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Young Lions, by Blaise Larmee, is the story of a three-artist performance group comprised of Alice, a wealthy snob, Wilson, a didactic leader, and Cody, who is dreamy and less ambitious. The book opens with Cody saying, “Our conceptual art group is not going as planned.” Later, there’s a party. Cody and Alice go to “The New Museum” and enjoy it. At a performance the trio meets Holly, who is presumably a non-institutional being who nearly becomes a fourth member, but serves to illuminate to character and audience the inner lives of the three primary members. She is an ethereal muse. The crew travels to Florida; they fail at a quasi-Spiritual act; on a walk, Alice remarks how much better her experience would be if it were in a museum; Holly is left behind; they return to normal life. The book is well paced and nicely drawn in pencil, smudges and detritus left in, rendered somewhere between CF and Jockum Nordstrom (the topic of another debate: right down to the lettering style, it’s a lot of CF, but who cares? Influence is inevitable. Four years ago it was Brinkman. There will be others.); it is frequently beautiful, especially when Larmee allows himself to render a detail: a lamp on page 25, or Cody and Alice languid and relaxed on page 51. (more…)