This may not seem like a huge deal in of itself, but it's a big step since I know now how to sort by meta data (it's a lot easier in the new wordpress.)

Only books that have the "end-date" field filled out will show up on these lists, but not many have creators tagged on them without an end date. Anyway, it's a great step, because it means soon (maybe very soon) you'll be able to sort any list by end-date.

no, I decided to nix all backend access for site users. Eventually I'll probably have a book submission form in the front end, but it's low priority.

I've still got about 2000 books so far in my self contained database, so I'd tell you not to submit any as it might be a double. However, if you want to send me a text list, I can make sure they're part of the first self-contained upload. It could be as simple as 

TITLE – Issues Contained – date range – author – Self Contained Series

Self Contained Series is going to be a new taxonomy just to give a way to link easily to a specific series, like Ex Machina or Transmetropolitan. 

While the overall list will be sorted alphabetically (IE, Bayou before Bone) I'm going to be making use of the custom fields to actually sort within the books – mainly because it's required to make sure Book Vol. 2 comes before Book Vol. 10, if you understand what I mean. So each book will have a front in display name, but also a sort title. The sort title would be something like this:

Powers Volume 002

Powers Volume 010

Doesn't look as pretty, but is sorting friendly. I'm figuring that if there are things that are part of that series but not technically with a volume number, I'll be able to fit them in that way

Book Volume 002b – Extra Special Graphic Novel Title

etc. 

Really, I maybe should do a "sort title" for every book in the database just so alphabetical listings work nice. I'll get to it when I get to it. haha

the "Self Contained Series" there would be the name of the series. like: 

The Nightly News – The Nightly News 1-6 – November 2006-June 2007 – Jonathan Hickman – The Nightly News

It might be a little redundant, but keep in mind that one is a tag and the other is the name of the book.

Really, the easiest way for me would be if you followed the same excel format I use to import posts. I could send that to you if you'd like. But I'm not going to be getting into the big self contained import for some time. And believe me, it is gonna be a big project.