Summer 2010 Reading List

Here's a list of graphic novels I intend to buy over the summer. While most schools send out reading lists for the summer that include classic books, such as Tom Sawyer and Great Expectations, I make my summer reading consist of stuff I'd actually enjoy reading.

Invincible Iron Man: World's Most Wanted part 2 TPB

This volume contains the second half of Matt Fraction's World's Most Wanted arc. The story is about Tony Stark's fall from power after the Secret Invasion as he's being hunted by Norman Osborn for the most valuable thing Stark has that isn't a suit of armor, his mind. Before Tony left his office at S.H.I.E.L.D. (now called H.A.M.M.E.R.), he deleted the Superhuman Registration Database from the computer system. Now Tony's mind is the only place where the database still exists, which leads him to run around the country as a fugitive using older versions of the Iron Man armor. While he's running, Tony is slowly deleting his mind so no one can ever know the information he once knew. This story is very compelling as it tells the story of how the intelligent and powerful Tony Stark becomes a brain dead nationally-hunted fugitive. I'm definately picking up this paperback next week.

Mighty Avengers: the Unspoken TPB

Last month I bought the first volume of Dan Slott's run on Mighty Avengers and I was immediately hooked on this series. I recently read Slott's final arc on the Mighty Avengers series and was disappointed this had to end. Fortunately, the next trade paperback for Slott's Mighty Avengers is coming out next month so this is definitely going onto my list.

Superboy: the Boy of Steel

Once again, Superboy is one of my favorite characters. So having a collected edition of the story that featured Conner Kent during Geoff Johns' run on the re-launch of Adventure Comics is really exciting for me. Even though I usually wait for a paperback edition, I'm willing to pay extra for one of my favorite stories.

Invincible Volume 12: Still Standing

Originally, this was advertised on online bookstores, such as Amazon.com, Borders.com, and Barnes & Noble.com, to be released during February but recently ads for this book in the Invincible series has changed the release date to sometime in June. I hope this does come out next month because I've already collected the other volumes and I started buying the issues since December. Overall, Invincible has become one of my favorite series and I hope to expand my collection very soon.

Well that's the end of my summer reading list. Its not very long but it contains most of the books I intent to buy before school starts. If you have any suggestions about what should be added to this list, then post a comment to this post. Later!

Superboy's getting his own ongoing series! Yipidee Doodily Doo!

It was announced today on DC's the Source that Superboy would get his own ongoing series written by Jeff Lemire.

The post stated:

"It’s the kind of thing that pops into your head and just clicks – who’s better suited to pen the adventures of a super-teen in middle America than Jeff Lemire, author of the touching, evocative ESSEX COUNTY and Vertigo’s SWEET TOOTH?
So, it makes perfect sense to announce today that Jeff Lemire, along with artist Pier Gallo, will be launching a SUPERBOY ongoing series later this year, with a special, one-off co-feature debuting in the August issue of ACTION COMICS (#892), which will give fans a primer for the full series.”

Read more here.

I'm actually really excited for this series. Superboy (a.k.a. Kon-El, Conner Kent) became one of my favorite characters when I started reading the collected editions of Geoff Johns' run on the Teen Titans. I enjoyed the character's struggle of finding out who he is (especially since he was cloned from Superman and Lex Luthor). Unfortunately Conner died as a result of his second fight against Superboy-Prime and destroying Alexander Luthor's tower during Infinite Crisis. I felt disappointed when I was starting to enjoy the Boy of Steel and he gets killed off. After learning this information, I spent most of 2008 buying issues of Superboy's first ongoing series off eBay. Fortunately, Conner Kent returned to the land of the living during last year's Final Crisis: Legion of 3 Worlds mini-series by Geoff Johns. Then the Boy of Steel was given some more time in the spotlight when DC decided to re-launch Adventure Comics, which featured the modern Superboy as its main character for the first six issues. Conner's story during Adventure Comics allowed Geoff Johns to finish his issues with the character as Superboy comes to terms with having Superman and Luthor's DNA and decides to become his own person. I am definitely adding Lemire's series to my pull list and hopefully, this new ongoing series will be just as good if not better than the recent stories featuring Superboy.