Independent reading
A guide to Bay Area comics retailers.

By Charlie Anders

THE PAST FEW years have been bewildering for independent comic book sellers. Hollywood has seized on comics for new material, from the mainstream Spider-Man to the indie Hellboy. But sales have stayed flat. The major publishers have made things worse by encouraging people to buy trade paperbacks at Borders instead of visiting small, neighborhood comic book stores.

But Bay Area independents aren't surrendering any turf to the behemoths of retailing. To keep their businesses alive, local sellers of graphic storytelling are amping the coolness factor of their shops. They're building on communities of local comics creators and fans and making their stores hip destinations instead of crack dens for hardcore comics addicts.

The stores I recommend are run by people who genuinely care about comics. They support cool indie titles, but they won't laugh at you if you approach the counter with the latest issue of Superman-Batman: Double Colonoscopy either.

Comics creators as well as zinesters speak in hushed tones of Comic Relief (2138 University, Berk. 510-843-5002, www.comicrelief.net), the Berkeley store that has supported independent creators for more than 20 years. "Up-and-coming creators and their sometimes rough but oftentimes brilliant creations" have always found a home there, says writer Tristan Crane. He likes the store so much that he held an impromptu release party there for the latest issue of his acclaimed queer comic How Loathsome.

Many people have discovered such diverse samizdats as Holy Titclamps and Fleep in Comic Relief's famed Fringe Culture section. The store puts the Asterix, Tintin, and Manga comics up front, but as you progress back through the ample bins of superhero back issues, you reach the blossoming Underground and Erotica section.

Daniel Clowes, author of Ghost World and Eightball, says his new favorite place to buy comics in the East Bay is Signal Books (1816 Euclid, Berk. 510-843-1816). He praises its great selection of comics and graphic novels, plus art books and film books, "without any of the depressing, stupid comic-store junk."

In San Francisco, Comix Experience (305 Divisadero, S.F. 415-863-9258, www.comixexperience.com) is more likely to feature a tableau from an Alan Moore comic than Superman in its display window. (Photos of some of the store's zaniest window displays are archived at www.comixexperience.com.)

Comics geek Claudius Reich has been going to Comix Experience since Pappy Bush was president, and he adores its huge selection of "comics for grownups" and "strange comics for stranger grownups."

Longtime owner Brian Hibbs "has great taste in books," comics fan Jackie Jack raves. Comix Experience isn't the only place to find obscure favorites, but Hibbs is most likely to know the skinny on which artist has just given birth or changed publishers, Jack says.

The store even produces its own photocopied zine, Onomatopoeia, rife with surreal accounts of fictional correspondence with the management of Marvel Comics. You get the impression Hibbs and co. wander around having conversations in their heads with Stan Lee and Joe Quesada.

Isotope (1653 Noriega, S.F. 415-753-3037, www.isotopecomics.com) used to be a cluttered little dust mite-ridden spot called Comics and Da Kind. Former manager (and ex-bartender) James Sime bought out the store and remodeled it to create an atmosphere resembling a nightclub, complete with comfy couches. Sime launched the new name with a whiskey-tasting featuring acclaimed writer Warren Ellis.

Sime doesn't actually sell alcohol, but he will hand out beers to local indie comics creators such as Larry Young (Astronauts in Trouble) who hang out at the store. Not only does everybody know your name, but they also know what you've published and what you're working on. Ryan Yount, artist and writer of pirate comic Scurvy Dogs, also works in the store.

Ever since comic artist Brian Wood got drunk and drew on the toilet seat, Sime has been hanging toilet seats on the wall, each featuring original art by artists who've visited the store.

One habitué, James Fulton, says Sime inspired him to create The Butcher, his minicomic about being a butcher at Safeway. Isotope has started an annual award for minicomics, an oft unappreciated indy format.

"This is the coolest comic store in the country, possibly the world," raves Young, who also runs his own publishing company, AiT/PlanetLar. "It's the atmosphere. There's original art. There's cool guys," he says. And Sime will help a newcomer find comics he or she will like, rather than push the comics Sime likes, Young adds.

Another Sunset District store, Amazing Fantasy (650 Irving, S.F., 415-681-4344) also remodeled recently, when new owner Frank McGinn took over. The new Amazing Fantasy has a clean, airy feel with lots of space to move around in. It also features a great selection of action figures in the front window, creating the temptation to pit Janis Joplin against Spawn in mortal combat.

All of these stores have achieved great success in drawing hipsters back into their graphic-textual embrace. And yet they remain largely the province of male readers. One can't help feeling that if someone came along and did for comics what Good Vibrations did for sex toys, the resulting store could be a massive success. And the Bay Area might be just the place to try it.

Charlie Anders is the publisher of other magazine. She's managed to pare her comic collection down to only a few thousand books.