AJD

Here are a couple of books that turned up in a care package from Heritage yesterday. The 82nd and 83rd of the first 100. Both nice solid books with just enough issues to be easily affordable. Great PQ on both too - offwhite/white at worst, which is nice for books 73 years old. I've picked up two more since then, but they remain a large ocean away for now.

+1 for leave them as is. This way you get to enjoy the cover and the splash with the Kirby sig. If you decide to part with them some day, sell them together, or marry them then, based on the advise of a trusted expert dealer.

I think with a big chunk of the cover missing it could be a 0.5 1.0 is the absolute tops. It will be a fun read though.

This will be a fun journal, and I think we'll all be hoping you get there. I'm inclined to think you've set the $$ a little low considering the early ASM prices, but half the fun is going to be looking for the bargains!

Have a look here: Category 6 includes punched books, and it looks like 2.0 is the likely grade.

I was basing my comment on the price guide for early Airfix kits in the back of Arthur Ward's Model World of Airfix book. I don't have a more general guide for aircraft kits - and i don't recal ever coming across one.

I really like that Police Cases #15. I think 6.5/7.0 is the real sweet spot for eye appeal per dollar. And I don't hink I've commented on the FF #1 - just a great book. I don't why it isn't up there with AF15. In my mind it's a more significant book in some ways.

The new boards remind me of the Simpsons take on Euro Itchy and Scratchy Land. C'est la vie, here's my newest acqusition - an Australian reprint of a Fox book. I'm pretty sure I overpaid for it, but with these books, you might never see a copy again. And it's really nice in hand, with great colours. I have to wonder what the hell those animals are. They look like buffaloes, but have the dentition of carnivores (note the canine teeth). Like the pentadactyl cats on Fiction House books, the artists evidently hadn't studied actual animals. The Fox and FH editors sure didn't have the attention to detail that Kurtzman drove on the EC books he edited. There's an important safety tip on the back. If you shrink yourself to escape capture, watch out for spider webs:

+1 on the nice books. That Voodoo presents beautifully.

And now? I think you have slipped past any objectivity where Voldy is concerned. CGC have always been lenient on Marvel chipping. I thought 3.0 before I saw the post with the grade, but 3.5 is close enough.

While I'm at it, here's #33 and #45

Let me backfill one of the missing issues. Here's #10. I swear I have an image of this cracked out, but I can't find it.

+1 on that

Dang. I was interstate for work and didn't think to check when this round was due. oh well, good luck to the remaining players.

Another great book. I really like the collection you're pulling together here.

Cool - I did wonder. Now please burn my submitted grades without reading.

Well, it's a metaphor rather than a euphemism, but you're on the money. While I'm here, I should note with sadness the passing of Murray Ball. Ball was a New Zealander cartoonist, who produced the funny, charming and sometimes very earthy Footrot Flats strip. I have a full set of the collections on my bookshelves, and I'm about to go read one of them.

Time for another trip to the bookshelf. This is newly published, and is a great way to appreciate the swords and sandals artwork that fill a fair chunk of the New Direction EC title. Some great stuff in here - as you'd expect with Williamson, Wood, Orland, Kreigstein.... I went to the LCS looking for some comics to read. I never buy floppies any more because they are such poor value for money (and most of them are compost anyway). But this hardcover collection caught my eye. I like the Brubaker work I've read, and the artwork in this is great. I'm only a chapter in so far and, as expected, it's gritty crime noir stuff. Last, but certainly not least, I finally succumbed to the reviews and bought a copy of Persepolis. I've heard all sorts of good things, but I couldn't get past the fairly crude artwork. I'm very glad I finally decided to give it a shot. This is a beautiful piece of literature. Marjane Satrapi does a masterful job of showing the human cost of events like the Iranian revolution of 1979. From a distance it's easy to generalise and make sweeping observations, but she shows what it's like to live it. In the process she presents herself as sometimes proud, sometimes brave, often flawed and often weak individual - in short, a human being. If you haven't read the book, give it a try. And the artwork really works with the story. Sometimes simple is enough.

Dairy confessions with sideboob? Ummmm.... ok. Just for you:

Those kits look to be in very nice condition. Nothing that a bit of glue and paint couldn't fix though. I've got no idea about the market for monster kits, but I've noticed that the guide values for aeroplane kits are way above the actual eBay sales. I think there are more kicking around than is generally appreciated. That said, it's rare to see old kits in that state of preservation.

Man, that one sounds like fun! And, yes, a man can never have too many T-Rexs. I read this recently and highly recommend it if you want to learn more about everyone's favourite therapod:

I think that the AA really covers 1946-1955. There was a distinct change of tone in comics after WW2 ended.

Yeah, thought about it long and hard, but I really don't like tape. Fiction House GGA on the other hand...

Wings #86 Fiction House grade is Fine -(5.5) or a little better. Bin is $72 $65.00 $55.00 Hi Sharon!

As you all know, I am a dedicated romance title collector. My collection of such titles doubled this week with this addition. Love the cover - clearly Cary Grant and Audrey Hepburn as models. Which makes me think that the True Love above might also be modelled on real people - maybe Marilyn Monroe and ... ? (all suggestions welcome). And here's the 'beneath the covers' shot. (Sideboob alert!) Well, OK, I don't think it's really sideboob, though the B&W reproduction makes it look a bit like it. As you can see in the following panels, she's wearing some kind of top/dress, which would be obvious in the colour version. The black dots on her 'skin' are probably meant to indicate the stitches in said garment. We can dream though... The story is from Diary Confessions #9 if anyone has one to scan that page.