[Robb_K]

Schoolgirls’ Picture Library 143

Dancer in Hiding

Yes, this unidentified artist's drawings are quite good (although, all the young girls' faces are too similar (they all could be sisters)).  The story is very unrealistic.  How likely is it that an unsuccessful ballet writer steals the first ballet of an amateur, and it is a success.  And so, the thief then tries to sabotage any success that the writer's second ballet will have, when succeeding with that plan would likely be extremely difficult, and it would be a lot easier to steal the second ballet and pretend he wrote it than to spend all his time trying to block every move The star professional ballerina and true ballet composer attempt.  This defies logic.  Why would a highly successful ballerina need to get a class of untrained amateur schoolgirls to dance her fiancee's ballet to make ballet officials believe he wrote it?  Why not have her professional friends state that it is excellent work, and why wouldn't the professional ballet officials and producers believe her over an upstart writer, who never before wrote anything of that good quality?  If she is one of the very highest level ballerinas, she could have brought her fiancee's music to her own producer, put on a demonstration of it to him, and told him that she wants her own troupe to perform it as her next project.  If she is so famous, and in such demand, she could get financial backers to back that project, and might even be wealthy enough to back it with her own money.  The kind of hounding activities LeBlanc was performing smack more of a personal vendetta based on hatred, than trying to continue stealing a rival's compositions, or to cover up the fact that he stole one.  If the villain cannot write successful ballets, there is little to be gained by stealing just one.  He would need to continue stealing them to keep up a successful career.  Characters' motivations are a major key to the integrity, credibility, and believability of a story.  Even at 8 years old, I'd have had a hard time enjoying this story (with a premise with more holes in it than Swiss cheese) for anything other than looking at its nice artwork. 

[Goof]

Thanks for your reply, Morgus. I’m glad you liked the choices.

“You have to wonder how this comic line would have changed if it had hung around.”

The short answer is, the comics got better. I’m a big admirer of these early stories (or I wouldn’t have selected them here), but for me there’s no doubt that, generally speaking, the later SPLs were more varied in story type and freer and more original in artwork. Looking further on, the best of the later girls’ comics (1970s/1980s) were also harder hitting, more realistic and sophisticated in story treatment, and often more technically accomplished both in writing and art. If you are keen on the spooky and dangerous, try the late 70s horror comic Misty:

https://www.juliaround.com/misty

None of these stories can be downloaded here for copyright reasons, but Rebellion have reprinted a few of the best. It’s worth trying Moonchild, the Four Faces of Eve, The Sentinels, or Wolf Girl.

[Goof]

Thanks for your comments, Robb K.

Schoolgirls’ Picture Library 76
Loyal to Her Disgraced Mother

Firstly, Pat Tourret was indeed female, the eldest of three sisters (Pat, Gwen and Shirley), who were all artists on girls’ comics for around 10 years from the mid ‘50s to the mid ‘60s. They had a broadly similar style, and worked mostly on romance titles. The rest of their careers was devoted to book illustration. My personal preference is for Gwen, who had more warmth and flexibility than the others. All the sisters seem to me to have been superb technicians in their mature work (this is an early example), but it’s probably fair to say that Pat was the best line artist of the three.

I agree about the virtually complete lack of violence in these stories, compared to those aimed at boys. The boys’ stories could reach high levels of excitement with combat sequences at key moments. The girls’ story creators had to do without this, but it seems to me that they made a virtue of this necessity by developing more psychological tools, the use of which depended much on the skill of the artist. Something that I particularly admire is the way artists were able to generate tension, drama and even confrontation without being able to resort to the standard fist or gun fight that was a routine of the boys’ genre, by use of facial and body language to convey mood, suppressed emotions, secrecy, concealed or half suppressed thoughts.

On the question of the lack of athletic action in this story, I think this is down more to the artist than to the genre in general. Pat Tourret’s art, like that of her sisters, was quite static, and when she did attempt rapid or extreme movement (such as the running panel you refer to), I personally find it a little awkward. You can see this also in the other story that she drew for SPL, #139 “Carol Out West” – it’s remarkable how little physical action there is here for a Wild West story. However she did command a good range of facial expression, and it’s fortunate that the hard, intense stares that were her trademark happen to suit this story, especially Miss Molsey’s habit of glaring pure hatred at the heroine. The same type of expression can be rather disconcerting when you meet it in her romance stories!

Schoolgirls’ Picture Library 143
Dancer in Hiding

I’m sorry this one didn’t go down well with you. I like it for its vitality, characterisation and occasionally bizarre invention more than for its plausibility, which was never the strong suit of these early PLs. 

I personally rate the art very highly. The subtlety, precision and elegance of the line, the energy, variety and free flowing movement of the figures and the use of some powerful lighting effects seem to me to be exceptional. The sameness in the girls’ faces is a general factor in girls’ comic stories. Some artists were a lot better than others at differentiating their characters (and there were a few quite brilliant caricaturists), but even the best tended to use a fairly uniform face for the girl protagonists, who were usually differentiated by hair style and colour. Oddly, it’s something I’ve found useful in identifying artists, as many developed their own distinctive “girl face” (as I think this artist does), and this has sometimes proved a better identity tag than their style with other characters, where their individuality can be obscured by the need to draw villains, old people etc according to fairly standard visual conventions.

[Robb_K]

Super Detective Library 45

Lesley Shane: Crime from the Sky
Great artwork by Passingham, and an equally great story premise, plot and staging. Excellent entertainment. It would have made a great early 1950s Noire film. At first, I thought Schultz was patterned after Edward G. Robinson. But this character needed to be more rough-edged and cruel. I'd have liked to have 100 pages to flesh out the story a little more. I didn't get enough time to enjoy the party before it was interrupted by the paratrooper attack. Also there wasn't any new suspense point when the 2 (out-of-3) top crooks entered their final transport vehicle (private yacht) and headed for Algeria. From then, it was either they'd be intercepted by British ships en route per Ms. Shane's testimony, or they'd get away free and clear. It would have been better for one more fly in the ointment (a temporary escape to a place short of their destination, that provided a slim chance for them to get away). On the other hand getting Lesley Shane involved in their capture would then have been a problem.

In any case, the artwork was so fine and detailed, that I felt like I was really there, in the story, like "living in a film".  The action scenes were very realistic.  The intricate plot was very inventive, and plausible.  This was, by far, the best of the 3 review stories to my taste (probably no surprise to anyone, given that Super Detective Library gave writers and artists much more leeway in what they could portray in their stories).  It was a bit unusual in that the chief criminal of the operation could only stand by, helplessly, in custody of The French Police, as his confederates were apprehended with the stolen Jewels.  He could have claimed that he played no part in the robbery, and that the thieves planned and carried out the operation on their own.  But even if he would have been released, he had no assurance that the other 2 partners wouldn't change their identities and disappear to a hidden place in The 3rd World, and retire selling off the stolen jewels individually, little by little, for the rest of their lives.  There are many possibilities for a series of sequel stories.

[Robb_K]

Thanks for your comments, Robb K.

Schoolgirls’ Picture Library 76
Loyal to Her Disgraced Mother

Firstly, Pat Tourret was indeed female, the eldest of three sisters (Pat, Gwen and Shirley), who were all artists on girls’ comics for around 10 years from the mid ‘50s to the mid ‘60s. They had a broadly similar style, and worked mostly on romance titles. The rest of their careers was devoted to book illustration. My personal preference is for Gwen, who had more warmth and flexibility than the others. All the sisters seem to me to have been superb technicians in their mature work (this is an early example), but it’s probably fair to say that Pat was the best line artist of the three.

I agree about the virtually complete lack of violence in these stories, compared to those aimed at boys. The boys’ stories could reach high levels of excitement with combat sequences at key moments. The girls’ story creators had to do without this, but it seems to me that they made a virtue of this necessity by developing more psychological tools, the use of which depended much on the skill of the artist. Something that I particularly admire is the way artists were able to generate tension, drama and even confrontation without being able to resort to the standard fist or gun fight that was a routine of the boys’ genre, by use of facial and body language to convey mood, suppressed emotions, secrecy, concealed or half suppressed thoughts.

On the question of the lack of athletic action in this story, I think this is down more to the artist than to the genre in general. Pat Tourret’s art, like that of her sisters, was quite static, and when she did attempt rapid or extreme movement (such as the running panel you refer to), I personally find it a little awkward. You can see this also in the other story that she drew for SPL, #139 “Carol Out West” – it’s remarkable how little physical action there is here for a Wild West story. However she did command a good range of facial expression, and it’s fortunate that the hard, intense stares that were her trademark happen to suit this story, especially Miss Molsey’s habit of glaring pure hatred at the heroine. The same type of expression can be rather disconcerting when you meet it in her romance stories!

Yes, I knew she was a female.  My inclusion of the possibility that the writer was a male was because that wasn't absolutely official, at least according to Grand Comics Database, which, apparently, has seen no documentation for that story.

[The Australian Panther]

Schoolgirls' Picture Library 143 - Danger In Hiding
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=95970

On the Splash page, bottom right, we read 'from 'the masked Ballerina'. So either this is a reprint or it's an illustrated version of a book or a story. Perhaps from an earlier girls paper?

From the get-go the girls are between the exciting mysterious stranger and the 'Tartar' teacher who, 'thought Ballet a waste of time.' But she is not the baddie this time. 
A cottage not far from the school, which had stood empty for weeks. [Check]
Lights in the windows. [check]
Their own scene painter and wardrobe mistress! Well supplied at that school.
Page 12. The fall creates a little doubt, suspense, but only to the next panel though, when the verdict is positive.
Edmund Leblanc. Why would a man be hanging around a girl's school? Why would he even know that a group of school-girls were putting on a ballet? Hasn't he got something better to do with his time?
The human croquet ball is a clever idea.
If you are someone like me, it's easy to see that the story is a bit of a stretch, has more than a few holes, but
the visual narrative works very well to cause 'willing suspension of disbelief'
. It gets you in and the experience is very enjoyable.

cheers!
   

[Robb_K]

Schoolgirls' Picture Library 143 - Danger In Hiding
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=95970

On the Splash page, bottom right, we read 'from 'the masked Ballerina'. So either this is a reprint or it's an illustrated version of a book or a story. Perhaps from an earlier girls paper?

From the get-go the girls are between the exciting mysterious stranger and the 'Tartar' teacher who, 'thought Ballet a waste of time.' But she is not the baddie this time. 
A cottage not far from the school, which had stood empty for weeks. [Check]
Lights in the windows. [check]
Their own scene painter and wardrobe mistress! Well supplied at that school.
Page 12. The fall creates a little doubt, suspense, but only to the next panel though, when the verdict is positive.
Edmund Leblanc. Why would a man be hanging around a girl's school? Why would he even know that a group of school-girls were putting on a ballet? Hasn't he got something better to do with his time?
The human croquet ball is a clever idea.
If you are someone like me, it's easy to see that the story is a bit of a stretch, has more than a few holes, but
the visual narrative works very well to cause 'willing suspension of disbelief'
. It gets you in and the experience is very enjoyable.
cheers!

I had little problem believing that LeBlanc learned about the schoolgirls putting on his rival's ballet in a public show.  We were told and shown that he had been watching his rival ballet composer's fiancee's movements to find out about his next composition, in case he might get an opportunity to steal it (as he did the man's first), but more importantly to find the opportunity to sabotage her efforts to get it shown publicly and disprove his own claim that that composer was a genius, and his claim that he wrote the ballet that LeBlanc got published in his name, and had a very successful and lucrative show run and tours, might be believed (and prove he was a fraud).  Of course, that strategy of sabotage would be nigh on to impossible to succeed, and so is completely irrational.  So, the question of why LeBlanc hangs around the girls school is not only explained in the story, but it is almost irrelevant given the irrationality of his sabotage strategy and motivation.  The plot all appears as a forced illogical concoction, used to get pre-teen and younger teenaged girls to become the heroes of this story so the readers can identify with them, and feel good about the possibility that they can make a positive mark on The World, just as boys enjoy superhero stories about the kind of powerful man they aspire to be, and they can identify with their young teensaged boy sidekicks, who share in the heroic activity.

[Quirky Quokka]

Nice selection of comics I wouldn’t normally read. The art was fine, and the stories had a sort of NANCY DREW vibe to them, reminding me of the early to mid 60’s editions. Those Ruddy Nappi covers for the NANCY DREWS were the best part. They always seemed to promise adventures that were spookier and more dangerous then you got when you read them. (My older sister collected a few...but it was the same deal with The Hardy Boys that I got...) You have to wonder how this comic line would have changed if it had hung around.

Morgus, I picked up a number of those Nancy Drews at second-hand sales over the last few years and the covers do promise more than delivered. Though they probably would have been a more exciting read at the time.

Cheers

QQ

[Quirky Quokka]

Super Detective Library 45

Lesley Shane: Crime from the Sky
Great artwork by Passingham, and an equally great story premise, plot and staging. Excellent entertainment. It would have made a great early 1950s Noire film. At first, I thought Schultz was patterned after Edward G. Robinson.

Robb, I was thinking the same thing and wondering if they'd based the crook on Edward G. Robinson. Especially the close-up with the cigar on p. 24. And lots of noir feel with the shadows and staging.

Cheers

QQ

[Quirky Quokka]

Lesley Shane - Crime in the Sky

I haven't read any Lesley Shane adventures before, but I really enjoyed this one. A good noir-like heist story with dramatic art.

Cover - After reading the story, I can see how the cover fits. But if I just saw it on a newsstand, I would think it was a war comic. I guess that's cleared up once you open it.

p. 1 - I was a bit taken aback that he was called the Joker, with the narration box ending with 'will the Joker plan one last jest?' The Joker is such a famous DC character, that I thought it was a bit risky to go with that. The Joker debuted in the first Batman comic in 1940, while this one is 1955. The Gotham Joker would have been very well-established by then. Plus, there's really nothing in the story to indicate why he would be called the Joker anyway, as he's not funny, unless the scam is his idea of a joke. Or maybe it's a reference to his poker-playing days. In any case, it seemed odd. Though I really do like the art on the splash page. Already makes you wonder what he's plotting.

The story was good, though the heist was a hugely expensive operation, with helicopter hire, military plane on standby, 100 paratroopers and others. How much were they going to be paid and what profit would be left from the sale of the jewels? Though it was probably always the plan to leave all the 'assistants' in the ditch and split the loot with the smaller group.

I got a bit confused on p. 49 when one of the bad guys is called Leon, mainly because the old guy who hosted the party was the Count de Leonville. For a minute, I thought he was in on it. Surely it wouldn't have been hard to come up with another name.

Lesley certainly is intrepid, jumping into a helicopter for unknown destination, then boarding a plane she ends up having to fly. I would have liked to see her in the action a bit more. She was never in any direct danger from the crooks, as they didn't know she was on the plane when they jumped off with their parachutes. Though if she hadn't been intrepid, she wouldn't have been able to tell the navy and police what had actually happened, so lots of Brownie points for bravery.

Lots of great art with some wonderful close-ups, great detail in the faces, interesting angles (especially some of the aerial shots). Lots of noir feel with the shading and sense of underlying menace.

A good selection.  Thanks Goof.

Cheers

QQ

[Goof]

Thanks for your comments Robb K. I’m glad that you liked this.

Super Detective Library 45
Lesley Shane: Crime from the Sky

“At first, I thought Schultz was patterned after Edward G. Robinson. But this character needed to be more rough-edged and cruel.”

I agree that Schultz could be more threatening and formidable, but the option to have him as a part-comic figure no doubt restricted his scope to frighten. Having a hen-pecked ex-gangster as the villain was for me one the appealing points of the story. I did also wonder whether Conrad Frost may have had to limit the noir in a story that was written for a family paper, but some of the others in the series actually go a lot further in working up the villains. Also, sensitivities about a family readership didn’t seem to inhibit the creators of Buck Ryan, which had a quite surprising amount of violence for a national daily of its time.

“I'd have liked to have 100 pages to flesh out the story a little more.”

Yes, there’s certainly scope to work up parts of the story in more detail. Of course, the story may have been longer in the original Daily Sketch publication, then cut to fit the PL format. But having said that, the only example that I’ve seen of both the newspaper and PL versions of a story (#19 The Last Jest of Angelo Yates) was hardly cut at all, and actually had a new ending added on to the original.

“It was a bit unusual in that the chief criminal of the operation could only stand by, helplessly, in custody of The French Police, as his confederates were apprehended with the stolen Jewels.”
   
I thought that it was strange in some ways that Schultz didn’t choose to leave on the helicopter with the others rather than take the risk involved in pretending innocence and staying on in the hands of the police, especially after Lesley had already accused him point-blank of planning the whole thing. But he evidently thought he could fool everybody and no doubt didn’t want a life on the run. And anyway, what would Mamie have had to say about losing all her aristocratic friends?

[Goof]

Thanks for your comments Panther. I’m glad you liked the story.

Schoolgirls’ Picture Library 143
Dancer in Hiding

“On the Splash page, bottom right, we read 'from 'the masked Ballerina'. So either this is a reprint or it's an illustrated version of a book or a story. Perhaps from an earlier girls paper?”

As far as I know, this is not a straight reprint. I think that it may well be a reworking of an earlier girls’ comic story – possibly from School Friend or Girls’ Crystal. Several SPLs started life in this way.

“it's easy to see that the story is a bit of a stretch, has more than a few holes, but
the visual narrative works very well to cause 'willing suspension of disbelief'”

Yes the story, like many of these SPLs, stretches credulity in parts. These stories feed a lot on inherently improbable coincidences, such as villains (and sometimes heroines) being in exactly the right time and place to overhear a give-away conversation or similar. Sabotage endings where the heroine(s) are prevented from performing a ballet, play or other show by the villain sending a false message are also very common. I personally like the rather weird variant on this that is used here, where the troupe are trapped on an island, and escape by signalling to Roger Ainsworth in a passing boat by giving him some of his ballet in full costume. It’s not terribly likely, but it’s a fun idea.

[Goof]

Thanks for your comments, QQ. I’m glad you liked the story.

Super Detective Library 45
Lesley Shane: Crime from the Sky

“I would have liked to see her in the action a bit more.”

Yes, I was in some doubt about selecting this one over others in the series, as it doesn’t give Lesley a lot to do, but I liked the unusual combination of crime, slightly edgy comedy, atmospheric location, big dramatic action and a particularly effective ending.

However, I did cheat by sneaking in a reference to a couple of other stories where Lesley is much more active. In #51 “The Mystery of Table 13” she needs to squeeze out the truth about a man’s mysterious disappearance while being stonewalled by MI5, has to fight her way out of a French nightclub that is a nest of foreign spies (including busting her way through a barred window) and tackle a couple of armed enemy spies who have just tried to gas her. In #39 “The Stolen Crown”, it feels like she’s in action on almost every other page, upending a gang of men who are attacking a woman, fighting off the attentions of her client, crashing through a heavily guarded gate on horseback, rescuing a pilot from a burning plane… Full-on action that any of her detective rivals would have been proud of.

[Quirky Quokka]

Thanks for your comments, QQ. I’m glad you liked the story.

Super Detective Library 45
Lesley Shane: Crime from the Sky

“I would have liked to see her in the action a bit more.”


In #51 “The Mystery of Table 13” she needs to squeeze out the truth about a man’s mysterious disappearance while being stonewalled by MI5, has to fight her way out of a French nightclub that is a nest of foreign spies (including busting her way through a barred window) and tackle a couple of armed enemy spies who have just tried to gas her. In #39 “The Stolen Crown”, it feels like she’s in action on almost every other page, upending a gang of men who are attacking a woman, fighting off the attentions of her client, crashing through a heavily guarded gate on horseback, rescuing a pilot from a burning plane… Full-on action that any of her detective rivals would have been proud of.

Thanks for those extra tips, Goof. I'll have to check them out. And thanks for your contributions on the forum this fortnight. I hope we hear from you again.

Cheers

QQ

[The Australian Panther]

Super Detective Library 45
Lesley Shane: Crime from the Sky
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=74054
I was delighted to see this choice!
I am a huge P.I. fan and also a Lesley Shane fan.
Good counterpoint to the previous two books.
Why did DC not sue? Well the character here is one-off, not a series character.
Not worth their time.
Also, the name is somewhat generic.
So on CB+ we have
The Joker [comic book]
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=61706
Super Detective Library 38 - The Saint Plays the Joker
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=74128
A-1 Comics 1 - Kerry Drake
One story features a female villain called, you guessed it. 'the Joker!'
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=22474
There are more here, particularly in the radio serials. And in some of the funny animal books.
Passingham is great, he reminds me of John Prentice. Of course both of them are from the Alex Raymond school.Also, made me think of Stan Drake, whose 'Juliet Jones' was a fixture in Newspapers when I was much younger. 
https://www.lambiek.net/artists/p/prentice_j.htm
OK The story:-
This is a 'Caper' plot, beloved of Hollywood from the 60's on, and a good one. It even feels familiar, so it wouldn't surprise if, either it was based on and earlier movie or TV episode or was used as the basis for a later production. I can easily see the premise adapted into a James Bond film. That's how much I liked it.   
Arnold Beauvais was a master and it shows in this cover. Wonderfully composed.
Arnold Beauvais
https://bookpalacebooks.blogspot.com/2011/02/arnold-beauvais.html

  One of the names that crops up regularly in our upcoming Thriller Index is that of Arnold Beauvais. He was the main artist for Super Detective Library, contributing from almost the beginning—his first cover appearing on issue 7 (July 1953) and his last on issue 112 (September 1957). In all he produced 89 covers for Super Detective, almost half the total for that paper's 188 issue-run and included an uninterrupted run between issues 14 and 49 (October 1953 to March 1955).
Sadly, it seems that none of his covers have survived the years and we could find no examples of original artwork to include in The Thriller Index.

https://bookpalacebooks.blogspot.com/2011/02/arnold-beauvais.html

At first, I thought Schultz was patterned after Edward G. Robinson. 

I hadn't made that connection, but thank you.
Page 3, panels 3 and 4, His height, the way he chomps on that cigar, page 12, panels 2 and 4.
He has given the character a different face, probably for legal reasons. 
Pages 30 and 32 would have been even more spectacular in 1955.
So, as a story and as a comic, great, but Leslie Shane is little more than a cypher here.
Leslie is basically a bystander until page 50.
And now, my one real complaint. Having flown in a DC# [Dakota] I know that there would not be enough runway length to either land or take off. So, they were adjacent to 'a disused airfield'? Hmmm.

Graet fun tho! Thank you Goof, well done. And don't be a stranger in future, come by, check out the reading group and contribute your very interesting opinions.
QQ Tomorrow!       



     

[The Australian Panther]

Off subject, but here is an interview with Tom Beauvais, Arnold's Son. About his work.
The apple didn't fall far from the tree.
An interview with Tom Beauvais
https://www.filmonpaper.com/blog/an-interview-with-tom-beauvais/

Enjoy!

[Quirky Quokka]

Super Detective Library 45
Lesley Shane: Crime from the Sky

Why did DC not sue? Well the character here is one-off, not a series character.
Not worth their time.
Also, the name is somewhat generic.
So on CB+ we have
The Joker [comic book]
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=61706
Super Detective Library 38 - The Saint Plays the Joker
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=74128
A-1 Comics 1 - Kerry Drake
One story features a female villain called, you guessed it. 'the Joker!'
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=22474
There are more here, particularly in the radio serials. And in some of the funny animal books.

Thanks for the extra info on the Joker, Panther. I suppose to me it seemed like an already famous name to use, but also that he didn't really appear to be a joker, so why use that name anyway? It would possibly be different today if someone created a new character called the Joker. DC's lawyers would probably be ready to pounce. There's been enough of a kerfuffle with DC now having Shazam rather than Captain Marvel because of Marvel comics, though there's probably more to that story than I know.

And something different for tomorrow 

Cheers

QQ

[The Australian Panther]

I thought I'd go back to basics and look at the meaning of the JOKER in a deck of cards, as an explanation of how the concept might be applied to characters.
Joker Card Meaning: The Mysterious Origins
https://www.magicianmasterclass.com/post/joker-card

The Joker card is often depicted as a court jester, clown, or harlequin, representing chaos, unpredictability, wit, and intelligence.
In popular culture, the Joker card has been associated with characters like the Joker in the Batman universe, further cementing its image as a symbol of chaos and cunning.

Actually, the character that comes to mind immediately is Marvel's Loki!.
There is also the American Indian figure, 'The Coyote'
https://www.britannica.com/topic/Coyote-mythology

Coyote, in the mythology and folklore of the North American Plains, California, and Southwest Indians, the chief animal of the age before humans. Coyote’s exploits as a creator, lover, magician, glutton, and trickster are celebrated in a vast number of oral tales (see trickster tale). He was typically portrayed as a demiurge (independent creative force), as a maker of fateful decisions, as the being who secured for humans such necessities as fire and daylight, and as the originator of human arts. In all cases, his transgression of normative social boundaries frequently resulted in social or physical chaos, a situation resolved in each folktale’s conclusion. 

There are several COYOTE comics characters, but this one is the most interesting.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coyote_(comics)
Coyote is an American comic book series created by Steve Englehart and Marshall Rogers.
The subject is worthy of a doctorate, methinks!
cheers!

[Goof]

Thanks for your good wishes, QQ and Panther. I enjoyed putting it all together, and hope I may have managed to raise the profile of the girls' stories and artists a little. Looking forward to your next contribution, QQ.