Well worth the discounted price I paid for it from Bud Plant Comic Art. A solid 5 star read.A piece of Batman History. In my Astro City: Local Heroes review, I may have been a little harsh on what is, overall, a great series (even if I stand by my review of that particular trade), saying that Astro City shows the limits of the viginette format, and Batman Black and White proves true, except with Black and White, writers get about eight pages. It's just hard to make a great graphic novel with the short story format like Batman Black and White. This book is a series of unrelated black and white stories featuring various artists and writers. I think the idea is very good, and it is a great way to peep other talent. Katsuhiro Otomo wrote a great, if forced, Batman story, and so did Matt Wagner, of course, Paul Dini's Two-Face story is the best of book, many other stories are really interesting and may be read again (depending on your tastes, most of the stories are noir, some are humorous, like Gaiman's excellent Black and White World, and some are dark, like Brain Bolland's story). But the stories take about 5 minutes to read, and you probably won't find yourself engrossed in them like you did the first time. It's a great idea though, and the trade features some extras like art and blurbs about each of the writers and artists. However, the book isn't phenonimal, it's good (but unfortunately hampered by it's format). I could reccomend this to someone who wants to fill in a Batman collection for the sake of having one, but that's about it. With all that said, I really do like this book. I'm not trying to put the book down, I'm just trying to put the book in perspective. I don't think it should get five stars or a must own reccomendation. This book should get priority over some Batman books, and even some other trades, but not top priority.