Ken Games is a new series by Spanish team and newcomers José Robledo and Marcial Toledano that have worked on shorter stories in the past but have their breakthrough with the three-volume series Ken Games. This book was just released in French last month. Ken Games is about three friends, Pierre, a mathematician, Thierry-Jean (TJ), a banker and his girlfriend Anne, a schoolteacher. Each of them harbours a secret hidden from the others. Pierre quit school and competes as a boxer to make ends meet. TJ is an underground poker player and Anne is waitress in a diner. Trying to keep up appearances is difficult and the game of bluff and lying may start to cost each player more than initially intended. How far will each of the friends go to hide the truth from the other?
The premise of the story seems innocuous. Each of the three friends told a small lie that overtime became huge and took more out of them. One wonders why they let it go that far. What seems like a trite concept for a drama soon turns into a thriller without quite abruptly. The revelation in the last few pages about some of the bigger lies are totally unexpected and instead of creating a thriller seem like something pulled out of a magician’s hat. It just doesn’t fit in and the foreshadowing for the end revelation was insufficient.
This volume, the story was concentrated on Pierre, the boxer, which is why he’s on the cover. By the looks of it, he’s the principal character. Obviously, the stories of the three friends are bound to intertwine and I can already take a wild guess seeing where this will lead and it will not be nice. Still the story is interesting enough and the game of bluff between the friends will ultimately be a game of bluff on themselves. The second volume is expected in August 2009, so maybe readers won’t have to wait long to find out.
Toledano has a refreshing visual style that gives each character his own distinct and exaggerated look. The choreography of the boxing scenes is superb and technically correct. That’s a good thing. Based on the artwork, it’s hard to figure out where this story takes place but the colours are rich and the facial expression effective. Toledano is not the type of artist that I would have cast for a thriller, but so far, he’s doing a great job. I can’t wait to see how much his work has evolved in the next volume.
