Contest Results

The authors would like to thank everyone who participated in our "What Stan Lee Means to Me" Contest. The top ten to fifteen entries were so close in quality that it was extremely difficult to pick one stand-out -- let alone rank them. It's kind of like picking your favorite Stan Lee comics -- lots of early Fantastic Fours and Happy Hogan-era Iron Mans, very few She-Hulk #1s. If we were conducting the contest again, we'd make sure we could name multiple first places.

We hope you enjoy the efforts of the readership, which we've published below:

Grand Prize Winner
Scott Sheaffer

Runner-Up
Rony Daniel

Third, Fourth, Fifth Place
Peter Wallace
Larry Rodman
Dr. Mitchell Jomsky

Sixth through Tenth Place
Ray Earles
Dave Lasky
Mark Clegg
Sean Kleefeld
Steven Rowe

Special True Believer Award for the Youngest Participant
Daniel Ponzini, Age 14 (500K .doc file; right-click to download)

Our deepest thanks again to everyone who entered.

And a special thank you to celebrity guest judge Dean Haspiel, the creator of Billy Dogma and an artist for assorted Marvel and DC comic books. Visit his site and show him some love.

-- Jordan and Tom

Tom Spurgeon and Jordan Raphael are pleased to announce the Official Contest of Stan Lee and the Rise and Fall of the American Comic Book:

"What Stan Lee Means to Me"

Tell the authors and the world what comic-book impresario Stan Lee means to you and win a valuable prize. Submit anything in any form that can be put on a Web site for a general (but sophisticated) audience that fits under the contest title. This can be positive or negative, funny or serious, thoughtful or dashed off -- the idea is to embrace the full array of views that the comic-book community has about Mr. Lee.

Entries due August 30. Winners announced September 14.

Top Ten Finishers will be published on the site.

Top Five Finishers will receive advance reading copies of Stan Lee and the Rise and Fall of the American Comic Book.

Runner-Up will receive an advance reading copy and a random Stan Lee comic book from the 1960s.

Grand Prize Winner will receive the hardcover book and an iris print of the Drew Friedman-drawn Stan Lee portrait used as part of the cover for the Lee issue of The Comics Journal (#181).

We will consider any submission of any kind that can be put on a Web site, including art, MP3s, fiction, essays, or dirty limericks.

Entries will be judged on creativity and general excellence.

Please limit written entries to 800 words and audio/visual entries to three minutes.

Contest will be judged by the authors and an unnamed celebrity guest star who will be browbeaten to help us render a decision between now and then. If not, then one of our friends.

Send your contest submissions to: contest@stanleebook.com