Comic Books: How the Industry Works. Shirrel Rhoades. New York, NY: Peter Lang, 2008. 406 pp.

After reading this book on the comic industry by veteran magazine and comics publishing executive Shirrel Rhoades, the main impression is confusion—who is this book intended for? Judging by the back cover blurb, it seems to be primarily aimed at people interested in breaking into the comic book industry, which is fine, of course, but a lot of the information provided in this book (e.g., comic industry basics in chapter 1, comic storytelling and the superhero genre in chapters 2 and 3) is so basic one would assume that someone interested in working in the industry would already know it. Furthermore, if this is indeed intended to be an industry guide-cum-“breaking in”-book, then a lot of other information is simply irrelevant (e.g., the parts dealing with comic history, and the detailed discussions of particular comic book storylines). [Read more...]