Behind the Eigh…oh, too easy, never mind.
I bought Dan Clowes’ Lloyd Llewellyn series off the stands when it was originally released. I’ve been buying Eightball since the first issue. I have been recommending Eightball to our customers since the beginning, and have helped to create a nice large audience for it locally. (When we had trouble getting the first issue back in stock way back when, I happened to be at a convention where another dealer had a pile of #1s for sale at about a buck each. I bought them all, brought them back to the store, and sold every single one.) I keep all the Clowes book collections in stock, and display them prominently.
When the new issue came in, we put the display poster right in the front window, next to the door, directly beneath the “OPEN/CLOSED” sign.
Our stock of Eightball #23 is currently racked on our “NEW ARRIVALS” graphic novel bookshelf. We continue to recommend it to our customers. In fact, we have mostly sold through our order, and I’ll probably have to reorder this week.
The reason I’m stating all this? I’d been feeling a little lax in my comics weblogging duties in that I haven’t made with the Eightball #23 review yet. The comic is excellent, is thought-provoking, is very much worth discussing, but I don’t have an angle on any kind of review. I have a series of random observations at best. (I realize that’s never stopped me before, but I think Eightball #23 deserves a real review more than, say, Spider-Man 2.)
But I look at all the points I made above and I realize — you know, I’ve already done my part for the Dan Clowes entertainment juggernaut. I carry it in the store. I hand-sell it to people. I have a large clientele that has come to trust my judgement when I recommend comics and books to them, and the work of Dan Clowes is always very highly recommended.
So I’m posting guilt-free. If I suddenly have a revelation and decide that, yes indeedy, I do have something to say about Eightball #23, I’ll post my review, but meanwhile there are plenty of other excellent overviews on other weblogs. (Sean Collins’ review is the one that’s stuck with me the most…a very interesting take.)
In the meantime…buy a copy for yourself if you haven’t already. It’s very good. You can trust me.
You’ve got a friend in old Mike.
