Ok, how about this for an idea. We take it in turns to post a favourite (British spelling) comic cover every day. This went really well on the comic fan website that I used to frequent. What we tried to do was find a theme or subject and follow that, until we all got bored with that theme. I'd like to propose a theme of letters of the alphabet. So, for the remainder of October (only 5 days) and all of November, we post comic cover pictures associated with the letter "A". Then in December, we post covers pertaining to the letter "B". The association to the letter can be as tenuous as you want it to be. For example I could post a cover from "Adventure Comics" or "Amazing Spider Man". However Spider Man covers can also be posted when we're on the letter "S". Adventure Comic covers could also be posted when we're on the letter "L" if they depict the Legion of Super Heroes. So, no real hard, fast rules - in fact the cleverer the interpretation of the letter, the better, as far as I'm concerned.
And it's not written in stone that we have to post a cover every day. There may be some days when no cover gets posted. There's nothing wrong with this, it just demonstrates that we all have lives to lead.
If everyone's in agreement I'd like to kick this off with one of my favourite Action Comic covers, from January 1967. Curt Swan really excelled himself here.
Discussion and voting on future monthly themes takes place on the "Nominations, Themes and Statistics for A Cover A Day" thread. Click here to view the thread.
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Another look at Halo, and a hint of the mystery that surrounded her. Mike W. Barr and Jim Aparo took the unique approach that while cover featured from the start, this plot point/story wasn't told and resolved in consective issues. (Image courtesy of the Grand Comics Database.)
Two pre-Codes from Atlas: Journey into Mystery #18 and Journey into Unknown Worlds #18
Here's one for the solstice...
...followed by two that fit the theme.
I'm cheating here, but, since summer is beginning in this hemisphere:
When I saw this on display in the library, I assumed it was a graphic novel. In fact, it's a prose YA novel. At the time I was still teaching, and we were looking to expand and diversify the options for the Grade 10 "coming of age" choice novels. Unfortunately, I read this after reading Malinda Lo's Last Night at the Telegraph Club, an extremely well-written YA/literary novel with "intersectional" racial and LGBTQ representation that naturally grew from her setting and the story she was telling, and an interesting historical perspective. Lo received my recommendation. That novel proved a hit with the kids who chose it, while presenting them with some real and interesting challenges and discussion.
With apologies to Dahlia Adler, Hot for the Summer is a piece of fluff, and no doubt there are readers who would enjoy it. But most of the characters exist to check off a box: "Hi, I'm ___. I"ll be your______ character in this novel" This is how Trump supporters imagine DEI works. Also, the protagonist's main problem is deciding between the hot but sensitive jock guy she's been crushing over and who is now noticing her, and the hot and cool girl she had a thing with in the summer who has transferred to her school. I know kids who would kill to have that problem. Again, it's a matter of expectations: it's not like the stuff we typically discuss at this site doesn't frequently sell wish-fulfillment.
But it is a great cover. Welcome to summer!
Another nice picture of Rainbow.
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