After months of waiting,
The Shadowed Circle Compendium has been released. This book is a mixture of both old and new articles from
The Shadowed Circle magazine. At the time I am writing this blog post, the magazine has six issues out.
After a cursory glance of the table of contents, I am prompted to provide a quick commentary about compendiums which I have said verbally spoken about for years, and I can finally put that into writing.
Keep in mind this has happened a number of times in the past... a number of magazines went out of their way to produce a limited edition book reprinting articles from back issues. While this cool from a collectible standpoint, the practicality goes out the door. And every book, magazine and fanzine should always have a practical purpose and intent -- avoiding, if at all possible, a financial cash grab. As an example, for non-fiction, documenting information from archival materials is meant to serve as a form of preservation. But magazines and fanzines also become desired when back issues are difficult to acquire due to a lower print number (compared to later issues).
My gripe is that the value of the back issues drops when those same articles are reprinted in a compendium. As an example, I once had a complete run of a monster magazine and the first issue was not only out of print but often sold for $125. Issue number two often sold for $50. Starting with issue number four, they were easy to find and could often be purchased for $10 or less. Having a complete run, I was a proud possessor of the set. One day the editor wanted to reprint all the articles from the first three issues into a hardcover book. He publicly asked for feedback and my reply to him was “don’t do it.” I explained how the value of those first three issues would drop once he did. But he still went ahead and printing his compendium and two years later the first issue of that magazine sold for an average of $60 on eBay. Hence the demand dropped for those early issues of his magazine and, in my opinion, diminished the value of his magazine altogether.
With today's technology, print-on-demand removes the limited aspect of the print run so early issues almost never go out of print. So it may be that compendiums of today's magazines will not diminish the value of those early issues from a collectible aspect... time will tell.
Which leads me to this hardcover (and paperback) edition of
The Shadowed Circle Compendium. Both editions arrived in my hands the other week and many of the articles in here were reprinted from past issues. In fact, the only new articles I could observe during a cursory glance was “The Shadowed Seven” in which different Shadow authors and fans listed their seven favorite
Shadow novels, and “The Shadow in Fan Publications,” which spoke about
The Shadow's history in fanzines.
As a fan of The Shadow, I enjoy reading anything about the fictional character, regardless of whether it is the pulp version of radio incarnation. Whether it be perspectives, reviews or trivia unearthed in archives, any new article written about the character is welcomed with open arms.
While these new articles are featured in the Compendium, and not elsewhere, fans of The Shadow who want to collect one of everything will no doubt rush out and make a purchase. I bought my copies to support the cause, as I would with any kickstarter, and would gladly do so again. But as someone who bought all the issues of The Shadowed Circle, I question the value of my purchase of what is clearly the same articles I already bought last year. Of the 179 pages, only 30 contained new material.
Keep in mind that this is my opinion, but I certainly would have loved to have purchased a book whereby all of the articles were new. But if you do not have any of the back issues, this book is worth getting for your collection and comes with my recommendation… especially if you are a fan of The Shadow.
The link to make a direct purchase, digital, paperback or hardcover is listed below.
https://www.theshadowedcircle.com/index.php/compendium
