Binding comics

One of the things that gives me great pleasure is sitting in my chair and reading a novel. I, like many people, enjoy the heft and substantialness of a hardback book.

I am also an avid comic book fan. If you managed to muddle through my 100 nouns post, you saw that I name a couple of comic book series as things that I enjoy. I prefer adult-oriented works. Vertigo comics, an inprint of DC, publishes books for adults. I have been slowly having my individual comics collected and custom bound in hardcovers.

I have about 18 so far. Last year I was doing a lot of traveling for work and I slacked on prepping and sending my projects to the bindery. As part of my closet cleaning activity, I'm starting up again. Four soon-to-be-books will be on their way to the bindery in Omaha soon. There are binders all over the place., but I use these guys because they have a track record with comics, they're reasonably priced, and a fine fellow named David Banks acts as the middleman. He does a fantastic job and he does it because he loves the hobby.

The book pictured is one of mine. It's the last one that I had bound (last December!): Sandman Mystery Theatre. The color scheme including the foil imprint and the bookmark ribbon are my choice, as is the design and content of the spine and cover. There are many possible combinations. I try to choose a color scheme that is unique to the series I am having bound. Swamp Thing, for example, will be green cover with yellow foil. Black Orchid will have a light purple cover with black foil. Preacher will either be black cover/white foil or vice versa; I haven't decided.

Anyone out there read comics or graphic novels? A nice way to read comics, especially those from Vertigo, is to purchase the trade paperbacks at your local book or comics store. These collect one or more complete storylines and they contain no ads. Many of them have little extras such as additional comments from the author or pages from the artist's sketchbook.

If you know me and you're game, I'm willing to lend a title or two. That's another big benefit to having them bound. They're easy to transport and loan out. I'd recommend Lucifer, of course, my favorite, but SMT (see above) is good, too. A single volume complete series like The Losers could be just the thing, too, a modern day spy/action/adventure story.

(I guess that protesting that I am not a geek is not going to be very convincing at this point. I certainly don't feel like one. I don't spend more than 30 minutes at the comics store and most of the time I am in and out in five or ten minutes. A bookstore consumes far more time for me. I don't read superhero comics and I don't play card games such as Magic. I'm just a guy who likes literature. Today I purchase Fun Home by Alison Bechdel. More on that and an explanation about why I was out and about in the next post.)