Karma Kitty Goes to Comic Con by Mari Mancusi

Karma Kitty Goes to Comic Con by Mari Mancusi

3.5 stars

Hailey Hills is one of the comic book creators of the popular, Karma Kitty. She arrives at the famous New York Comic Con for the first time with her comic book artist, Thomas. She is anxious about the event because her ex-fiance is going to be there and she hasn’t gotten over him since she left him at the alter because she was kidnapped by alien cats. That’s right alien cats. Strange things happen to Hailey and she wasn’t expecting the boots she bought for her Karma Kitty costume to be magic and able to turn her into Karma Kitty. Hailey finds herself battling ninjas, pirates, and a past love she isn’t sure she wants to leave completely behind her. I’m never really sure how to rate short stories or even novellas because they just aren’t books and for me I have different guidelines for rating them. Unspoken guidelines that I just seem to automatically know how I feel about rating and writing a review for. I really like Karma Kitty (I’m not typing out that title it is far too long), but I didn’t feel like it was a five star or even four star story. It was definitely higher than a three though hence the rating. To be a five star story you really have to blow me away and Karma Kitty didn’t do that. For me, Karma Kitty was a fun short story I downloaded for my Kindle and would read periodically when the current book I was reading would get too dark. There are a lot of spelling and grammar errors in this book, but it’s easy to look past because it’s fun.


The main female character is Hailey. I liked Hailey well enough for her small part in the story and I felt like Mancusi did a great job of giving her a character. She was funny, sarcastic, sassy, and smart. She reminded me of myself a few times. Her situations were just so crazy and outlandish, but they would make me smile or laugh. One thing that really bothered me about Hailey was how she would lie to Collin and say it was because he wouldn’t believe her so there was no harm in lying. I disagree lying is lying and you should own up to the fact that your lying and not make excuses about it.


Kick-Butt Heroine Scale: 8

The main male character is Collin. Collin is a rather bland character compared to Hailey, while I did like him he didn’t have enough characterization for me to say if I really liked him or was just neutral. Even with his POVs, I learned nothing about him. While it’s not a bad thing considering this is a short story, I would’ve appreciated just as much depth as Hailey was given.


Swoon Worthy Scale: 7

The Villain- This was your typical bad Saturday morning cartoon villain. Not Joker bad because that is just far too evil, but more like Mojo Jojo and unless you were a 90s kid (or born in the 90s *cough cough* me *cough cough*) you probably don’t know who that is or even remember him.


Mojo Jojo was a villain that is scary for a kid but funny for a teenager and that is exactly how these villains are for me. They were so mediocre and I honestly thought they we didn’t even need them to continue the story. The ninjas were good enough and we didn’t need the whole Nancy Drew thing Hailey attempted to pull.


Villain Scale: 5

Our other character in this story is Thomas, Hailey’s comic book partner. He’s the artist of Karma Kitty and Hailey’s best friend. I really liked his character and he was just so funny. He reminded me of Beast Boy from Teen Titan personality wise. 

Character Scale: 7.5

This cartoon pictures and gifs are probably unnecessary, but I like them. Anyway keep in mind that this is only 92 pages. While it is developed quite well for a novella/ short story, I thought it could’ve been better. Once again Mancusi is able to achieve making me laugh (which is really hard to do in books) and I recommend her if you want a fun writer who will have you giggling.


Cover Thoughts: I like it. It says “Karma Kitty”. It would’ve been cool if she looked like she was ready to fight somebody, but it’s simple and fun. Perfect for a short story!