Shiver as You Read! Atlas Comics Library Volume 6 Review

One of my favorite parts of collecting comics is getting really well put together collected editions. Whether its the actual issues collected, the way they're presented in the book, down to the way the book is actually constructed, I just love a quality book.

I have been pining after the Atlas Comics Library collected editions from Fantagraphics for some time because Fantagraphics is known for putting together quality books. These collected editions have everything you could want and more. Fantagraphics was incredible enough to send me a copy of Volume 6 of the Atlas Comics Library titled “Shiver as you Read”.

This volume is actually the third so far in the series to have horror stories: Volume 1 collected the pre-comics code comic Adventures into Terror, Volume 2 collected the pre-comics code title Venus, and this volume also collects early 50s pre-code horror comics, but pull from the pages of Men's Adventures and Amazing Detective Cases. These two titles don't necessarily sound like horror books, but thats because Atlas took existing titles and converted them to horror titles in hopes of keeping up with the pre-code horror boom.

A quick side, the Comics Code Authority was formed by Charles Murphy in response to widespread panic regarding the content of comic books, particularly in response to Frederic Wertham's book Seduction of the Innocent. So these pre-code collections are some of the last of the huge boom of horror comics that came out during this time. The code was still being used in 2010 by some publishers. We have horror comics now but they haven't really seen the popularity that they had back before the comics code.

Let's take a look at the book itself.

Front Cover

Its a beautiful hardcover, and my favorite part - oversized. This is a regular comic next to it for scale. The paper quality is great. There is a lengthy introduction that provides a lot of cool information - I would say the introduction is something of a dry read if you aren't really interested in all the little details, but its not required reading to enjoy the book. There are comic as well as prose stories in this volume. I also love that they've kept several ads from the original comics, it really helps make the experience feel more authentic.

Pages from the Introduction

Spine of the book

Original ads included in the collected edition

As far as the stories themselves, they really feel like classic horror - there's a time and place for the gruesome stuff but this all so far has felt a bit more suspenseful than violent. I got into horror as a genre a few years back when I read Dracula by Bram Stoker - so with this being more classic, gothic, and suspenseful, this was right up my alley.

Story pages

This volume releases September 30th, but the first 5 volumes of the Atlas Comics Library are available now. You can get these books, as well as special artist edition books and more on Fantagraphics website, or you can have your local comic shop order them for you. The price on this is $44.99 - which to me is well worth the price given the craftsmanship that has gone into this book.

Link to pre-order on Fantagraphics Website: https://www.fantagraphics.com/products/the-atlas-comics-library-no-6-shiver-as-you-read

Back cover