My daughters and I headed up to our 1st major area comic convention since 2019. It was a pretty major affair I'd have to estimate at least 5000+ people attending on Saturday. I of course was on the hunt for holes in my collection that I could make a deal in person on. I am always on the hunt for weird Bronze and Silver age pulp stuff to dig into, and while that might not have much value , they arecalways inspirational in ones games and fun to read.
I've been a Conan collector for decades, I have had most of the 275 issues of Marvel original series at one point or another, I have had issue # 1 at two different points in my life and sold it when the market was high and funds where low but this current pandemic effect Comic boom is like nothing I have ever seen, what I sold some of my old books for which were premium prices at the time are now dwarfed by current prices. Its unlikely I'll have the urge to spend the current dollars for a copy of the first issue again, but I may pick up a low grade copy if the price is right. I'm currently trying to fill the holes in the 1st 25 issues and I picked some very nice books at the show, #3 and #14 the 1st Appearance of Moorcocks Elric of Melibone in comics are very hot books right now, #11 is the classic retelling of Howards "Rogues in the house" , I've got 12 of the 1st 25 issues, the rest arent terribly hard to get with exception of #1, #23, #24 (the 1st Red Sonja issues, and I have some great RS stuff, I'll talk about as some point) Of house I have several editions of Howards original stories and several comps (Omnibus) of the comics, so I have read most of them at one point or another and that includes, The Savage Sword Mag, the epic Dark Horse series AND the Marvels new Conan series. I jumped a at $10 NM copy of the movie special as that I had somehow never read as kid so I might as well add to the mix. I could pontificate for many 1000's of words on The Cimmerian and the inspiration of that Howards world had on my interests, its one of the reason I want to start a new chapter blogging to do just that.
Lieber's dyamic duo, are a close second from boy fantasy library (or 3rd if we count Tolkien) This Fafhrd and Gray Mouser 5 issue series was cancelled due to lack of sales back in 1973, unfortunately these guys were not on my radar until about 1978 or so, so I couldnt have helped with Sales back in the day. I have had the first issue pictured here for years but found 2,3 and 4 in a some 3 dollars bins by vendor out of Indy, it was karma because I looked for these books all day friday and did not find them, and then they turn up 1st thing Saturday after I had given up looking and was browsing the cheap bins for oddball stuff and -score! These books are a great read if your looking for an intro to Lieber, all but issue 3 are adapted original Fritz Lieber stories. while a nice copy of issue 5 still illudes me it's not alone , There are some other comic adaptations out there, including my favorite story "Ill met in Lankhmar". That four issues series has illuded me as well, as I'm looking for the original comics instead of the trade paperback compilations.
Did you know Archie Comics put out weirdo horror/ sword and sorcery comics? Neither did I ,but that's who published Red Circle Comics and this title "Sorcery", Only 6 issues in 1974 -75. I havent read them yet , just flipped thru them and they look off the wall. these are not worth much
the facial expression on many these painted covers are classic, do yourself a favor and google it....
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