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Monday, August 31, 2009

Books Indiespensable: Stitches

Posted by Alison Hallett on Mon, Aug 31, 2009 at 4:35 PM

stitch_01.jpg

Powell's has a subscription book club called Indiespensable which, for $40 per shipment, promises a signed first edition of a new book, hand-picked by Powell's employees, plus supplemental goodies like advance copies of other books, or basil-in-a-bag, or those handy little Scout Books, courtesy of Pinball Publishing, whose customizable covers have been popping up all over the place lately.

Their 13th volume ships on September 9, and it is, notably, the first graphic novel to be released by the series: David Small's Stitches. Small is a children's book author, best known (to my generation, at least) for Imogene's Antlers, and technically I suppose I should call Stitches his "graphic memoir," though I'm not sure how many more fancy ways of saying "comic book" I care to learn. The book is about Small's childhood; a childhood in which David's radiologist father treated his sinus infections with X-rays; in which, as a 14-year-old, he's admitted to the hospital for what he believes is a minor surgery, only to learn upon awakening that he's just undergone surgery for cancer and moreover, one of his vocal cords has been removed.

Reading Stitches, I experienced the same dazed sense of awe as I did while reading David Mazzucchelli's brilliant Asterios Polyp—even though in many the ways the books couldn't be more different (Stiches is quiet and emotional where Asterios Polyp is cerebral and wordy). A full review of Stitches will be running in the paper soon, but if you've got your eye on the book, I think it'd be worth signing up to snag the fancy autographed first-edition Powell's version—it's only $15 more than the list price. I'm not generally one to care what shape my books are in, but Stitches is going on the one shelf that my cat hasn't figured out how to knock books off of, and anyone who wants to read it will be washing their hands first.

 

Comments (3) RSS

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1
So other than the author's John Hancock, is the fancy $40 version any different than just buying a copy of the book?
Posted by Graham on August 31, 2009 at 4:58 PM · Report
2
There's a custom slipcover made just for Powell's subscribers, plus whatever treats they throw in the box. It's debatable whether its worth it, depends on how much you like having super-nice books. Like I said, I don't usually care too much, but I'm pretty enamored of this one.
Posted by Alison Hallett on August 31, 2009 at 5:08 PM · Report
3
Read this book. Great graphic novel.

http://thejamminjabber.com/2009/09/08/stit…
Posted by thejamminjabber on September 8, 2009 at 3:38 PM · Report

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