable oversight. It’s one I’m willing to overlook as the sex isn’t the sole focus of this series and everything else is done well enough to compensate. Yes, this is a story about lesbian bondage sex and it offers enough depth to transcend that base description. It may be a very specialized class, but “Sunstone” is the best in it.