Disney "Take Along Books" + a few other things

[deanmary]

    I personally am very excited about these new "Take Along Books" that
Gemstone is going to publish.  I think the time is perfect for such a
format with the success that Tokyo Pop and CrossGen have been having
with them.  I get the feeling that the majority of these stories will be
Italian?  Here in the US we have not had many Italian Disney stories
published so I am not sure whether they will appeal to me or not.  I
certainly am excited about the opportunity to find out though!  Even if
I find the stories are only a little to my liking, I will be buying this
title every month if for no other reason than to support Gemstone.  So
by early 2004 we will be getting every month two prestige titles, two
newsstand titles, and a "Take Along" book!  That sounds fantastic to me
and more than I could have hoped for.  Every bit of news I get about
Gemstone's plans makes me all the more impressed with their publishing
plans.

    I have a few questions.  Are the "Take Along Books" going to be sold
in Walmart stores and is this what format Walmart want?  If not, I hope
that negotiations are still taking place with them.  I think it is very
important to find places other than book stores and comic book stores to
sell Disney comics, and I can't think of a better place than the check
out lines of Walmart stores.

    Also, are there still plans for there ultimately being some
"regular" sized trade paperbacks?  By regular size I mean a format that
is growing ever more popular in the US.  The trade paperbacks are the
same dimensions as a regular newsstand comic, but usually contain about
6 issues of a comic book for a price between $15 and $20.  A few weeks
ago on the list someone asked for opinions on what people would like to
see in such a format.  I think they would be the perfect format for
collecting stories by such people as Barks, Rosa, Van Horn, etc. in an
archival format.  Just for an example, imagine a library of Bark's ten
pagers where you got between 10 and 15 of them per trade paperback at
the cost of say between $15 and $20.  Even though I have the entire
Barks library by Gladstone in the album format, I would love to buy
these stories again in a trade paperback format as this format appeals
to me more than the album format.  Is there a chance we could see the
entire Barks library that was done in the album format redone in a trade
paperback format?  Of course libraries of Barks, Rosa, and Van Horn
could be just the start!  There are many other writers and/or artists
that would be great in such a format.

    As for my preference for when Donald and Scrooge stories take place
in time, to me the most important thing is a *good* story, no matter
when it takes place.  I probably enjoy Don Rosa's stories more than
about any other current Disney creator, and his stories usually take
place sometime in the 1950's unless it is a story about the past of
Scrooge.  However at the same time, if a creator makes a Duck story that
obviously takes place in 2003, that is fine with me as well.  So a Duck
story that takes place in the present day with computers, fax machine,
etc. is fine with me as long as the story is a *good* story.  I imagine
Scrooge would like PCs a lot for at least one thing -- he could save
postage by sending e-mails instead of "snail-mail"! :)

Dean Rekich