Josh Crawley

by Josh Crawley

Every so often, I daydream about winning the lottery. I don’t imagine things like my own private island (though I wouldn’t dismiss the idea right now). No, I dream about making awesome comic books.

I realized recently, though, that while I was paying more talented people than myself to make some comics, there are plenty of awesome comics that have already been made that aren’t in as awesome a format as I would prefer. So I think to myself “I bet I could license some of that material. In turn, that would mean more money for the publisher to make more awesome comics, and those creators would also get some more royalties!”

I won’t bore you with the first book I’d do, because it may come off as sucking up to anyone who hasn’t heard the exchange between the writer and myself.

Simpsons/Futurama Crossover Crisis

Anyway, I realized there was a publisher that was already doing something in a similar vein: Abrams Books, through their Abrams Comicarts imprint. They’ve done some very nice yet inexpensive collections that, while they may not appeal to everyone, have amazing production values. The first book I recall seeing of theirs was the Simpsons/Futurama: Crossover Crisis slipcase hard cover. This book is comparable in size to an oversized Marvel hard cover, better quality than a DC Absolute edition, with the added bonus of an amazing die-cut slipcase… and it costs about half as much as either! More information is available on the release on the Abrams site.

Archie Marries...

Another great looking book they’ve done recently is the Archie Marries… slipcase hard cover. It has about the same page count, same size, and same price. If you head over to the listing on the Abrams site, you can even see a preview of the bonus materials offered in this enormous edition.

Art of Jaime Hernandez

A third book of theirs to grab my attention was The Art of Jaime Hernandez: The Secrets of Life and Death hard cover. As a long-time fan of Jaime’s artwork, I’m looking forward to the afternoon I can curl up with this book and immerse myself in it and drink a few cups of tea (preferably a nice smoky Lapsang souchong). According to the Abrams site “In April 2006 Hernandez began serializing his work with the New York Times Magazine—all of which will be collected here in full color.” Sounds like a must-have book to me!

Abrams has done other great looking books, and looks to have some interesting books coming in the future, so I’m sure I’ll be recommending more of their books in the near future!

That’s it for this week. Next week may be that bio I may (or may not) have mentioned I may have for this week (which I completely forgot about until after I’d already had a decent clip on this column); be here to find out!

Follow my tweets, email me, check out the Westfield Comics Facebook page, or go Google Gemma Arterton. I know I will be.

Josh Crawley may or may not be the keyboardist for Everclear. He strongly suggests you not bet that he is.

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