You don’t need hear me grouse about the price of some comics today. A good friend tells me he often relies on his local library in West Hollywood to read trades and graphic novels, which inspires me to check my own library to see what goodies it has on hand. Here’s what I found today. I’ve read only rave comments about The Umbrella Academy and Kathryn and Stuart Immonen’s Moving Pictures has an interesting plot about art treasures during World War II. I was very happy to see a copy of the collected Batwoman.
Go find which comics trades and graphic novels your library has! You may be surprised! If you don’t see much or anything at all, ask if your library is part of an inter-library loan system and you’ll be able to request books from other libraries in its network.
The library allowed me to sample thing I’m not sure I would have tried otherwise. I’m grateful to them for giving me Y The Last Man and Fables as well as Secret Invasion and Justice League. I wonder how many younger reader will get hooked on comics because of the library.
Good question, Robert. At my library there’s a separate section for graphic novels, trades, and manga for kids and teens though I’m sure they could borrow books from the adult section, unless it’s something like The Alcoholic from Vertigo that I borrowed last year.
The only book about comics my one home town library had when I was 12 was one compiled by Jules Feiffer, I think. I remember being entranced by Sub Mariner, the Torch, Superman and Batman’s origin, and Wonder Woman. Oh, and Plastic Man.
Joe
It probably is linked to the format shift, most librarians probably hate dealing with those flimsy single issues so with trades becoming more common they will start showing up in libraries…
Over here albums and pocket books have always been a popular format for comics so there’s also been plenty of comics in libraries, as long as I have used them. And trust me, it makes a big difference. Though also here superhero stuff has been very rare in libraries, probably because of the unsuitable format.
Hi, Reijo. Yes, your point about format makes absolute sense. Do Finnish libraries carry magazines? My local library does, which is nice, but it doesn’t take much for magazines to start showing wear. Plus, magazines are non circulating, so you have to read them during your visit.
Again, thanks for your mention of Tove Jansson and Moomin all those years ago. Now that I’ve caught up with a few things I may borrow the third volume soon.
Joe
They do carry magazines but they too keep the current issue non-circulating, and then there’s 5-10 older issues available for loan. After that they end up in “10 cents an issue” type of sales and are usually pretty worn out at that point.
So the magazine policy is similar then, at least to what I’m used to. It’s nice that your libraries loan the older issues.