Curious about the Errata Stigmata character who keeps getting vague mentions in earlier volumes? Well, Gilbert Hernandez (with some help by the third brother, Mario) finally tells her story in Tears from Heaven, the fourth collection of Love & Rockets tales.

Errata was orphaned in infancy, her parents dead in a crib-side double murder. (Whether or not that had anything to do with Errata's condition -- bleeding from the hands, feet and side, from wounds corresponding with those suffered by Christ on the cross -- is never made clear.) Adopted by her wealthy uncle and very strange aunt, she has, shall we say, a tempestuous childhood.

Then Penny Century, usually a sidekick in Jaime's tales of Maggie and Hopey, goes on a few adventures of her own as she flees the smothering attentions of multi-billionaire alien H.R. Costigan. In a second Penny feature, we learn how she and ace mechanic Race Rand met -- although the reasons for their parting remains a mystery. A third finally shows us some of the real attraction between Penny and Costigan. Jaime also demonstrates how painful it is for Hopey to give up a habitual misdemeanor, and fills in the background on spacebound Rocky and her doll-like robot Fumble.

Gilbert also takes Luba's family for a day at Isidro's beach, and the ravishing Tonantzin joins the Palomar cast along with her fleet-footed younger sister Diana and the well-meaning Theo. Anyone interested in eating slugs might want to take note of Tonantzin's sage advice in the matter. Perhaps the best glimpse of Palomar comes in a 15-page picnic scene, where nearly all of Gilbert's regulars make an appearance and even a few of Jaime's cast make brief walk-throughs.

This is good storytelling, which in many ways makes the flash and splash of superheroics pale in comparison.

[ by Tom Knapp ]