for bankruptcy at this time). When the industry began to recover from the "bust", annuals began re-appearing on occasion, but by no means as regularly as before the "bust", when numbered series of annuals had reached the tens or twenties, indicating over a decade of regular publication. Currently, the comic book annual is still something of a rarity, its purpose in presenting "extra" material often served by Special Editions that are released at random intervals rather than the set yearly schedule of an annual. Annuals often allow new talent to develop a story for A-list characters which "creates an opportunity for a rising star to encounter the dedicated fanbase associated with these series, developing overlap that can expand the audience for talented new voices and grow the publisher’s concept of who should be part of their top tier of creators". In 2017, Katie Schenkel, for Book Riot, highlighted that annuals are "less common that they were 20 or 30 years ago, but when companies decide to put them out for specific series the annuals are often out towards the end of summer. Comic story arcs tend to be around six issues long, and annuals fit in between one arc and the next". United Kingdom In the U.K., a large number of annuals are published shortly before the end of each year by companies such as D. C. Thomson, Egmont (formerly IPC/Fleetway), and Rebellion Developments, aimed at the Christmas market. These annuals are generally large-sized hardcover books with over 100 pages and a high color content. They are normally cover-dated with the following year's date to ensure that stockists do not remove them from their shelves immediately after the new year. One of the earliest annuals was issued in 1822. Frederic Shoberl was the founding editor of Ackermanns The Forget-me-not, which was an early annual, a then-new type of publication in England. Shoberl continued to edit the annual until 1834. A junior version called The Juvenile Forget-me-not was published from 1828 onward. For many years until the near-collapse of the British children's comics market, an annual would be published each year for each of the comic titles published by Thomson and IPC/Fleetway, featuring extra adventures of the comic's current and former characters, plus additional material in the form of puzzles, text articles, etc. Annuals were often even published for comics which had themselves ceased publication or been absorbed into other titles;