Eleven years ago, I told a little white lie on the Eyrie Forum, and now I've got to come clean...

Gryphon will probably remember this better than anybody else on the board, but about 12 years ago, I posted this, also found at http://www.eyrie-productions.com/Forum/dcboard.cgi?az=printer_format&om=267&forum=DCForumID1 :

You'll never believe what I've come across: The book that Gryphon read while on his way back to the Wayward Son to take his revenge on Carson D. Carson, Archives of The Shadow!
The description Gryphon gave of it was a little off, though, but here it is:

Having finished _The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich_, he got
up from the table and paced across the large room to the shelf where
he had acquired it, and as he slid it back into the ranks of books,
his eyes seemed drawn to glance at another, taller book standing a few
spaces down the row. He reached up and pulled it out -- it was black,
bound in leather, and the cover had the words "ARCHIVES OF THE SHADOW
- W. GIBSON" stamped in gold foil on it.
"Wow," Gryphon murmured. "Where'd they find -this-?"

The actual thing does not have the title stamped in gold foil, but is deeply embossed on the front with the title, Shadow logo, and author's name (W. Gibson), leatherbound in black, accented in red, and is about 600 pages long. I can't figure out how to upload to my @!#$ Internet supplier, so anyone who wants pictures can email to get a scan of the front cover.
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The truth is, I made that book myself, and passed it off as a mysterious find.

I was inspired by a combination of the description of Gryphon finding the book in Passion, the Shadow movie, and reading a ton of The Shadow pulp novels, and decided I wanted to make a replica of the Archives of the Shadow book for myself.

It was one of my first attempts at bookbinding, but I poured days of my life into selecting which Shadow novels to include, editing them for the new format, and printing the book on my old Okidata laser printer.

I created the covers of the book using multiple layers of hardboard, which I cut, stacked, and glued to resemble the stylized movie poster version of The Shadow (see the image below for reference)

Since I didn't know how to do golf foil embossing, I instead molded the leather cover to match the contours of the hardboard covers using a homemade book press, and bound the whole thing together with picture hanging wire and some brass strips from the hardware store. It wasn't a spectacular first attempt at binding a book, but it turned out almost exactly as I'd imagined it.

Long story slightly shortened, 11 years ago I wrote the post above, and when Gryphon said he wished he had a copy, I took a long look at my motivations for creating the book in the first place. I realized that I'd done it mostly for the joy of creating something, and that it belonged with somebody who would truly appreciate it. So, I sent it to Gryphon.

Gryphon, I hope that it has found a good home with you, and that you'll overlook my little white lie and accept my gratitude for many, many years of Eyrie enjoyment.

Cheers,
Sean