Tales of Syzpense #66

Dread the Halls debuts for the 2nd week in a row! + a Dread signing today and last chance to get a signed Calendar Book or Origins of Marvel Comics before the holidays &another festive Spinner Rack.

Due to some shipping challenges facing the industry right now, our Dread the Halls holiday one-shot didn’t reach every shop last week. Which is bad — there is plenty of grim news about comic distribution during this holiday season — but it’s also resulted in our comic being talked up at various sites as a new release for the second week in a row. And it got singled out by sites like The Beat as a top release and the best of the many holiday-themed one-shots released this month.

None of which makes me feel good about the challenges facing comic retailers this month especially, at a time when December sales can really determine some shops’ fate for the coming year.

To that end, Dread co-author Jordan Hart and I will be signing copies of the book, handing out free stuff, and hopefully helping this great San Marcos shop end the year well.

Our signing is tomorrow from 2pm to 4pm at Knowhere Games & Comics. In addition to Dread, I’ll have copies of my Mighty Marvel Calendar Book and the deluxe Origins of Marvel Comics, along with a few other requested books like Shaun of the Dead (our adaptation is somehow turning 20 next year) and Zombies vs Robots, too.

If you’re not in the area but want any of these things personalized and shipped, the shop can take care of that (er, I’m assuming/volunteering. Which is what they get for picking such goofy pics of us for their IG ads, as you can see below), so just let them know before or during our signing.

“Dread the Halls is the perfect comic for this time of year. Jordan Hart & Chris Ryall, along with the artistic team, craft tales that weave together horror and holiday cheer in a macabre dance.” — Capes and Tights

• Full Capes and Tights review of Dread the Halls here

Dread the Halls offers an enjoyable mix of festive frights and creative storytelling, with standout entries making it worth a read” — AIPT Comics

• Full AIPT Comics review of Dread the Halls here

---

And while I’m sharing new reviews, these lines from a recent Calendar Book review made me happy, too:

“This book is nostalgia personified.”

“The Mighty Marvel Calendar Book is a book to treasure.”

I like those as pull quotes on their own but here’s the full Forces of Geek write-up where I pulled those.

---

Also, if you go check out Owen King’s engaging Substack newsletter (especially good if you’re a lover of baseball, books, or music), you can pre-order a signed copy of his Syzygy graphic novel (with co-writer Jesse Kellerman and artist Marianna Ignazzi), due in February. We’ll have words (and pictures!) on next year’s sequel soon, too.

“My friends at Oblong Books are now taking preorders for signed copies² of the Self Help graphic novel that collects the first five issues. With Self Help: Lie Another Day, the concluding arc of the series — also five issues long — arriving at comic stores around the same time, here’s your opportunity to catch up with Jerry Hauser and his great big mess. Important note: these will be signed just by me. My co-writer Jesse Kellerman and all the other members of the team are unfortunately too far away.”

---

A Haunted Girl on CBS News

A Haunted Girl co-writers Ethan Sacks and Naomi Sacks were featured on a CBS News segment this week, discussing mental health support and their comic. Their part of the segment comes in around the 18:20 mark but the whole piece is a good watch.

---

‘Tis The Season of the Spinner Rack, Parts 2 and 3

(Part 1 is at the bottom of this issue)

Since there’s little chance I’ll send out two more newsletters ahead of Christmas, I figure it’s best to share two sides of the spinner rack’s holiday offerings this time around.

Leading off with a copy of the source material for Lee Ferguson’s Dread the Halls cover, the EC Comic Panic’s first issue. In this case, it’s a ‘90s reprint of Panic #1, but still.

One other bit of trivial concerning these covers is, I just this month turned in a 25,000-word manuscript involving one or more of these titles, for a book slated for publication roughly a year from now. I think it will be announced in the next month or so, at which time I’ll say more about it.

And since I’m ending on a cryptic note, I might as well end on a second cryptic note, too, by mentioning that I’ll also have a spinner-rack-related announcement in the first part of 2025, too. Trying to line up various bits of good news to hold onto next year amidst whatever else the year has in store for us all.

In the meantime, a final plea — if you have any comic-related gifts to still pick up, or if you pre-order comics from a shop and haven’t picked them up in a while, please go by and go buy. We all want to maintain a thriving retailer ecosystem next year and far beyond, and they can’t do it without all of us.