DC Trade Solicitations for July 2013 - Batman: Death of the Family, Justice League: Throne of Atlantis, Nightwing, Jim Aparo

It's April, barely spring, and DC Comics already has books in their solicitations for July 2013 that won't actually come out until October. Comics, everyone!

• Batman Vol. 3: Death of the Family

From the "striking while the iron is hot" department, the biggest headline on DC Comics's July 2013 trade paperback and collections solicitations is the Batman: Death of the Family collection. Collected Editions originally broke the news about many of these collections a few weeks ago, but now here they are officially on DC's solicitations list. It's nice to see the Batman collection released first and the Joker collection of tie-ins released second, which I think is more proper, versus the tie-in Night of the Owls collection that was released before the main Batman collection.

Oh, an apparently an acetate jacket with "the horror that is The Joker’s skinless skull" underneath? Charming.

• Justice League Vol. 3: Throne of Atlantis

The second biggie, the collection of the Justice League/Aquaman crossover, is now solicited for September. Adding to the ongoing confusion about what the individual Justice League and Aquaman books will collect, here's another new set of contents for the Justice League volume: JL #13-17 and Aquaman #15-16. This omits Aquaman #14, which had previously been listed as included in that volume. The good news is, that's another issue the Aquaman trade can recover separate from the Justice League volume; the bad news is, the JL trade now seems to be down an issue, but holding at the same price as before.

• Batman: The Court of Owls Book and Mask Set

I'm curious if anyone's buying this. I liked this story and all, and the photos of the people on owl masks at the cons have been cool, but I'm not sure I necessarily need an owl mask hanging around. At first listing it seems the price of this is not more than if you had bought the Batman: Court of Owls hardcover on its own, so maybe if you missed it the first time, might as well get a mask out of it.

• Nightwing: Old Friends, New Enemies TP

Among other things, this collection of Nightwing/Speedy Roy Harper team-ups is the first time, I'm pretty sure, DC has collected any parts of when Action Comics became Action Comics Weekly. I'll be exicted to add this one to the DC Trade Paperback Timeline, if indeed it makes it to print (you never can tell with these trades of older material, though a Nightwing book has a better-than-average chance).

• Green Lantern: Sector 2814 Vol. 2 TP

Elsewhere on the site we had been discussing how these Sector 2814 collections are getting nearer and nearer to intersecting with Crisis on Infinite Earths, and then to the post-Crisis Green Lantern Corps collections, in which some of the characters still remembered pre-Crisis continuity (those stories are also in Tales of the Green Lantern Corps Vol. 3). Anyway, hopefully the continuance of these John Stewart-focused Green Lantern trades suggest DC intends to keep the character around for a while, despite what rumors may suggest.

• Legends of The Dark Knight: Jim Aparo Vol. 2 HC

Based on your feedback, these artist focused editions have been very popular; this volume collects self-contained stories from Brave and the Bold, which should cut down on some of the strangeness where these books collect stories with no beginning or ending because the spotlighted artist only handled one part.

And your New 52 collections for July:

• DC Universe Presents: Vandal Savage TP

Rather excited for this one, both for the short stories in the DC Universe Presents zero issue, and also because James Robinson's take on a serial killer Savage and his criminal profilier daughter sounds like an epic combination.

• Sword of Sorcery Vol. 1: Amethyst TP

Equally glad to see this done-in-one -- I really only wanted to sample the adventures of Amethyst, not delve into them long-term, so I'm glad it worked out (good for me, bad for the title, I guess).

• Batwoman Vol. 3: World’s Finest HC
• Captain Atom Vol. 2: Genesis TP
• Green Lantern: Rise of the Third Army
• Legion Lost Vol. 2: The Culling TP
• Shazam! Vol. 1
• Talon Vol. 1: Scourge of The Owls TP
• Wonder Woman Vol. 3: Iron

Six months and counting till October ... What's on your must-read list for July?