I promised to start recommending books about comics, did it once and then forgot about it. Sorry. Today, I'm going to suggest that if you're at all interested in the history of comics, you pick up a copy of Brush Strokes With Greatness: The Life and Art of Joe Sinnott, a book all about the man some call the best inker in the comic book industry.
In the interest of full disclosure, I'll mention that Joe is an old and dear friend, and that I wrote the Afterword in this book. (Some guy named Stan Lee wrote the foreword.)
For those of you who don't follow comics: Most comic art is created by someone sketching the thing out in pencil and then someone going in with a brush and/or pen and inscribing the precise lines in ink. Often, one person does both stages but sometimes, the work is divided. Some artists prefer to do one or the other…or are good or fast at one and not the other. In many cases, publishers have encouraged the assembly line procedure so that the better artists can produce more pages. There was a time when most inkers were guys who weren't qualified to do the pencil art and their limitations caused them to bring down the quality of the pages they finished.
That was more common in what we might call the pre-Sinnott era. Joe was and is a very fine artist, and he showed everyone what an inker could be. When he inked a bad artist, the work came out better and when he inked a good one, it also came out better. He's also one of the three or four nicest people I've met in comics…and I think some of you know how many people I've met in comics. So that's not faint praise. This book, compiled and written expertly by Tim Lasiuta, tells the story of Joe's life and showcases his artwork, plus it's filled with testimonials from those who've worked with him and/or admired his skills. How can you not order a copy?