Is it? I haven’t even seen a trick or treater since… 1995. When I lived in Nevada, nobody brought the kids around to the house; even the neighborhood kids went to a Halloween party at the school in town instead of trick or treating, and we only had like 20-30 homes in the entire subdivision. It’s not like we didn’t know who lived where and what was what. And when I moved to SC, well, we had nobody come by the house last year. I’m told the area’s “too church happy” (Like that’s going to stop the kids from dressing up to get FREE stuff?), but I think it’s just that society has become less trusting in general and people are more concerned about unknown child molesters, would be terrorists and that sort of thing.

Damn, that’s depressing, when you think about it. We’re all so worried about everything that’s effed up in the world, that we can’t even enjoy life.

I pretty much just buy books I want to read, or read again (at least, that I think I will read again) but at the same time, the OCD in me can’t break up a run, especially a lengthy one, even if it is peppered with some bad books.

So the pleasure I get is both from READING comics, and from knowing I HAVE certain comics.

All my books are bagged and boarded, not because I want to maintain their condition for value, but because I want them to last as long as possible so I’ll always have them to read.

For the most part, I try to avoid duplicating graphic novel reprints with single issues, but there’s some exceptions. I’m trying to complete a run of X-Men and Avengers, and while I have all the issues in one form or another (either trade or single issue) already, I want single issues of both runs. I want to read a musty old comic that some kid read in the sixties, I want to know I have every ISSUE ever printed.

I dunno. Maybe that makes me a bad comic fan. But that’s how it is.

I will say, as I’ve recently been culling my 50+ long box collection due to space considerations (and switching over to short boxes for back pain considerations) I’ve found a perverse joy in finding stuff to get rid of. Mainly crappy short-lived Image comics from the 90s or random limited series I’ll never read again. I tried to sell some of it on eBay, but there were no takers. So now I take a box at a time down to Half Price books. I may only get $30 a box or so (a mere fraction of what I paid) but at least I’m clearing out some space, and can use that money to pick up a few used trades or something. I’d donate them, but frankly, I don’t want to wish this stuff on anyone.

Check your monkeyspit email address – “No One” wants some of those Grummett issues.

If you don’t have that email address anymore, then email me at louisbrightraven@yahoo.com

If you can manage to put up with the clutter as it builds over a year, I also strongly suggest this being an annual “organize (or re-organize) the collection” event. We all wish we could have such stringent back issue filing policy as our local shop, but we can’t. Once a year is not at all difficult; I took care of my stuff over the course of two or three weeknights.

But what to do with the stuff that doesn’t make the cut? Since I’m the manager of a comic book store, I bring my stuff in and put it next to the Free Comic Book Day stuff. Sure, people will come in cynically for some free throwaway Wolverine story on mini-paper, but when they see your vintage 80′s Uncanny X-Men stuff (we’re talking Inferno issues, a second print of #248, maybe some of the Australia storyarc), for FREE, they’ll flip. It really makes FCBD a fun event when you can genuinely surprise someone with a deal so good, they feel like they have to get those comics home NOW!

If you’re like me (and Greg, as mentioned above), you probably don’t want to see your extensive runs broken into piecemeal, even if it is by people with such innocent reasons as “that one had a cool-looking cover”. Thus, also during FCBD, I organize a fun little event called Comic Book Trivia. I ask a few easy questions, hint strongly at the answers, then reward my contestants with applicable runs of comics. One of my customers answered three Daredevil-related questions on FCBD ’08, and took home the entire Bendis run of Daredevil. Crazy? Only if I was ever going to read it again, I guess… and I assure you, as much as I enjoyed it once, I was never going to go back and re-read it.

Of course, we don’t all have such an outlet. Our local comic shop owners might look at us with a funny eye if we say “here, give away these 80′s Uncanny X-Men books for me! Sure, they could sell for something, but I just want a warm fuzzy feeling instead of dollars.” Some of the less scrupulous ones might even eBay them for themselves. Greg’s other ideas are still good, though. There are plenty of children out there looking for something to read. Libraries can put comics to good use. Halloween is a great time to give away comics instead of candy.

I think back on all the comics I’ve given away in the past two years, and the emotional reward of seeing people overjoyed at reading these books far outweighs any good feeling I could’ve bought with the money I’d have made.

The other side of the current comics market is that it’s a great time to be buying. Almost the entire history of comics is available extremely cheaply, either in print or on the vast online secondary market. I’m as acquisitive as ever, but I’m spending a lot less money by being smart.

I’ve quit buying new comics–I can take that $4 and spend it on a single issue, or I can buy the trade of the whole storyline for $6 in six months. Plus, every time I pick up a new issue, I look at it and think, “I can buy this one comic, or six comics I’d like just as well from that 50 cent box.”

I just don’t know how to get rid of the damned things once I realize they’ve gotta go. I’m sure I’ll never read most of them again, but I also know I will never be able to throw them away; so that leaves dumping them on some poor schmuck at a comic shop (assuming those still exist at this undetermined future point), basically asking him to throw them away.

Once you’ve done that, it becomes much easier to stop buying comics you don’t really like for the sake of buying them, and to wait for trades. I still go to shows and hit the cheap boxes, but not with the same gusto that I used to. Sometimes I miss those days….

I’m the same way. I’ll take a chance on damned near anything if it’s cheap enough.

Hey, Starfire! Now that’s a comic I’d heard of but never seen. She looks like a Sci-Fi version of Red Sonja. Except Brunette. Still sexy. Was she? A Sonja takeoff, I mean. And, has she ever appeared in the DC Universe?

It’s been pretty damn disheartening to watch the characters get manhandled, mistreated, and shoved aside in recent years. Does Risk have any limbs left?

Sigh.

The subsequent Devin Grayson/Jay Faerber Titans run was absolute crap, though, yeah, due in no small part to editorial interference. Best to get rid of that one.

The effort required to sell these on eBay is going to kill another couple weekends in the future.

But it’s fun, any excuse to go digging through all the comics is as much fun as reading them.

Your knowledge is scary impressive, sir.

Ha! Well, about useless nerd things. Julie knows the important stuff, like cooking or how to put in a new car battery.

I know about Eclipse because I was a fan of a lot of their original comics– Ms. Tree, Miracleman, Prowler. You probably know a lot more about Viz than I do. It just depends which door you’re coming in by.

Except for the little “Viz” logo at the bottom there (which tells us about a lot about the history of now #1 manga publisher in the U.S., Viz Media), I’d have to turn to Frederick Schodt’s “Dreamland Japan” to remember what “Eclipse Comics” were. Your knowledge is scary impressive, sir.

I’m not sure how this affects things in the era of e-Bay, but it at least used to be the case that the comics market was incredibly artificial, dominated top-down by the Overstreet Price Guide.

That’s why I always tell people to start with eBay or dealer sites. Those are the folks that actually sell comics. Overstreet and Wizard, I’m pretty sure, are mostly just about selling their price guides. I’d be surprised if they did even as much research as I suggested to Carla.

I empathize with retailers who have people wanting to sell at book value, only to be informed there’s a difference between it’s “worth”, and what a dealer is willing to pay for it.

I live by the credo, sonething is only worth what someone else is willing to pay for it. And if that’s nothing, then that’s what it’s worth.

Cheers,

B