I finally got a chance to sample Batman: Murder at Wayne Manor, one of Quirk Books’ interactive mysteries that feature replica artifacts. It’s written by Duane Swierczynski, as was The Crimes of Dr. Watson, but as suits the main character, there are also comic-style illustrations by David Lapham. The plot here seems the best integrated with the licensed property of the three books in the series. (Along with the Holmes one, there’s also Dracula’s Heir, by another author.) Bruce Wayne […]

I have read an honest-to-goodness romance novel set at the San Diego Comic-Con. More Than Comics by Elizabeth Briggs is the love story of Tara McFadden, a young woman just out of college who’s been writing Misfit Squad, a successful graphic novel for Black Hat Comics, “the third largest comic book publisher” in this universe. That’s not the only discrepancy. She’s meeting her artist, Hector Fernandez, for the first time in person at the con, and he turns out to […]

Review by KC Carlson Between the years of 2007 and 2011, a publisher named Running Press issued a series of beautifully written and produced Vault books on the histories of comics’ biggest companies (Marvel and DC Comics — both previously reviewed by me, here at CWR) and their top characters (Batman and Spider-Man). Despite the similar title, this new 2015 Avengers Vault book, from a different publisher, Thunder Bay Press, is not like those books. In fact, I think the […]