IDW Publishing; $29.99

Dick Tracy was born of the gangland despots of the 1930s and the active imagination of Chester Gould, who would spend decades chronicling the adventures of the straight arrow detective and his startlingly weird rogues’ gallery.

This first hardcover volume in IDW Publishing’s new series collecting Tracy’s adventures is a proverbial “must have” for anyone who is serious about the comic book and comic strip arts. With an insightful foreword by Road To Perdition and Ms. Tree creator Max Allan Collins, who succeed Gould as writer of the strip, as well as an interview with Gould conducted by Collins.

Volume 1 is superb introduction to Tracy’s world and what impelled its creation. Do not miss this book!

–J.C. Vaughn