Spidey's Wall-Crawler Wordwebs

Background

Back in the mid/late 70's Tempo Books was (as far as I'm yet aware) the first publisher to produce a series of Marvel tie-in puzzle books. Printed in a handy 5.25" x 8" square-bound format, these books are tough to find now in top-notch condition, and are prized by many collectors.

Story Details

This is the first book in the Tempo series. It contains 64 black & white pages of cheap newsprint paper, wrapped in a stiff cardboard cover.

In terms of content, there are 24 "wordweb" puzzles. A "wordweb" is a super-easy crossword puzzle where 15 or 20 words required are all given to you, and you simply need to fit them into the supplied crossword grid. Naturally, these puzzles are all very easy, and are designed for kids rather than adults.

Each page is illustrated with black and white line art taken from contemporary issues of Amazing Spider-Man... which is to say, mostly John Romita, Sr. pencil work. The answers are given in the back.

General Comments

These books were groundbreaking at the time, and their charm is still easy to see, nearly half a century later. There's nothing particularly clever in the puzzles. But what they do, they do very well.

Overall Rating

This is a great start to the series. I'm looking forward to reviewing the whole lot of them! Let's start off with a hefty four-web rating and see where we end up!

Footnote

This book was originally published in the U.S.A. in 1977 by Tempo Books. It was re-published two years later in the UK by Carousel Books.

I have the UK "Carousel Books" edition, and it is slightly narrower (at 5" wide rather than 5.25") than the other Tempo books.