Giarrusso's Mini-Marvels are also a great read, and I would love to see it get its own series as well. There's a digest coming out soon. It's got everything done to date, so keep an eye out!

The difference is, I've been giving out trades, not comics...

I've tried to base choices on the individuals' TV and Movie taste.

My boss (who adores Sci-fi) got Planetary... he has since worked his way through Fables, Marvels, and LOEG... He is going to start getting Fables regularly...

Others have received:

DMZ

Fell

Sandman

Calvin and Hobbes (not strictly a comic, I know, but certainly was a strip...)

Strangehaven

League of Extraordinary Gentlemen

Preacher

My aim is to get people to read them and then recommend them to others in the office or pass them around... If they hate it, I want to know why and what they hated...

(oh, and the best entry book for Fables - as others have said before - is definitely Book two - Animal Farm - they can then go back and read book one, but Animal Farm hooks better...)

I also pass on my subscription to 2000AD after I've read it...

Kid friendly (the kiss of death!), this book is centered around several elemetary school aged characters garners comparisons to Peanuts. At times funny, moving, tragic, and cute, this books really hits all it’s marks nearly flawlessly. Available in floppies and TPB collections.<<

I absolutely love this title. Unfortunately, as I've mentioned previously, Diamond seems uninterested in providing my LCS with copies. Even worse, for some mad reason Lone Star & Mile High appear to prefer not to acknowledge the existence of recent issues.

Similarly, I would recommend Kunkel's Herobear and the Kid as a wonderful book that should find instant apeal with animation fans, but again, it is just one TPB, and not an ongoing series (I'm dying to see Kunkel's upcoming Shazam book!).

Elfquest by the Pinis is also a book that I have found appeals to non-comic book types, but again, doesn't fit the "ongoing" rule.

Depending on my assessment of the tastes and interests of this mythical "new reader," I would recommend one of these:

* Amelia Rules! (by Jimmy Gownley)

Kid friendly (the kiss of death!), this book is centered around several elemetary school aged characters garners comparisons to Peanuts. At times funny, moving, tragic, and cute, this books really hits all it's marks nearly flawlessly. Available in floppies and TPB collections.

* True Story Swear to God (by Tom Beland)

Kid friendly in art style, but not at all in language and content. If the "new reader" is a typical female, this is your book -- it's all about a developing romance and relationships between friends, family, and cultures. The fact that it is distributed by Image means should be in most comic shops, I think.

* Castle Waiting (by Linda Medley)

This was in my top 10 "runs." This is a clever book incorporating aspects of various fairy tales and mythological ideas -- the talking centaur, the sprites infesting the castle, the order or bearded nuns that are responsible for the upkeep of the castle, etc. It comes out every couple of months or so from Fantagraphics, and a collection of older issues is available.

* Usagi Yojimbo (by Stan Sakai)

Despite more than 20 collected TBPs (all in print) I think a new reader could get into this book easily. Anyone who is interested in samurai, honor, sword battles, and the like should enjoy this book. From Dark Horse, so it is from a major company and is easy to get in monthly or larger doses.

You do know I'm not serious. RIght?

How does that hurt the Big Two more than it hurts my LCS?

Rex Libris is a great series. Check it out. It's published by Slave Labor Graphics.

You may well be right. Even though I buy a ridiculous amount of comics, a fairly high percentage of them from the Big Two, I don't really read the mainstream "universe" books & so don't feel qualified to speculate further ... But yes, it is indeed true that SHE-HULK & THING & DEADPOOL & NEXTWAVE & X-MEN FIRST CLASS don't star major characters (I mean, the Thing is a major character ... but not by himself) &/or don't affect the major goings-on in the Marvel Universe. (And if I could think oif a DC equivalent offhand, I'll bet the same would be true).

The same, of course, goes for similarly intentioned miniseries like GLA & AGENTS OF ATLAS (which actually was played somewhat "straighter" than most of the others, but still had no real truck with mainstream Marvel at the time, if memory serves). *sigh*

Maybe that, as much as anything, is why I tend to gravitate toward indies (but *not* Alan David Drone's beloved "artcomix") so much these days. (In addition, of course, to the Big Two's being wicked & all.)

Yes, the end of the first volume crosses over but rarely do these moments last long or end up meaning much although I think volume 12 and beyond will probably start linking these two series together much more closely...however, that is still 12 volumes later, meaning that there are at least 11 very accessible volumes for a new reader, which counts in the title's favor enough that I think a little crossover action can be overlooked.

But I still have this impression that both DC and Marvel nowadays relegate their lighter books to peripheral parts of their universes, and that is why the majority of comic book readers don't buy them, rather than any innate preferences for grim and gritty stories.

Actually, some issues of Mighty Avengers seem to fit the bill of "fun" book (though it's still Bendis idea of a "fun" book, that might not jibe with anyone else's idea), with the Avengers fighting Mole Man monsters and Iron Man-possessed by Ultron-turned into the Wasp, and a miniaturized Ares coming to the rescue, and all the characters joking and stuff. And the book sells a lot, because it's Bendis and it looks central to the MU.

Is there any grim and gritty book nowadays that stars a non-central character from the big-two universes that sells a lot?

A regular customer came into my LCS a few weeks ago and told the comics manager he wanted to try Fables, as he had heard 2 non-comics reading co-workers talking about how good it is. In this case, it was the non-reader causing the regular reader to try a different type of book.

(MARVEL ADVENTURES: AVENGERS is a fairly close second, though it's just a *bit* more uneven, probably because of what I perceive -- not necessarily accurately -- to be a certain situation with revolving-door writers & especially artists.)

Even though, y'know, given my hatred for the Big Two, I am ethically bound to demand that the new reader in question shoplfit the comic.