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to Rutland to kidnap the Avengers, who were in town for the Halloween Parade. And there really was a Halloween Parade in Rutland! This story could have actually happened!

It was right then that I realized that wondrous and magical things could happen in comics.

So.

Twenty-eight years later, give or take a month or two, and I found myself out to dinner with my pal Selby and his friend Steve Englehart. We talked about this and that, until Steve asked me where I grew up and I answered, “Mostly in rural Vermont.” “Oh? Whereabouts?” says Steve. “Near Rutland,” I say. “Ever hear of the Halloween Parade?” says Steve.

Whereupon I launched into a much grander version of the story you’ve just read, while a slow Yoda-like smile spread over Steve’s face as I told it.

“And that’s the one comic that got me into the whole art form,” I end up. “I doubt I’d be doing what I’m doing today if I hadn’t got such a big kick out of that book at just that time.” Steve looked at me and said, “I wrote that.” And that’s one of the things I love about comics. Something that Steve worked on for a month or so back when Nixon was still President had a positive and lasting effect on at least one kid, out in the world. And that’s a pretty powerful thing. One of the other things I love about comics is the sense of community that’s engendered by the folks on the front lines of comic book entertain ment, and that was underlined for me at this past weekend’s Alternative Press Expo. This show had it all: Fae Desmond and David Glanzer and their able staff ran things with clockwork efficiency. Sometimes the scope of these things is such that odds are something will fall through the cracks… but if it did, it went unnoticed by those of us on the floor. The venue itself was perfect; big enough to fit everyone in but small enough that the interactions were useful and intimate, and not rushed or impersonal. Usually comic book conventions are frenetic and jangly things, but surpris ingly APE was bustling without being overwhelming. I was able to give my pal Ed Brubaker a hard time about writing Batman but still retaining his edgy independent street cred, while looking at frankly gorgeous Steve Lieber art from an upcoming Detective . And Steve was keeping up his end of the conversation while working on comic pages. I couldn’t believe it. The

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