COMICS: Comic Relief

It's been mentioned many other places, such as Newsarama, but I thought I should mention here as well that Comic Relief, a Berkeley institution, and likely the finest comics shop in the free world, is being evicted from its University Avenue location of 17 years. Due to nothing more than landlord crankiness, apparently.

The store was opened in 1987, just in time for my Freshman year at UC Berkeley in 1988. It was at Cal that I got hooked on comics again, and once I was, Comic Relief was a weekly ritual. Trekking from the dorms on the South side of campus to the store on the West side is one of my more pleasant college memories, enjoying the beautiful stroll through campus and thinking of all the goodies I was about to get my grubby little hands on. I went to my first signing at Comic Relief; it was Dave McKean, and I've still got the Black Orchid, Sandman, and Cages issues he signed. Even when I graduated and moved to different cities in the Bay Area, I always tried to get by Comic Relief at least once a month, even though I lived nearer to other comic shops. The selection was simply unbeatable.

The shop isn't going out of business, it's just moving; the search for a new location is ongoing. And when they find a place and get settled in, I may have to make an excuse to visit a friend in the area just to see the new space.

But moving's gonna cost a pretty penny. So help them out by visiting the University Ave. store while it's still open, or ordering from them online at this site. (Even if you don't order, check out the site, with nifty artwork from Berkeley comics creators Dan Clowes, Richard Sala, and Adrian Tomine.)