The Books of Magic #1

The ongoing Books of Magic series launches in 1994 with this first issue, subtitled "Bindings, Book 1: Tearing Down," rendered in Charles Vess's lush, painterly cover art. The cover assembles a striking gallery of mystical figures — a dark-cloaked pale figure looming at center, a woman in flowing red whose hair blooms with strange green tendrils, a towering robed presence, and a hooded figure at the edge — all surrounding a smaller inset image of a bespectacled young boy reading quietly in bed as tiny creatures and orange birds swirl through the air. It's a beautifully atmospheric introduction to this DC/Vertigo series, with the team of Rieber, Amaro, and Gross promising a world where the mundane and the magical are never far apart.