More Comics

We were kind of on the fence about whether to descend to the Toronto Comic Art Festival site again, but in the end we decided it was worth it after all and made a second visit. This time we made a much more appreciable dent in the wallet.

If you click on the picture to the left, you’ll get a bigger shot of it. It’s a panel from NextWave: Agents of H.A.T.E. written by Warren Ellis and illustrated by Suart Immonen. This time around, we actually brought our hardcover trade paperback (and picked up volume 2 while we were there ) and got both of them signed with a little doodle courtesy of Stuart. I am very happy about this as I can’t remember the last time a comic made me laugh out loud so much… and for whatever reason, Warren Ellis hates French Canadians. Go figure. Strangely enough, when I asked Stuart about how much input he has into the creation of the comic, he seemed kind of torn about it. It would seem that during the entire run so far, he and Warren Ellis have exchanged maybe a total of 20 e-mails, and whenever he asked Ellis about how to approach a particular page or panel, the usual answer was “whatever way you think is best,” and after a while, since that was the only answer he was getting, he stopped writing e-mails and just concentrated on doing the book.

I really have no words to describe just how hilariously psychotic this series is. Ellis has taken the Marvel universe and just attacked with a Great Sword Of Snark (+5 against Avengers Fans) that digs into every single thing about the Marvel universe that comic fans may have ever debated. The fact that makes extra-dimensional beings from the darkest reaches of pain and nightmare big fans of the Suicide Girls website is also so unbelievably awesome that if you punch the very concept itself, it explodes, which is par for course with NextWave.

This is the cover to one of my favorite Vertigo series, Fables, the revisionist, post-modern update to fair tale characters by Bill Willingham. James Jean is the cover artist and work is absolutely gorgeous. We were determined to get something signed by him this time, and so showed up good and early to a) be the first ones to actually form the line for his table and b) choose which table he was to sit at when we asked the Beguiling folks where he was to sit and they said, “You tell us, we’ll put the sign up.”

James Jean surprised the hell out of us by… not being white. At first I thought maybe some kind of volunteer or assistant was getting the table ready for him when an Asian guy showed up. But when he sat down, looked at us expectantly and said “Hi!” I had to reorder my reality for a brief moment from James Jean=White Anglosaxon Protestant type to James Jean=Asian guy with glasses. The confusion got settled when he explained that he was from Taiwan, and decided to change his last name to something that would be a little more palatable to Western ears. Still, my first volume of Fables is now signed by him, and I am a happy camper.

Our next bit of loot was a surprise purchase by the Wife. A local artist by the name of Jeff LeMire had created a comic in 2005 called Lost Dogs which won a Xeric award, which is something put out by the Xeric Foundation, a group composed of, amongst other people, Peter Laird, co-creator of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. The award goes out to promising new artists to help them publish their work and get into the industry. Our friend, Sonny Liew, was one such winner a few years back. Jeff ended up being a VERY personable, humble and friendly guy, and it was nice that the slower Sunday vibe allowed to just stand around and talk to him about various things. Unsurprisingly, he showed an interest in the Wife’s artwork when she mentioned she was “in the biz” and encouraged her to keep pursuing it and self-publish if necessary, contrary to her own opinion that because she is a) a girl and b) wholly devoid of talent, she stands no chance in the industry. With any luck we’ll be able to see the guy around more often, and perhaps within a year or two, it will the Wife sitting at one of these tables, signing and doodling for others.

The other acquisition, which was not signed, was Wimbledon Green, by Seth, Yet Another Canadian Artist, who has been winning awards and making a lot of waves in the Literati crowd that deign to read “graphic novels,” but not comics.

I have to admit, aside from having seen his work on more recent compilations of the Peanuts strip, I haven’t delved too deeply into his work, but he’s another the artist The Wife has been aware of for some time, so hopefully this will give me an excuse to get a better grip on the kinds of stories he tells.

All in all TCAF has been a pretty big hit with us; the more laid back, “it’s all about the artists and not the merchandise” vibe of the event made it enormously fun. And it’s just a blast to be surrounded by so many comics creators. I have a feeling now that even if we ever do get a chance to go to the San Diego Comic Con, somehow, the cozier, more intimate feel of TCAF is going to keep this event at the top of our list. As far as Paradise ComicCon and others go, this is definitely the event to beat in our books. Although I still can’t quite believe that James Jean isn’t white. That’ll take me a few years to digest.

Tomorrow, either my thoughts on Digital Devil Saga 2 (which I don’t feel like writing today after writing this) or thoughts on "font-style: italic;">Persona 3 which should be delivered to us by Monday afternoon.

Of Comics & Cowboys

Today ended up being a long but pleasant day.

The afternoon was spent cruising down over to the University of Toronto campus where one of the old and currently under renovation halls was taken over by the Toronto Comic Arts Festival. While we did not achieve everything that we set out to do, it was for the most part a success. Our failures come in the form of completely forgetting that Stuart Immonen (penciller for the utterly hilarious Next Wave: Agents of H.A.T.E.) was there and bringing anything for him to sign. The other failure was missing out on James Jean (cover artist for Fables) who was in the middle of a panel discussion when we showed up, and the other miss was Paul Pope (creator of 100%) who we spectacularly failed to locate.

On the other hand, we managed to meet with Evan Dorkin, who has done completely psychotic Milk & Cheese comic (“When dairy products go bad!”) and got him to not only sign our trade paperback, we came away with a Milk & Cheese fridge magnet. This is, of course, awesome. The other success was meeting Bryan Lee O’Malley, creator of local comic sensation Scott Pilgrim, and I finally got to ask him whether he liked moving from Toronto to Nova Scotia, since we were contemplating a Halifax move ourselves last year. It turns out he doesn’t and will probably be leaving the province, so maybe we made the right choice after all in settling down here. I picked up the third book in the Scott Pilgrim series and got him to sign my first. We also ran into the Old Friend who was hanging out with her girlfriend, who, in turn was dating a guy that does a webcomic called Butternut Squash and seduced his lady love with a heart full of love and plastic guitar. The song? Freebird. The level? Medium. I give him credit for trying, but dude, Medium… Come on…

After that, we went to another part of the Annex to attend the Wife’s Friend’s 30th birthday party which had, wait for it… A COWBOY THEME! People were dressed as desperadoes and there was pinata in the shape of a cactus. Being the big Party Animal that I am, I immediately ran from the crowd in the backyard and retreated to the basement, there, to find (what in retrospect should been obvious) that someone had brought Guitar Hero II to the party.

As you may expect, it was all over for me at that point.

I am once again amazed at the continuing hesitation of people to play at Expert. I think I may have also accidentally killed the more innocent, “Hey, let’s just have fun” buzz that the other party-goers were enjoying with GH2. I strapped on the guitar, warmed up with Sweet Child O’ Mine and noted that the buttons were a bit stiffer than my hugely worn out Gibson SG at home, but got into it after a bad start and then after that went through a few favorites like Messenger In A Bottle, Carry on my Wayward Son and Monkeywrench at which point there were a lot of “Holy shit…”s, “What the hell level is he playing?!” and “HOW THE FUCK DID HE DO THAT?!”

Once I was done, fewer people were willing to approach the game, and some folks did attempt Expert, usually getting shut out within 2-4% of the song’s beginning. I told them I wasn’t that good. They told me to shut the hell up. One guy, upon leaving the party, put his hand on my shoulder and said “Dude… YOU are my Guitar Hero.”

As befits the basement, this is where we found the Nerd/Geek contingent and immediately scored Respect Points with whole “She draws comics, he reviews videogames” thing. It is still baffling to me that people would now actually consider this cool, and that so, by extension, are we. Much talk of games, anime, illustration and comics ensued and I think these guys now have a far more heavily distorted and favorable view of our lives than we actually deserve.

Also we finally finished Digital Devil Saga 2, today, but I’ll write more about that properly tomorrow.

Reunion

The submission package is probably on the plane to New York by now, so there’s not much else to do with regards to DC.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, there’s a review I need to write for a recently released game. This involves meeting up with a special little lady to relive the old days. I am, of course, talking about Lara Croft and the excellent updated to the 1996 original, dubbed Tomb Raider: Anniversary. For anyone that missed it the first time around, I can say–at least so far–that you’re better off playing this rather than going back to the original. This is one of those rare occasions when the remake supersedes the original.

And also, she’s a LOT easier to look at 10 years later than the massive amounts of pubescent imagination required to make her blocky, 1996 incarnation sexy…

Wednesday Is DC Day

Today, aside from the continuing heat that can officially be considered Days of Summer, it was really about one thing; writing up the submission materials for DC. We’re going to be sending the submission by FedEx tomorrow to the DC office on Broadway, New York. Man, never thought I’d be writing that sentence, but there ya’ go.

Anyway, back to tweaking that. But in the meantime, here’s more Guitar Hero 80′s related stuff. Check out these two videos showing two songs being played in their entirety on Expert.

The first already has “first tier introductory” song written all over it, and I suspect this is the GH 80′s equivalent to I Love Rock & Roll. It is also the one almost universally being panned by the Guitar Hero community for either being a) too easy to be worthy of the game, or b) too cheesy for inclusion. Either way, vast majority of GH players seem to hate it.

This other is simply flat out SCARY. I thought Hanger 18 was giving me trouble… Good God, this one is going to keep me busy until the next US Presidential administration takes power. LOOK AT HOW CRAZY THIS IS…

Slow Hot Tuesday

Today was one of those hot days that–in an apartment with no air conditioning–made it kind of an effort to even sit at the computer and write. Still, work got done and the 12th script for the kid’s comic is done. Guitar Hero II completion continues to elude me (although I got about 90% into Hanger 18 before crashing out) and I need to start setting my sights on a couple of other things. There are more new GameAxis articles owing soon, and I have to work on that submission for Shelley Bond the DC editor.

Busy little bee. And a damn hot one, too…

Back To Normal

And now things settle down once more.

The In Laws came over one last time in the morning to say goodbye before hopping in the car and driving back to Maine. It’s been a pretty interesting last few days. I get the distinct impression that they are a little homesick for urban life in a city with more than a million people. Then again, being only the second of two Asian families in an American town with a population of 3000 (and falling) will do that to ya’.

The Wife and I have also had the opportunity to not just revisit our favorite haunts but see some new ones. For example on Saturday, at the request of our friend Sonny Liew in Singapore, we tracked down a book he’d been looking for that he located in a Toronto bookshop dealing in rare books. If it hadn’t been for his request, we never would have tracked down this neat little place (with its ultra friendly black cat) on our own, and it’s now definitely the kind of shop that bears repeat visits. On the way (because we walked there from Eaton Centre) we also found an army surplus store that sold everything from current standard issue forest and winter gear for the Canadian army to pressurized pilot helmets worn by MiG pilots of the former U.S.S.R. complete with neat-o breathing masks. The Wife ended up getting a cap for herself with a red star on it and now looks like the People’s Artist. The evening was spent with the Wife’s aunt for a bit of a family reunion, since the Aunt hadn’t met up with the In Laws in something like 25 years, so there was merry making and wine and conversation all around. Mostly I stood around and talked and occasionally smoked while everyone else did that family thing. The food was prepared Singapore style, meaning that I didn’t eat most of it (too spicy) and had a glass of milk on hand for the inevitable accidental consumption of something too hot for me to handle. Which brings us to today.

Today’s Big News

Today, after the In Laws left was our excuse to take the street car down to a part of the city we hadn’t yet seen, Exhibition Place. I’d viewed parts of it from a distance, namely the classical statues and the big turbine, which I didn’t know were part of the grounds. I hadn’t realized however, that this was actually the site of the biggest exhibition floor in the country, or that a lot of major national tradeshows and other events happened here.

The reason we came down was because there was yet another comic book convention running. I had no idea when we arrived that Toronto was such a comic town, but it seems like we’ve inadvertently picked ou the perfect city in Canada for us to hang out in with our particular interests. Although we missed the start of the Paradise Comic-Con, which was yesterday, we made the effort to stop by today. Sunday, however had a special going, in that anyone that showed up in costume would be allowed free admission. So the total body count–at least as from what I could see–was:

1 Next Generation era Starfleet Officer, engineering and operations division.
1 Darth Vader, Episode IV era
1 Snowtrooper
1 Scout Trooper
1 Imperial Crimson Guard (the guys that stood by the elevators guarding the Emperor in Return of the Jedi)
1 Batman
1 Superman
1 Spiderman (child)
1 Robin (child)
1 Baroness (the female villain from G.I. Joe)
1 Power Girl
1 Ms. Marvel (
2 Hogwarts Students, 1 Slytherin, 1 Gryffindor

That aside, the real reason we came down was because the Con was having a special section devoted to Women Of Comics. A lot of female artists were on hand, many of whom I recognized (at least in name), and though we missed her, big names like Gail Simone were also on hand. Of particular interest to the Wife was the fact that DC had some editors sent down. One of them was Shelley Bond, the editor for a new line of books aimed at female readers called MINX. Our friend Sonny Liew is one of the artist that is helping to launch this line with his book, written by Mike Carey, called The Regifters.

Anyway, the editor was in Toronto mostly to talk about and promote the MINX launch, and partly to scout out talent. She was dispensing advice to artist who lined up at her table and showed off samples of their work. This was one of those things the Wife initially thought was a gigantic waste of time because a) she sucks, b) people never get a break this way and c) she sucks hard. I more or less whined and kicked up a fuss saying that this was something she should do anyway, under the pretext that it would be a good experience for her and that she could at least say she’d done it. Miraculously, she went along with this, and so we showed up and took our place in line, which turned out to be very small, with only three people ahead of us.

We were the only “pair” there as the rest were either hopeful amateurs, or slightly more established artists who had web comics and a space in “the artist’s alley” (the area behind all the sales tables where individual artist can sell their work or take original commissions) and were angling for more work. Unsurprisingly, most of the people who were in line were male. Surprisingly, a lot of the work seemed to be the usual superhero stuff. That gave me pause for thought, since Shelley Bond was clearly the editor for a female readership line that was more focused on emotion and characterization than dynamic battle poses in tights, but hey, there ya’ go…

When the Wife’s turn came, they refused to let me stand and insisted on pulling out a chair from their table and letting me sit down. The Editor introduced herself, did all the usual handshaking and the Wife showed off her stuff. Obviously she had a few things going for her a) she’s talented, regardless of her constant denial, b) she’s a professional illustrator who’s already had work appear in Maxim and FHM, which she was able to show, and c) she even had a portfolio book on her which she uses as a promotional piece for
Art Directors in advertising agencies. In other words, she was already established as a professional with a polished body of work. There was that irrational surge of spousal pride that came from seeing the Editor praise her work for avoiding things she’d already gently criticized in others, such as a nice variety of panel numbers and sizes, good use of angles or interesting choice of two-shots. The Wife explained a little about herself and what she was working on, and, in the interests of adding in a little extra insurance, I named dropped.

Since Sonny Liew was one of the artists who had contributed to MINX’s launch, I not-so-discreetly mentioned that not only did we know him, we lived across the street from him for a few years and were contributing to his anthology. It turns out that not only was the Editor totally gushing with praise for Sonny, she was aware of the Liquid City anthology was pretty enthusiastic about its development. The Wife then went on to mention an aborted attempt to work with Serena Valentino (who does Gloom Cookie for Slave Labor Graphics) and these little associations seemed to helpfully cement her credibility with Shelley Bond.

At the end of the talk (which lasted far longer than the others and we actually put an end to it ourselves out of guilt) the Wife got the e-mail and snail mail address of the Editor with a request to see more work, any ideas for stories, as well as a question of whether she’d be willing to work with any writers besides me. Her response was, yes, she was willing, but her preference was still to work with me if at all possible.

This, of course, is insanely cool.

So now it turns out that an idea that we’ve been talking about for the last couple of weeks is incredibly well timed. The subject matter seems perfect for MINX and so I guess the next step is to write it out in proper submission format and then send it off to the DC offices in New York to see how it goes from there.

I have no idea why 2007 is turning out to be the Year Of The Comic for us, but man, I am SO not complaining.

After that we spent a leisurely afternoon wandering around on the Harbourfront, which is the downtown section of Toronto that overlooks Lake Ontario. I cannot believe how different it is from the closest Singapore equivalent, Boat Quay. Boat Quay is a riverside boulevard of sorts filled with restaurants and bars designed to cater to the flood of executives that come in from the nearby Central Business District. Harbourfront, on the other hand, seems more geared towards families and couples and people genuinely interested in having fun, rather than drinking to forget their loathsome occupation, or hungry, pretty young things looking for that potential golden ticket that means citizenship to another country. Where Boat Quay is claustrophobic and full of ambition, Harbourfront is spacious and relaxed. Where Boat Quay is about elitism and arrogance, Harbourfront is about being yourself and just having a good time.

Have I mentioned recently how incredibly happy I am to be back home? Well I am.

Scott McCloud

So today was the day.

We tromped on down early in the evening to the OISE building (just across the street from the Royal Ontario Museum) and settled down to listen to Scott McCloud talk about comics.

First however came an impressive presentation from his daughter, Sky, in the eighth grade. She was frighteningly articulate and media savvy and I really fear for her workplace when she enters the world of gainful employment, she’s a Ball o’ Fire. Mostly she just talked about the genesis of the “Making Comics 50 State Tour,” but it was obvious right from the start that this particular junior high student was an old hand at talking to hundreds of people and keeping them entertained. The only thing I ever did that involved public speaking at the age of 14 was alienating my entire junior highschool by accusing them of voting for Student Council President based on who was the most entertaining. As you can imagine, that didn’t go over so well.

When the Senior McCloud finally took the stage, it was a kind of surreal experience, not because I was particularly star-struck or anything (while I have a great deal of respect and admiration for Scott McCloud he doesn’t make me go weak in the knees the way Neil-O did) so much as it was jut bizarre having someone thoughtful, witty, engaging and articulate… talking about comics. In a thoughtful, witty, engaging and articulate way.

For the most part, the talk was cribbed straight from his latest book Making Comics. His first book Understanding Comics was essentially Comic Critical Theory. His second book, Reinventing Comics brought comics into the 21st century by discussing the impact that the digital revolution was having on what was traditionally a print medium. His third book, the one that is the subject of this tour, is about Applied Comic Theory, in that this one actually talks about the mechanics–and consequences thereof–of framing, time, panel construction, characterization, dialog and writing in general and all that other good stuff that actually goes into taking an idea from your head to something that people actually read.

Of particular interest to me was something that he talked about which I have always discussed with other people, but which McCloud has distilled into a much friendlier, more digestible version. He talks about how comics are essentially created from five choices; choice of moment, choice of frame, choice of image, choice of words and choice of flow. It’s really quite straight forward when you break it down like that. Choice of moment is about which parts of your story you decide to cover. Unlike film where you can show a simple action like a guy starting a car in one continuous shot, comics must choose which moments are worth presenting, if any at all. Choice of frame is about the angle you pick, the distance from the “camera” and such. Choice of image is a bit misleading in that he seemed to be more covering the specific STYLE here. Photo-realistic, or stylized? Black & white or color? Choice of words is obviously how much writing actually appears as words versus how much as image. A good example of how redundant this can be would be an example he uses of a hero jabbing his finger at the camera with spectacular Kirby-esque foreshortening that completey undercuts itself with the caption, “And then he jabbed his finger and said…” and the word balloon “I JAB MY FINGER AT YOU!”

Choice of flow is the issue of pacing. Should the story be told sequentially from moment to moment? Do you throw in flash backs? Do you leap forward in time? Do you break up action moments suddenly with a voice over that analyzes character motivations that lead to this explosive moment? All of these can work quite well, given the proper application and an understanding of how this moves–or impedes–the story.

He also gave an interesting analysis of his take on the state of comics globally, particularly in the 80′s before the internet started homogenizing everything. He noted, for example, that the European tradition, particularly the Franco-Belgian schools that had produced icons like Herge (of Tin Tin fame) or Moebius (The Airtight Garage) had a dominant characteristic of being much at ease with “world building” in that often, the environments and the culture and setting were as important to the comic as the story that took place. He showed a few panels from various comics showing the intricate detail, how bicycle fender or car had just as much attention paid to it as the hero.

The Japanese manga scene–aside from its obvious stylistic difference–played much more with contrasts and slower pacing. He showed how the Japanese manga artists liked to make their characters stand out much more by simplifying them against complex backgrounds, and how the larger length of manga made the Japanese artist much less afraid of “wasting panels” by showing slower paced, more leisurely images. He showed examples with the “camera” in Japanese manga wandering over various parts of an environment, or focusing on simple, every day moments that American comics might deem to trivial to cover.

And of course, on the American side, there was the undeniable aspect that it was dominated by super heroes to degree unheard of in either Europe or Japan, but, more subtly, he pointed out that American comics had been heavily influenced by the theatrical or vaudville tradition. Because American comics were originally comedic, and the first comics came out during the era of Vaudville, comics were framed much in the way that a stage play was composed. This was also carried on to a large degree as film was introduced to American culture and when it happened, McCloud noticed that American comics are far more inclined to compose “beauty shots” where the characters are facing the camera. He commented that one of the things Will Eisner tried to advise young artists on was to give up this habit, saying that “you have to let go of this obsession with the close up” and then he contrasted this with the European and Japanese comics that frequently show the backs of characters, long shots, or what have you, but are nowhere near as concerned with getting that “beauty close up” as their American counterparts.

Another interesting thing that came up in his talk was his classification of comics creators into four “tribes.” There is the Classicist, and these are the people who are very much invested in perfecting craft and technique. These are the ones like Alex Ross or Jim Lee who make the kinds of pictures that are worthy of framing, who show people just how beautiful comics can be. Then there are the Animists, and these are people who strive for story, for engaging the audien
ce and actual medium of delivery is secondary to the effect it has on the reader. There are the Formalists, of which McCloud counts himself a member, who play with ideas. These are the guys that are interested in the medium itself and want to pull, push and stretch the boundaries of it, just to see what it can do, how far it can go. And finally, there are the Iconoclasts, who believe that comics should be about Truth and strive for Authenticity, and try convey some kind of important theme or point.

It was all quite educational, and quietly mind-blowing. I think if this kind of course had been offered when I was in university, I probably would have majored in comics, because I found myself deeply, deeply fascinated by all the information that he was just throwing up there and really wished I could just get in a conversation with the man to talk about this stuff.

Now the only thing that’s missing is that he needs to write a fourth book. I would find this book particularly useful if the titles was Publishing & Distributing Comics, since that’s the particular stage that the Wife and I find ourselves needing the most help with.

Then again, what struggling comic book artist doesn’t?

Script #2

The only things of note that occurred today were that the second script for the other anthology has been started. It’s definitely a nastier piece, but then you can’t be all sunshine and optimism all the time, and since it’s a commentary on artists, I think they get venerated enough that it’s time to inject some criticism into the creative process. Or at the very least, some ugly metaphors. Ah, it’ll all make sense once the thing is out. I hope. It’s called Inspiration and it’s really another one of those looks at the creative process and what how it can work.

Sonny has looked at the script for his Cities anthology and likes it. Looks like the next step is to get some feedback from all the rest. As to be expected, it’s really Mike Carey’s opinion that scares the crap out of me, since the others are primarily artists, whereas he’s reeeeeeeeally going to be looking at all the writing in this anthology from… surprise, a writer’s perspective.

And, as a lame as it seems, I am now replaying Shadow of the Colossus, but instead of taking on the giants of the game, as would be normal procedure, I am riding my horse in the vast, empty plains of the Cursed Land, collecting fruit and eating lizard tails. Nope, not making that up…

It’s All About Image

In this case, that means Image Comics. Now we’ve got news that the cities themed anthology has sparked some interest from the masters of variant/collectors/limited covers. I have to admit, when Image first started up, I too was sucked in. The thought of all those incredible Marvel artists allowed to let their imaginations run riot was appealing to me. At least until I actually read the stuff and realized that this meant, “We don’t need writers and compelling plots and characters aren’t important when you’ve got killer artwork.” It was Image that nearly killed my love for comics, and it was Neil-O that brought me back with his stories of The Sandman.

However, Image has undergone a rehabilitation of sorts in the following years. They’ve actually taken some interesting risks and have published the sort of thing I wouldn’t have previously associated with them, such as a black & white, almost anime/noir story called Avigon, and they’ve gone on to embrace writers back into their previously Artists Only club. The fact that they’re actually interested in this anthology (though having two Eisner nominees certainly helps the credibility) means that if it goes through, at least there will be a fairly broad exposure of the work and should ensure that the anthology appears in comic shops everywhere. Whee…

Still More Comics

Back to the ol’ word processor (in this case, Final Draft, don’t ask why I’m using a screen writing program for comic scripts, it’s just easier for me) to take another stab at the comic that’s been done for the Cities-themed anthology. I’m gonna’ try and hack a few pages outta’ it to bring the page count down.

In addition, I’m once again riding off the coat-tails of the Wife. She’s been invited to contribute to another anthology of comics and art, this one being co-published by an indie outfit known as Top Shelf Productions. Their most recent notable release is the super-gorgeous, extremely expensive, hardcover re-release of Alan Moore’s Lost Girls. The collection itself is a boldly mad, post-modernist, pornographic revisiting of beloved children’s literature characters, Dorothy (of The Wizard of Oz), Alice of Wonderland fame and Wendy the girl who stole Peter Pan’s heart. They get together one day and reminisce as well as share some graphically sexual stories about their lives. Alan Moore has gone on record as calling it porn, but this is the kind of porn that has enough substance that critics refuse to call it so.

Anyway, the Wife is going to be making a contribution to the anthology and she’s already warned the folks involved that she’ll be illustrating and I’ll be doing the writing chore, which they seem okay with. It’s not exactly being able to walk into a bookstore and see my novel on the shelf, but these two anthologies are still going to be appearing in stores, so it’s a step closer. And I really wouldn’t mind doing more writing for comics. It’s proving to be an incredible amount of fun. Fortunately I already had an idea kicking around for another short comic story and this will fit the bill quite nicely, so away we go…