“Secret Identity: The Fetish Art of Superman’s Co-Creator Joe Shuster” Leaps on “Best Of” Lists!

“Secret Identity: The Fetish Art of Superman’s Co-Creator Joe Shuster” (intro by Stan “The Man” Lee) is scoring high on year end/decade end “Best of’s,” from the President of the Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art, Ellen Abramowitz’s “The Best Damned Comics of 2009” on The Daily Cross Hatch, to Will Pfeifer’s “X-ray Spex.” Pfeifer hails “Secret Identity,” “Fascinating, with a story that manages to not only combine under-the-counter dirty books, Jewish psychos with Hitler moustaches and comic book history — and be true, to boot — but because it also serves as a de facto biography of Joe Shuster, full of amazing revelations and too-strange-to-be-true stories.”

“Secret Identity” is said to be the most reviewed book ever in the comics field, and has been featured on NPR’s “Fresh Air” to Fox News, The New York Times to Hustler, Time magazine to this month’s issue of Playboy. There have been reenactments of scenes from the Joe Shuster’s drawings both in New York and Hollywood by the famed Suicide Girls. Yoe has spoken about the book at the San Diego Comic Con and at the Toronto Comic Arts Festival, where he was a guest of honor (Joe Shuster was born in Toronto).

“Secret Identity” launched the ComicsArt line by the prestigious publisher Abrams. The book covers Joe Shuster’s life, from when he was the artist-creator of Superman, and, virtually, the seminal artist of the whole comic book industry, to previously-unknown aspects of Shuster’s life, when he drew S&M booklets titled “Nights of Horror” for the mob. Interestingly, the characters drawn by Shuster for “Night of Horror” look eerily similar to the citizens of Metropolis, Superman/Clark Kent, Lois Lane, Jimmy Olsen, and Lex Luther.

Anti-comics crusader Dr. Fredric Wertham railed against “Nights of Horror” before a senate investigation, after a gang of Jewish neo-Nazi juvenile delinquents, inspired by the booklets, horse-whipped girls and murdered two vagrants. The Brooklyn Thrill Killers made the headlines of The New York Times and Life magazine. The publisher of “Nights of Horror,” mobster Ed/Edward/Eddie Mishkin, eventually was imprisoned for two years. The case against “Nights of Horror” went all the way to the Supreme Court. In this landmark case, the Supreme Court set an important precedent ruling against the S&M booklets and, consequently, freedom of the press. Shuster’s connection with “Nights of Horror” and the mob was unknown by the public until Craig Yoe discovered these booklets at a rare book fair. Yoe has been called by Vice magazine, “the Indiana Jones of comics historians.”

“Secret Identity: The Fetish Art of Superman’s Co-Creator Joe Shuster” is been represented by The Gotham Group for a major motion picture.

“Jeepers, Mr. Kent!” -USA Today (which kicked off the press on “Secret Identity” with their front peg story.) “The drawing is impeccable, it’s kinky and funny at the same time.” -The New York Times. “Marvelous!” -L.A. Times. “High Weirdness” -NPR’s Fresh Air. “Eye-Opening” -Publisher’s Weekly.

• “Secret Identity” can be ordered here.

• Craig Yoe is available for press inquiries or interviews by emailing to yoecomix [at] hotmail [dot] com