Lore Olympus [Rachel Smythe]

So, this isn’t an official review (I’ll definitely get to that later) for a number of reasons, but Twitter 100% manipulated me into downloading an app today. It’s called WebToon and is basically a collection of webcomics that are updated chapter by chapter for you to read. And as I literally spent a rather large portion of my morning and afternoon reading just one of the stories available on this app, I felt it was incredibly important to share it with you all. Cause the truth is that this app offers some pretty amazing webcomics–though personally, to me, they’re really comparable to graphic novels in progress.

I really only read through Lore Olympus by Rachel Smythe, which I have to admit is a Greek Myth retelling of Hades and Persephone that I am immensely attached to (it was fantastic, I can’t even). I didn’t expect for this to be the case, but damn is it pretty brilliant. Though, fair warning for everyone, it does touch on a rather sensitive topic at one point. I think it’s handled very well, but I’d be lying if I said seeing it in a webcomic / graphic novel format didn’t make me slightly uncomfortable. It was triggering, I’ll just leave it at that.

I did sample a few other comics, of which there is actually quite a large selection of, and found that I enjoyed them immensely–though I couldn’t quite justify spending the rest of my day reading them so I took a break. I’m looking forward to reading them as time goes on, however, and I am definitely already subscribed to receive updates on any future chapters that come out for Lore Olympus.

Another cool thing is that of the comics I looked at, they’re all on Goodreads as well! I don’t know about you, but that was massively exciting for me.

And the best part about the comics offered via this app is that they are, at least as far as I can tell thus far, all free to read. All but the three most recent chapters are fully available to anyone with the app who wants to read them. There is a payment option to have early access to the most recent three chapters if you don’t feel up to waiting, of course, and that I believe is where the app makes a lot of its money.

Either way, this was a pretty amazing find for me and while I’m not a graphic novelist or anything of the sort, I think it’s cool to add that the app also allows you to post your own stories. I’m not sure about the particulars, but I have a feeling I’ll be reading quite a few of these works in the future.