Review: The Avengers - The Ultimate Guide To Earth's Mightiest Heroes!

Discover everything about Earth's greatest super hero team in The Avengers: The Ultimate Guide. The story of every single member, from their powers and their allegiences to their enemies is explored in detail and every page is packed with enough comic-book art to satisfy the most avid fans.

Ask the average man in the street which companies publish great comic books and they will no doubt answer Marvel and DC. Ask anyone who loves comic books and you will probably get a longer list, and Dorling Kindersley will be in there, and in my opinion should be right near the top. DK publish the most stunning guides to some of Marvel's and DC's most loved creations and over the past couple of years I have slowly been adding these DK books to my collection. I will write another day about some of these books, but wanted to bring this one to your attention first as it is simply stunning, and could be a great way of getting a reluctant reader boy into books.

Published to tie in with the recent film release, The Avengers - The Ultimate guide To Earth's Mightiest Heroes! is the perfect book for anyone who has enjoyed the movie. Most young readers may think that The Avengers are made up of only Captain America, Iron Man, Hulk, Thor, Hawkeye and Black Widow, but this book will show them that the history of The Avengers goes back a very long way (September 1963 to be precise), and that over the years more than one hundred characters have come and gone from its ranks. This guide gives details of every single one of them and I think boys will spend many a happy hour poring through this volume, memorising names and images so that they can impress their friends with their new found knowledge of The Avengers.

This volume is filled cover to cover with lavishly and lovingly produced pages that tell readers everything they need to know about their favourite superheroes, and introduce many characters that even some die-hard fans may have forgotten about. Big name characters like Iron Man and Captain America (and some of the key villains from the Avengers stories) are given the honour of double page spreads that give key data about the character and their powers, and this is generally accompanied by a lengthier column of text that gives even more background to their history as an Avenger. Readers are also treated to a beautifully rendered full page image of these main characters, as well as smaller images of them as they have appeared in marvel comics through the ages. Lesser know characters are not afforded as much page space, but we are introduced briefly to each and everyone one of them.

The Avengers - The Ultimate guide To Earth's Mightiest Heroes! is more than just a who's who though. It also includes page after page outlining the major storylines and events, organised decade by decade, and my Amazon wishlist has multiplied in length as I now realise just how many classic stories I need to read.

It is very obvious to me that The Avengers - The Ultimate guide To Earth's Mightiest Heroes! is written by people who love comics, and whether you are a long time fan of The Avengers, or a 9+ boy who has only just discovered them through the recent film I think you will love this book as much as I did. They thanks go to the wonderful people at DK for sending me a copy to review.