Many people out there have a wait-for-trade attitude when it comes to comic books. I happen to be one of those people.

It is not that I hate single issues. For me it is a question of availability. We Have a nice little somic shop about a half-hour away, but I can’t afford the gas and money for individual issues and still have enough to meet all of my other responsibilities.

I do have several single issues (I got online) of stories that interest me that were never collected that I have sought out.

The reason I don't regularly collect single issues much anymore is because of money, but also space. I collected single issues for much of my youth in the early to late 1980s, basically the days before trade paperbacks were born. Unfortunately, I ended up selling off my entire collection after I felt I had "outgrown" them and the fact they had taken up a lot of space in my room, space I no longer had in ample supply.

Over the next few years I went to comic shops regularly while in college. I just didn't buy anything. I could always borrow stuff from people in my dorm to read. Also, this was the time "Batman: The Animated Series" first came on so my comic book cravings were satisfied without having to buy much.

I graduated from college and got out on my own and I still would glance at what was available, but still without much urging me to buy.

However, all of that changed when I was in the grocery store one day and picked up a copy of James Robinson's "Starman." At the time, I knew that DC had several characters named "Starman" and I thought this was one more in that line. However, imagine my shock when I discovered he was the son of the original Starman, Ted Knight - a character I had read and enjoyed in various JLA/JSA crossovers as well as "The All-Star Squadron"?

By this time, I was online and could read reviews of various stuff and I discovered that Starman was pretty popular. I also discovered that trades were available of the "Starman" series so I decided to start buying them. I justified this in that it would probably be the only series I bought and could manage the space issues on my bookshelves.

However, as time went on, I discovered more titles. "Starman" led me to Geoff's John's "JSA" series. Now I am a big fan of "Shadowpact" because I got the "Day of Vengeance" trade as well as the four trades for the "Shadowpact" series. I am also loving Gail Simone's "Secret Six" through their various trades. I have gotten "Infinite Crisis" and all of its tie-ins.

I also began discovering collections of stuff I use to collect. Feeling nostalgic, I began collecting some of the stuff I had collected as a kid. These included "Crisis on Infinite Earths" and "Watchmen" as well as the JLA/JSA team-ups in the many "Crisis on Multiple Earths" volumes. I then started looking into stuff I remembered but never collected, including "Camelot 3000" and “Batman: No Man’s Land” and others

To quote "The Godfather III," "Just when I think I'm out, they pull me back in."

However, over the last several months I have seen the cancellation of collected editions including DC’s take on the Red Circle heroes, the Suicide Squad’s “Nightshade Odyssey,” “Infinity Inc. The Generations Saga Vol. 2,” DC’s take on the THUNDER Agents Vol. 2, and others.

The original “Infinity Inc.” was a series I originally collected and was looking forward to diving back into after 20-some-odd-years. The original “Suicide Squad” from the 80s was just coming out when I stopped collecting so I never read it. I had hopes I could get caught up on it. I have “Trial By Fire” and loved it, but it doesn’t look promising that DC is going to do anything more with it in the near future.

I have also seen Showcase Presents editions for the “Suicide Squad,” “Captain Carrot and His Amazing Zoo Crew” and “DC’s Who’s Who” put on indefinite hold. I have never seen a Vol. 2 put out for Mike Barr’s “Batman and the Outsiders” from the 80s, another series I collected back in the day. It remains to be seen yet if “All-Star Squadron” will get a Vol. 2 of Showcase Presents. I have seen the list of releases for stuff through April 2013 and I haven’t seen anything.

The original “Firestorm: The Nuclear Man” series was collected, the one that only lasted five issues. I would love to see "The Fury of Firestorm" collected in some fashion, but I have not seen any mention of that made yet.

There are a number of series from the 80s that I had high hopes might get collected so I could go back and read, things I couldn’t collect the first time, but have since peaked some interest for me, these include "Blue Devil," "Arion Lord of Atlantis," "Arak Son of Thunder," the Dan Spiegle/Mark Evanier take on "Blackhawk," "Atari Force," the late 1990's version of "Challengers of the Unknown" and others.

On the Marvel side I would love to see a collected edition for John Byrnes’ "Marvel The Lost Generation."

It is just that the single issues from these series are getting few and far between for me to go back and pick up. It is also getting expensive to try and get all these issues. Trades offer a cheaper alternative...in many cases. (Some hardbound books are pretty expensive, however I eventually got all of the "Starman" omnibus editions.)

However, with all of the cancelations, I would be afraid to get my hopes up even if anything is ever announced.

I know publishing depends on demand and sales. If neither are there then there isn't going to be much need to collect certain titles. However most of DC’s “The New 52” has collected editions, including titles that were cancelled after eight issues.

I just get tired or reading about something that is going to be collected, have excitement build and then have it all come tumbling down when the decision is made to cancel it. Maybe some day, in the near future, we will be able to download any issue of any comic we want and these concerns won't matter anymore.

However, until that time we have the current system to deal with.

The one series that recently came out that I am looking forward to the most as a collected edition is James Robinson’s “The Shade.” The announcements have been made and a date has been set of March 5, 2013 for the trade release. Will it happen? Important people said it will.

I hope so. If this one gets cancelled, I think the time will come for me to get out of comic books again.