Pondering Personal Preorders
First of all, if you're looking for the Vaguely Creepy Marvel Covers, click the link or scroll down (or just go here).

Secondly, it's that time of month again: time to submit my monthly preorder for comics I think I'll be interested in reading three months from now.  I've been trying to cut down on the number of books I order, due to considerations of both time and money.  Each month I try not to exceed 20 items (because going over that shifts me into the next tier of shipping rates) or $100 (because, well because $100 a month is a lot to spend on anything, really).  Here's my list for this month:

24 HOUR COMICS DAY HIGHLIGHTS 2004 TP
BOMBABY SCREEN GODDESS #4
CARNET DE VOYAGE
DC COMIC PRESENTS HAWKMAN #1
DC COMIC PRESENTS MYSTERY IN SPACE #1
DEMO #8
DIGITAL WEBBING PRESENTS #16
EIGHTBALL #23
EX MACHINA #2
FINDER VOL 6 TP MYSTERY DATE
FLIGHT GN
GOTHAM CENTRAL #21
HERO #18
NAUSICAA OF VALLEY OF WIND VOL 6 TP 2ND ED
PERVERSO ONE SHOT
RIDE #2
SEAGUY #3
SLEEPER SEASON TWO #2
STEVE RUDE THE MOTH #4
TOP SHELF CONVERSATIONS #1
URSULA GN

Looking over the list, here are some thoughts that occurred to me:

• 10 different publishers are represented across those 20 comics.

• DC is the most represented publisher, accounting for 6 items (30%).

• Image, Top Shelf, and AiT/PlanetLar are the publishers with the next highest representation at 2 items each.  (2 comics apiece might not seem like much, but it is significant when you consider (a) the total output from some smaller publishers and (b) my past purchasing patterns for each publisher.  In the case of AiT/PlanetLar, for example, I had only ordered one item from them before the big blogosphere push made the company stand out more in my mind.  (That item was the Astronauts in Trouble: Master Flight Plan HC, in case you were wondering, which I ordered almost a year ago and still haven't read.)  Lesson?  Promotion does work!)

• The remaining 8 items account for 8 additional publishers (About Comics, Alternative Comics, Dark Horse, Digital Webbing, Fantagraphics, Lightspeed Press, Slave Labor Graphics, and Viz).

• There were many other comics that looked interesting to me (such as The Walking Man) but I had to draw a line somewhere.  (One of the deciding factors ended up being how big a discount I could get through Mailordercomics.  Since The Walking Man was only offered at 15% off, I figured I could wait for the book to show up on Amazon with its larger discounts.)

Finally, Christopher Butcher, what happened?  I thought you were going to do this month's Previews Review early, yet it never appeared!  (I know, I know:  You were busy selling manga hand over fist.  And I only kid because I love.)

EDIT: I completely forgot about NAUSICAA OF VALLEY OF WIND VOL 6 TP 2ND ED.  I'm going to have to make an adjustment to my order to fit NAUSICAA in without going over 20 items, so the stats I discussed above will change.  (I'm leaning towards cutting GOTHAM CENTRAL since I was thinking of dropping the series anyway once the current arc was over.  In fact, yes, I am dropping GOTHAM CENTRAL.  The stats have been updated to reflect this change.)
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