Our library just bought a copy of Marvel: The Characters and Their Universe a gorgeous coffee table book celebrating the era of Marvel history we all adore, put out by a company who couldn't care less. But I digress....

As I paged through the book, I had occasion to talk to our cataloger about the state of the comics industry. She was just making conversation with me as she is interested in comics not at all. After describing to her the shrinking of the mass market outlets and the rise of the direct market, she said, "Wouldn't that just shrink your future readership? I mean, where do new readers come from?" I said, "How would you like to run a comic book company?"

Stephen

Hope!