In Brief:

Men of Tomorrow: Geeks, Gangsters and the Birth of the Comic Book, by Gerard Jones

A look at the birth of comic books and their golden age. Flowing and engaging writing style makes for easy reading even during the dull bits. Not very academic, but a solid social history of the art form.

In Depth:

I’ve been a comic book fan for long time now. I’ve enjoyed following the exploits of the biggies from the DC and Marvel stables as well as the smaller guys. But for as much as I love modern comics I could never muster much interest in the supposed “golden age” stuff. The art work of those early comics never appealed to me. It seemed cheap and rushed. The plot lines were childish and overly simplistic.

But in the spirit of having an open mind and trying to learn more about the history of the art form, I grabbed a copy of “Men of Tomorrow”. The book is a social history of comics, in that it doesn’t give the complete biography of the creators or the characters. Instead it gives a broad view of the world into which comics were born and the forces that shaped them and were ultimately shaped by them.

The author hangs a lot of the book’s structure on the story of Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster. Two young lads in Cleveland that invent Superman, experience some fame, and then have their publisher screw them repeatedly on rights and money. Other early comic book creators come in and out of focus, such as Bob Kane (Batman) and Stan Lee. But the bulk of the book loosely follows Jerry and Joe.

The writing style is engaging. The author successfully makes otherwise boring anecdotes and dry history interesting with skillful turns of phrase. It kept me reading way past my bed time on several occasions.

The focus on Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster is sometimes a bit myopic. The reader is given tantalizing glimpses of other early comics creators, but not to the same depth as Jerry and Joe.

Popcorn Factor:

This is a book for comic book fans. To them it will be interesting and thoughtful. To everyone else it’ll be boring.