November Vol. 1: The Girl On The Roof
Matt Fraction, writer; Elsa Charratier, artist; Matt Hollingsworth, colorist; Kurt Ankeny, letterer
Image Comics, 2019
The first of three novellas following the intersecting lives of three women. The tag line reads "One night. One city. Three women. November." The main focus of this installment is the titular "girl on the roof." Dee has been hired by a mysterious man to decipher a code from the newspaper early every morning, then broadcast it from an illegal radio on her rooftop.
While there is clearly something unsavory and likely criminal about the purpose of the daily code, she does not know what it is. Her only crime is the illegal radio broadcasts, a minor crime that she is assured she will never be caught at. The whole mysterious noir setup is very reminiscent of 100 Bullets--Elsa Charratier's art even recalls Eduardo Risso's--and like that series there are signs of some kind of deep conspiracy behind it.
The pay is 500 dollars a day (cash, paid under the table). Dee quickly becomes a captive to the job: she's been warned not to miss a day, but she can't do much with the money without calling attention to it. When the day comes that there is no code in the paper, the game seems to be up.
In the meantime, we see some corrupt cops in action. And another woman who delivers groceries makes a 911 call about finding a gun in a puddle in an alley: setting up the second installment (the 911 operator may be the third person in the trinity). There is a lot going on here, a complex story that already promises multiple connections and a large cast.
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