BIG BIG LITTLE BOOK BOOK (OCT042747)

Do you remember Big Little Books, those tiny tomes teeming with thrilling tales of adventure and excitement? Most measuring around 4 inches square and packed with 400+ pages, Big Little Books (and their many cousins and variants) have entertained children since 1932 with their large text stories and captioned pictures starring popular comic characters like Mickey Mouse, Buck Rogers, Flash Gordon, Dick Tracy, Orphan Annie, The Phantom, Donald Duck, The Gumps, and even superheroes like Batman, Spider-Man, Fantastic Four, and Aquaman. Costing just a dime all those years ago, many of these miniature treasures now command thousands of dollars in the collectibles market. This exhaustive, full-color pictorial guide also features "Better Little Books," "Dime Action Books," and many other variation on the theme, and many of these books are presented for the first time in a unique three-angle view that showcases the vibrant artwork and distinctive designs on the front, back and spine of every volume. This beautiful volume includes historical overviews of the BLBs and their many publishers, a guide to grading BLBs with notes on storage and preservation, a wealth of trivia tidbits and a BLB market report for 2004. The BIG Big Little Book Book, presented in a format that closely approximates the proportions of a classic BLB (but at twice the size), is an indispensable guide to one of the Twentieth century's most enduring formats of pop literature.