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Tomorrow Is Free Comic Book Day!

Tomorrow is Free Comic Book Day, a national celebration of comics and independent comic shops. To celebrate, we're doing comics coverage all day!

Jessica Plummer

Contributing Editor

Jessica Plummer has lived her whole life in New York City, but she prefers to think of it as Metropolis. Her day job is in books, her side hustle is in books, and she writes books on the side (including a short story in Sword Stone Table from Vintage). She loves running, knitting, and thinking about superheroes, and knows an unnecessary amount of things about Donald Duck. Follow her on Twitter at @jess_plummer.

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Today’s Free Comic Book Day coverage is sponsored by All Summer Long by Hope Larson, published by First Second.

Thirteen-year-old Bina has a long summer ahead of her. She and her best friend, Austin, usually do everything together, but he’s off to soccer camp for a month, and he’s been acting kind of weird lately anyway. So it’s up to Bina to see how much fun she can have on her own. At first it’s a lot of guitar playing, boredom, and bad TV, but things look up when she finds an unlikely companion in Austin’s older sister, who enjoys music just as much as Bina. But then Austin comes home from camp, and he’s acting even weirder than when he left. How Bina and Austin rise above their growing pains and reestablish their friendship and respect for their differences makes for a touching and funny coming-of-age story.

Are you ready, gang? Tomorrow is the best day of the year! Not New Year’s, not Halloween, not Elvis’s birthday…it’s Free Comic Book Day!

What’s Free Comic Book Day? It’s an annual event run on the first Saturday in May to support independent comic book stores. Participating shops offer special free issues of comics ranging from Marvel and DC to smaller, independent presses. Some stores also offer special discounts, in-store signings by writers and artists, costume contests, games, and other attractions. It’s an extremely kid-friendly event and a great way to check out new books and publishers you might otherwise have missed. (Remember, though, that your LCS pays for the comics they’re giving you for free, so try to buy something as well while you’re there!)

How can you tell if your LCS is participating, or find a shop that is? Aside from your favorite store’s website and social media, the best place to check is www.freecomicbookday.com, which lets you search for participating stores by zip code. Keep in mind that FCBD is a North American promotional event, though some European countries have started their own early May FCBDs as well.

Here at Book Riot, we’ll be doing comics coverage all day to celebrate and get you all set for tomorrow. Stay tuned to find out more about what to pick up and what to wear when you head down to the comic shop, and let us know in the comments what your FCBD plans are!

Upcoming Manga Releases of 2018

Want to pick up some brand new manga series? Check out these upcoming manga releases. There's something for everyone--from classic manga to a queer autobiography and romances.

10 Murder Mystery Comics

In honor of Free Comic Book day, here is a list of murder mystery comics including a Cat detective, US Marshall in Antartica, a detective in training, and much more.