There is a veritable flood of new comics every week: new issues, variant covers, new #1s, and fresh-faced miniseries. Fewer – but still bountiful – are the dozens of bookshelf editions landing in your local comic shops (and attainable by your local indie bookshops, as well!). From fresh original graphic novels, long-awaited archive editions, and collections of recent comics for all you trade-waiters, there are plenty of trade paperbacks and hardcovers to fill your shelves.
After reviewing hundreds of these sorts of books for AIPT over the years, I’ve come to appreciate what makes a collection truly special. Here at Tradewatch, I pick five books releasing in the coming week that seem the most exciting to me. Here are my picks for the week of October 20th, 2025.
Brooklyn Dreams
Dark Horse Comics, HC – $34.99 (Buy Now)
Vincent Carl Santini wants to tell you a story about his senior year in high school, but memory is a tricky thing. That one story becomes a hilarious and occasionally harrowing journey through all of Santini’s childhood growing up in 1960s and 70s Brooklyn.
Originally published in 1994, Brooklyn Dreams appears to be an intimate project for legendary writer JM DeMatteis and artist Glenn Barr detailing a life growing up in Brooklyn. Barr’s black and white artwork swings from painterly to rough-scratch cartoon, spotlighting emotion and narrative tension by way of visual complexity or simplicity. It’s very much an indie book of the early ’90s, and it very much seems like it strikes a genuine tone of fond nostalgia for a childhood in the city.
DC Finest: Events – Crisis on Infinite Earths: Part One
DC Comics, TPB – $39.99 (Buy Now)
The multiverse is on the brink of collapse, and only the greatest heroes can stand against the darkness consuming reality. This volume collects the first wave of stories that set the stage for the Crisis on Infinite Earths. From Swamp Thing’s battle to fix his gravest mistake to Batman and Catwoman’s deadly struggles under red skies, these stories delve into the heart of DC’s characters as they fight for survival.
Have you ever attempted to sit down and read Crisis on Infinite Earths not as a single-title event, but as the complete, off-the-wall, sloppy and spectacular experience? This book — and its eventual follow up — seems to be the most complete presentation of one of the most imporant events in comics history, collecting both the series and all its myriad tie-in issues. Dozens of creators, hundreds of characters, and only a vague outline of how the great DC reboot was meant to happen, Crisis is an amazing document of a company trying to reinvent itself. This might not be the ideal way to read it, but man oh man is it an eye-opening way to do so.
Facing Feelings: Inside the World of Raina Telgemeier
Scholastic Books, HC – $26.99 (Buy Now)
Spend an afternoon with Raina as she shares her artwork and tells stories about a range of topics spanning from her childhood to the creation of her graphic novels Smile, Sisters, Guts, Drama, and Ghosts!
It’s hard to overstate the effect that Raina Telgemeier has likely had on bolstering the comics industry by simply being. Her books, massive middle-grade bestsellers all, have found countless child readers and instilled in them a love for graphic storytelling; she is the hook for the young readers the comic industry desperately needs to survive. She is also, thankfully, a wonderful cartoonist, and this book takes a look at her craft and career.
Out of Alcatraz
Oni Press, HC – $29.99 (Buy Now)
Convicts Frank Morris and Clarence Anglin have washed ashore in San Francisco after surviving their infamous escape from Alcatraz Federal Penitentiary in June 1962. They soon meet their gruff and disappointed handler, a mysterious young woman who’s also running from something, and hope to quickly get their way north to the border—if they can even make it out of Modesto alive.
As much an examination of cultural mores and injustices as it is a period-piece genre thriller, Out of Alcatraz was one recent series that truly blew me away. It doesn’t hurt that it has phenomenal artwork by Tyler Crook (and Christopher Cantwell is no slouch in the writing department, either). It isn’t a non-stop story of action, but there are plenty of thrills. Mostly, it’s a book that treats its characters with as much respect as it treats its readers: plenty.
S.H.I.E.L.D. by Hickman & Weaver Omnibus
Marvel Comics, HC – $75.00 (Buy Now)
Leonardo da Vinci was an agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. So was Issac Newton. So were Imhotep and Zhang Heng and Galileo and other geniuses throughout time. They were the first heroes to defeat Galactus and the Brood and turn Celestials back. They saved the world long before Captain America or Iron Man were ever born, but what does this mean to our heroes of today?
This might be one of the strangest, most mind-blowing looks at the history of the Marvel Universe ever presented. Revealing that S.H.I.E.L.D. is only the modern version of a historic organization with ties to Leonardo DiVinci, Nostradamus, and Nikola Tesla, the book explores some pretty wild concepts and illustrates events like Galactus visitations, which our modern heroes have no knowledge of. It’s not a terribly long read — a total of 13 issues, all told — but it’s very much worth it for people who want to believe in the weirdest, longest conspiracy of the Marvel Universe.
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