After reading the first two parts of Chubby Bounty Hunter, I felt I needed some genre-guidance, some sort of crib-sheet that would tell me by what standard I should be judging this series. I went to its website, and discovered that it is “An epic novel series. One part fantasy. One part auto-biography.” This was an overwhelming relief, as Chubby comes off as unabashedly autobiographical, but claims to be a work of fiction. Thompson, in fact, loves to talk about himself, and especially this fantastical version of himself. The easiest trap for a first-person narrative to fall into is excessive self-description, and Thompson doesn’t so much fall as dive in head first. Several pages into issue 000: The Book of Resha he is still describing himself and his neuroses. We get an itemized list of his obsessive-compulsive tendencies, and this seems to paint an unsympathetic portrait of our hero. Chubby really starts to shine when the fantasy elements start coming into play. While some of the back-story reads like a polemical rant, the reality of Chubby comes across as one part Dungeons & Dragons and one part cosmic-soap opera. This information is delivered through slightly annoyed-sounding description and character stat sheets, and the result is somewhere between tongue-in-cheek satire and full-out nerdy obsession. This series has real potential, and the first arc of any epic series tends to be a little rough. (J. Blackmore)
Chapbook, Adam Thompson, Published by Uyugomiak, Chapter 000: The Book of the Resha, chubbybountyhunter.com