Karl Kerschl is pretty much universally praised for his comics art — from superhero work for the major publishers to videogame tie-ins, to the critically-acclaimed, Eisner-winning The Abominable Charles Christopher — and is constantly in demand for various projects. The latest of those will see release next week in the form of Fairy Tale Comics from :01 Books, edited by Chris Duffy and with a couple-dozen of the greatest talents in comics contributing. Kerschl was kind enough to take time away from his newborn daughter to talk about how he almost passed on Fairy Tale Comics, a shift from his usual artistic style, and the stories that grab us.

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And one in such exquisite detail even more so.

Welcome back to the coverage of this year’s Quai des Bulles festival, courtesy of Fleen Senior French Correspondent Pierre Lebeaupin. As mentioned in Part One, this is his report on the career retrospective interview of Pénélope Bagieu.

The interview took place Saturday at 2:30 PM in the Amphithéâtre Maupertuis, with Vincent Brunner interviewing.

30 minutes before the start, available spots were already thinning out. 15 minutes bore the start, there was no room left at all.

When Pénélope Bagieu entered the room, the audience broke into applause.

After a welcome message, a reminder of her exhibition, and a quick recap of her career, including her Eisner award, the interview started in earnest.

Brunner: How did she realize she wanted to become a comics creator, with so few examples, such as Claire Brétécher?
Bagieu: As far as her young self was concerned, the comics she read appeared out of thin air without anyone needing to be involved, and in fact she noticed female protagonists more than female creators. Later on she studied animation, then worked in illustration, at which point she started being commissioned for comics work as part of her job, and that turned out to be to her liking.

She realized she had been doing comics as a teen (typically girls playing sports, inspired by Attacker You), but she did not think of it at the time as being comics.

Brunner: So she created a blog, a new medium at the time.
Bagieu: She was not interested then in putting out a book; she had always been doing commission work, as she was hired straight out of school, so the blog provided her with a space to express herself freely: no need for any of it to provide a return on investment. In the end, it was a training ground for her to be able to make books eventually.

Brunner: And it provided her direct interactions with the public.
Bagieu: Not necessarily as interactive as with some since her blog did not have comments, but yes that meant being exposed to many people, but pre-Instagram standards. It was an ongoing entertainer job: back then when you went on holidays you used to ask another creator to cover your away days! Today she couldn’t imagine doing the same: she’s just too busy.

The blog removed some of the solemn aspect of books: she never stopped herself thinking: This joke is going to end up in a book and enter the public record! She enjoyed the lack of restraint. She found it nice for it to become a book in the end, but that was never the end goal. Now she has better outlook on the process: for instance, it has become apparent visitors do not necessarily translate to sales.

Brunner: This is where Joséphine starts.
Bagieu: It was a commission work, and her first character in fiction, so the matter was finding out in which scenarios, in which contexts, and between which characters she was going to be inserted. Once she had consistent characters, it was just a matter of coming up with setups such as the company party at which point the stories write themselves, even after 20 years.

Brunner: Then a movie.
Bagieu: Joséphine was a kind of training camp, and once it had stopped being fun to do, she stopped. She hasn’t regretted it, even when in Japan when she got asked for more at a signing (the Japanese public is more interested in the pictures than in the stories of comics of the French-Belgian tradition). She is proud of it being her first published book in Asia.

Brunner: Isn’t there always some part of treason when adapting for a movie?
Bagieu: To avoid feeling betrayed, you either do it yourself (which as a creator you always have the option to do, by law, as part of your moral rights), and you’re safe; or you put it in the hands of someone else and own up already that it’s going to be their work.

She find movies to be a source of frustration as compared to comics: in the latter, she can afford to put ellipses for instance, and one person can have total creative control, without sharing it with actors, the people responsible for lighting, sets, or props. That means it’s solitary work, but it’s fine for her.

Brunner: Exquisite Corpse was another milestone.
Bagieu: She had huge worries going into it: was she going to succeed, in particular when it comes to writing? But it didn’t matter in the end: she had fun working on it, and it was the start of a realization that once everything is said and done, the only thing that remains out of a book is the experience she has had working on it, as far as she’s concerned, so the only thing that matters is how much she enjoyed herself doing it.

Brunner: Does she follow any sort of process when creating a book?
Bagieu: She does write a synopsis ahead of time for validation, which is always a source of worries, but beyond that no particular methodology. So she works on her books in an almost school-like manner: plan, introduction, development, conclusion. Other creators may follow different methods: some start without necessarily knowing how the book will end.

Brunner: What form does this take?
Bagieu: A mix of words, arrows, roughs, sketches, in order the represent the staging in her head, and which only she can make heads or tails of it. They are literally impossible to display: it’s hard to even know which orientation the sheet is meant to have.

Brunner: And she has also worked with writers.
Bagieu: At the time of her being proposed La Page Blanche (which occurred before Cadavre Exquis), she requested being paired with a writer, and ended up with Boulet, which was great, in particular so she could concentrate on the illustrations, and moreso the colors: I handle the writing duties.

But she did get frustrated somewhat, as she missed not so much writing the story, as being able to stage it, which is the part she loves best. Stars Of The Stars* was another attempt at drawing someone else’s scenario, this time with Johann Sfar, who had initiated the project. None of this being out of the ordinary: there are no two pairs of writers and artists who collaborate the same way, no two writers who are alike. Sfar taught her a lot, she finds him to be an incredible storyteller.

In the end, she decided she did not want anyone else writing stories for her to draw anymore, even if she isn’t the best writer. And even if that meant leaving Stars Of The Stars stranded with a single tome.

Brunner: What kind of tooling did she use?
Bagieu: Back then, Photoshop and graphic tablet: it was just easier for her. Sometimes you have to find the right tool, as for California Dreamin’, but sometimes also get out of your comfort zone.

Brunner: On that matter, why did she draw this story?
Bagieu: First of all, she’s of course a huge fan. And she found Mama Cass’s story to be incredible and felt the need to transmit it. Her penciling came alive on the page, but any inking froze that, so she decided she would do it all in pencils.

This was her first long-haul book; she loved the feeling of spending 18 months with someone, so she came to appreciate creating biographies. If only she could tell of more women that way …

Brunner: What kind of documentation did she use for that?
Bagieu: Immersing yourself in a setting for the purpose of writing, that sounds fantastic! So she travelled to New York City, sleeping in a B&B in Greenwich Village and spending her days in cafés, and by the end of the week the book was basically written.

Brunner: To which extent does she embellish these life stories with fiction?
Bagieu: She prefers biographies that don’t lean heavily on factuals, as opposed to those that go on that date they did this then that date they did that: the biographies that made a mark on her were those from which readers received love for the person, doesn’t matter if there’s a 20-year time skip in the middle.

Which does not mean she gets to do as she pleases: there are extant relatives who could object. So she had to double-check biographical details: whether they were raised in a rich or poor family, the kind of siblings they had, etc. Her role is to provide embellishments and draw the lines between the given points as she prefers. Out of the truth, shape her own Mama Cass: the one she wants to see.

On that note, if you need background characters who nevertheless need to stay consistent from panel to panel, use your own relatives.

She’d rather introduce the subject to the reader and make him love them, rather than teaching him information.

Brunner: Did she hear from the rights holders?
Bagieu: They refused to license the lyrics, so yes she did hear about them … But other than that, when she went to Baltimore, she got feedback from someone from her parents’ generation that she did render well the high school ambiance, which she did not expect but was glad to hear.

Brunner: So what’s the relationship with Brazen?
Bagieu: Let’s do a Katia Krafft bio! No, it’d be better to do a Peggy Guggenheim one! Wait, what if I did 30 of them? She was looking for a format with Le Monde: what if she did women bios, told as children’s tales of sorts, and randomly said 30 as to how many, once every Monday? She went on to call her publisher, who said it’d have to be two books then.

Brunner: How did she settle on which ones to write?
Bagieu: She had settled on about 2/3rds of them right away, and the last third came during the course of the project: she got heaps of suggestions, not to mention those who did not make the cut and still regrets. Some who were suggested she passed on because she found them to be sufficiently well-known already, but it could also be because their stories did not connect with her. But sometimes it was love at first sight, such as when Lisa Mandel suggested Phoolan Devi¹ to her.

Brunner: That was quite a synthesis work. What was her process?
Bagieu: Oh yes, there we do learn information. She started the week with their biographies, then she’d have about two days to write and draw their chapter. This was a good exercise, as with such constraints this is what hit her that remains, and in particular their switch: the trigger, the one event where they go I’m done playing by the rules, I’m going to live my life how I decide (either in terms of career, lifestyle, etc). That was in fact her main contribution to the animated version: confirming, and in some cases reminding, of where that spot happens in the stories.

Brunner: How did she handle the publishing schedule?
Bagieu: She did do a few ahead of time, for use in rainy days and the like. But the immediate feedback kept her very motivated, as opposed to her latest book which she was done drawing back in May but isn’t out yet … (Author’s note: at the time this interview was conducted)

Brunner: No sequel then?
Bagieu: No, she’s sticking with the 30 she initially committed to. Tove Jansson never lost sight of her priorities in life, and she’s taken that in turn: she knows that if she works on something she’d rather not work on, readers will notice.

Brunner: So she has no regret on any particular one who did not make the cut?
Bagieu: No, not on one in particular, and anyway there’s nothing stopping her from from discovering more women and reading their biographies.

Brunner: And it was not intended for children specifically, was it?
Bagieu: And yet, there they are.

Brunner: Which leads us to The Witches.
Bagieu: As far as she’s concerned, the children audience is demanding, as you can’t bluff your way out, which is especially the case for drawings: she holds children book illustrators in highest esteem. So when she inadvertently brought a younger readership, she realized it was not necessary to write in a way that targets them. As a result, when she got the offer to adapt Roald Dahl, she was less afraid to do so.

That still meant some pressure, especially for backgrounds: she herself as a young reader demanded to be able to witness everything, down to the smallest detail. Luckily, everything was there in the book already: scary antagonists, funny moments, actual action. He was pretty much the only writer in children’s literature to introduce somber themes.

When she first read the book she was aged about the same as the protagonists, so it helped her get back to the right frame of mind.

Brunner: And it’s a book about grandmothers.
Bagieu: She drew a lot from her own grandmother, as part of generally making an imprint on the story: rather than being an illustrator like Quentin Blake, she was adapting the book and so needed for it to become her own, so the grandmother went from being Dahl’s to being hers as a result. As well as making a character into a girl.

Brunner: Yes, that Bruno character.
Bagieu: He made no impression on her at all, so she wondered: why is he here at all? Let’s replace him, and as we’re at it by a girl who is interesting, has her own backstory, and serves some story purpose.

Brunner: Haven’t witches evolved since then?
Bagieu: It was complicated to adapt The Witches in 2020. But it mattered for them to remain fairy tale witches, as that is what worked for her at the time, because they were impressive. But there is the grandmother who exposes and is a different kind of witch.

Brunner: What were the rights holders like?
Bagieu: A single person in fact, who was open to anything that made sense. He was very settled on some aspects: the setting being England for instance. But he accepted a female character who made sense. He reminded her of an important theme: the grandmother has to love her grandchild no mater what, and it has to be shown.

Brunner: And she created it on the road.
Bagieu: During her Brazen promo tour, so she remembers every page being done in a train or in a waiting room. The iPad was very useful for her: for instance the pencil effect, as seen in this page.

Brunner: And we get to her latest, Strates, set to release on November 10th …
Bagieu: And available at the Gallimard booth ahead of the public launch.

Brunner: Where she gets back to autobio, with moments that made an impression on her.
Bagieu: On the blogs you take highlights out of your life and make scenes out of them, without really exposing yourself: everything has to be made into comedy. Here she collected deeply personal stories, some of which aren’t funny. But it’s a jigsaw puzzle of elements that built her, out of very diverse subject matters, even if some of them appear unimportant at first glance.

Brunner: There is not even any consistent page count.
Bagieu: She’s trusting the reader to follow. This one story she wrote down ten years ago. Then years later she did three in a month. This was originally a cathartic process not meant for anyone else, but eventually she decided she should not be afraid to make a book out of it.

For this, she redrew some of the oldest ones. She thought to herself that if this was enjoyable to make, it would have to be enjoyable to read. But it’s still not easy for her, as she puts herself bare in these pages. With any luck, she hopes it has some universality and impresses other people in turn.

Audience Member: She went from bios, to an adaptation, to autobio; what’s next?
Bagieu: She does not know herself. About one week before heading into it in earnest, she’ll know. It’s never the same thing twice, because she easily gets bored. Right now she wants to do colors, painting, as Strates is in black and white; if she’s still in that state of mind in a few weeks, she’ll attempt a few pages, and if after three pages it’s still too hard, she’ll give up.

Audience Member: What would be her advice for starting out?
Bagieu: She’s not comfortable providing such advice: she started out in days that are now fully gone, and wouldn’t know how to start over today. But people today are lucky to have Instagram, even if that imposes a format constraint, which she could get bored of: she worries about Instagram formatting stories for swiping as early as inception, for fear of there not being nearly as much of an outlet for them otherwise.

Also, there are some things that shouldn’t be shown right away and need to mature, because feedback on them would catch the ego in too fragile a state.

But it is key to generally show, otherwise you never work up the nerve to do so.

Don’t worry about what pleases the public, as you’re never going to be able to hold that up in the long run: you’re going to get sick of it. Same for artificial constraints: your work as to be personal, and that comes from drawing a lot; that is how your style comes, you don’t decide it.

Existing in an era of abundance requires being demanding with the editing side: you have to demand being backed up and respected, so be careful. You must speak with other creators so as to avoid being alone, to counteract the tendency of being solitary already.

Audience Member: Do woman creators earn less?
Bagieu: Yes, big surprise here: statistically advances are lower for female creators. There has always been female creators (and readers) but now they’re spreading to other parts of the book chain, such as editors.

Things have changed in the last ten-fifteen years, and besides feminization, some commercials successes have forced the attention on them; but women creators are still invisibilized in many cases, or assigned to some boxes, etc.

It’s not the worst occupation in that regard, but not the best either. But now female creators are banding, under the descriptively-named umbrella of Collectif des Créatrices de Bandes Dessinées.

Audience Member: (Author’s note: a young girl who happened to be next to me) How did she learn how to draw?
Bagieu: As the audience member did: pencils and paper which was laying around, then art school after high school. But there are some self-taught creators, who draw better than her.

One additional piece of advice, on that matter: she herself drew a lot because she was made to treat paper and pencils as mundane: the paper won’t serve for any other purpose since there’s a bill on the other side, the pencils are old but abundant, so she was free to draw a lot. The opposite of the shiny Caran d’Ache painting set. Given disposable materials like old markers: you go ahead.

Audience Member: What kind of representation, of feminine role model did she have?
Bagieu: No, she did not know women who drew, or even the people who did: the question of who were creating comics did not occur to her. She did love Mafalda and anime as they featured girls, they were part of the action. Sometimes stories were stereotypical girl stories: rivalries, pests, etc., but it was cool to have girl protagonists. For her the golden era of French-Belgian comic book heroines starts now, with the female creators who are 20-25 today.

Audience Member: What kind of pressure does she have after her previous successes, in particular Brazen?
Bagieu: Now everything she does will be widely read as being from the creator of Brazen. Including when unrelated, such as Strates. But in the worst case, she has already put out a best-seller, so that’s something taken care of already. She’s in awe of the other creators who can keep doing books in a series, because she on the other hand has to be passionate about her work. It helps to be well backed up, and not necessarily driven to what will make the most money.

And that will wrap this year’s report from St Malo. As always, we at Fleen are grateful for the contributions of FSFCPL, and all the hard work he puts in to keep us informed of the state of webcomics in the French tradition.

Spam of the day:

The ZoomShot Pro is the new tactical zoom for smartphones and tablets that resists all types of terrain and that with its magnification up to X18 will allow you to take the best photos outdoors without the need to carry a professional camera.

Make up your mind and decide on your audience: are you trying to scam warrior wannabes with the tactical angle, or serious photographers. This is just muddled.

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¹ Editor’s note: Phoolan Devi, the Bandit Queen of India, was the one subject in the original French edition that was omitted from the US/Canada translation of Brazen.

And taking the time to produce either would prevent me from getting you to the latest festival report from Fleen Senior French Correspondent Pierre Lebeaupin, and we can’t have that.

Thanks to Ted Naifeh, I now have my cosplayer identity: Unkempt Superman. At first I thought this was about my hair: I haven’t bothered cutting my pandemic hair, plus the bad weather outside wasn’t doing it any favors. But I realized my attempts to help fellow festival-goers identify my costume (this was on Halloween’s day), namely having my cape stick out of my collar, and my shirt being open in front, doubled as painting the image of a Clark Kent who had barely had time to change back from his superheroing duties. So I’m definitely keeping the image of a superhero that goes increasingly unkept as the festival progresses; in fact, as soon as masks are off (vaccines providing sterilizing immunity can’t come soon enough), this will include increasing amounts of stubble.

This year, Quai des Bulles took advantage of November 1st (a holiday in France) falling on a Monday to go from three days to four, and while this was a good way to compensate for the cancellation of last year’s edition, this also meant this was my first four-day festival.

As the first large-scale festival in months (remember the 2021 edition of Lyon BD had limited scale, and no publisher presence), this was the occasion to reconnect with some creators, such as Cy, which I hadn’t seen (except through a screen) since the release of her latest work, Radium Girls (to be available stateside from Iron Circus in 2022), so lining for a signing with her was a no-brainer. But also the occasion to meet creators I had never seen in a festival before, such as Gally: she has illustrated l’Esprit Critique (a McCloudesque treatise in defense of critical thinking) and created Mon Gras et Moi (My Fat And I), so of course I had her sign both.

And I of course couldn’t skip having John Allison sign one of his Giant Days collections at the Akileos booth (where Naifeh was as well). While Akileos does not have all the interesting adaptations of non-cape English language sequential art (the adaptation of Witch Boy was found elsewhere), they do publish the French editions of Stand Still Stay Silent, of Jen Wang’s recent works, of pretty much everything by Raina Telgemeier, and as you may have guessed those of Allison and Naifeh. While I had caught a glimpse of Allison at Angoulême in 2020, Angoulême also is a big mayhem and I couldn’t manage to meet him at the time. So many thanks to Akileos in general.

Also returning were the fairy tale performances, the drawn concert performance, the painted shop windows, exhibitions (including one of Pénélope Bagieu’s works), and various events such as movie projections. In fact, it would be easier to list the differences: the previously mentioned extra day, the absence of in-hall food options (which was a relief to me), way fewer small scale meetups in bars or the like (which is fortunate, because I don’t think I’d have attended them; in unrelated news, cases were already on the rise at the time in France), and most significantly, an impressive pipeline for validating the mandatory health pass (either vaccination, certificate of remission from COVID-19, or a recent test) before you were given the festival bracelet, valid for the day, that would allow you to enter the festival spaces. In the end, while there were lines at times, everything otherwise went smoothly all things considered, which is testament to the festival organizers.

Stay tuned, I should soon be done transcribing the interview Vincent Brunner did of Bagieu about her whole career, but in particular her latest release, Strates.

We at Fleen, as always, thank FSFCPL for his contributions, and will share the Bagieu interview as soon as it is ready.

And why not?

• First up, a quick point over to the current Steeple storyline — Clotted Crime by name — and a news item from John Allison yesterday. A name from the hallowed past is being shared and that caught my interest:
  

  Kelly Vivanco has done the cover for the upcoming Clotted Crime part 3, but that is not all.

  I’m not sure what caught more of my interest, to be honest. Kelly Vivanco is the creator of Patches, a much beloved and long-hiatused webcomic that is still online for your delectation and enjoyment. Patches went on hiatus about the time Vivanco started producing what might be called fine art¹. Any time I come across Vivanco’s name, I take notice and fall in love with her work again. A cover page for Part 3 of Clotted Crime will be welcome indeed.

  But then there’s the second part of the newsbite, where Allison says that Vivanco has gone and done fan art of a previously-unknown bit of Tackleverse lore:

  She has also submitted some archival pictures of Tredregyn’s sole all-merman folk outfit of the 1960s, TENTANGLE.

  And the images are everything about her work that I love. Go check them out, and check out Vivanco’s work more generally if you aren’t familiar with it.

• Secondly, let us compare and contrast two upcoming comics events. On the one hand you have CXC, kicking off tomorrow and running through Sunday. On the other hand, you have the SDCC special event thingy — they’re calling it Special Edition — over [American] Thanksgiving weekend. The former is remote and online. The latter is in person.

  Nobody knows what SDCC/SE will look like or how many people might be there — badges are on sale now, a marked contrast to normal SDCC iterations where they sell out instantly — and thus it’s hard to make a case why one should attend, but it’s easy to make the counter-case:

  It is too soon for an in-person event, particularly one that takes place on the busiest travel weekend of the year², doubly-particularly since many people did not get to gather with family last year and just might be able to this year.

  CXC will be taking place in a combo of mostly virtual and a few in-person events at The Billy (which will also be available online). The schedule is packed with Zoom, YouTube, and Discord channels, the guests are lined up, and it’s free. CXC is a no-brainer. And, in a completely different way, so is SDCC/SE.

Spam of the day:

No matter if you have a big bust or small bust, this is the best wireless bra that looks great under clothes while feeling like loungewear.Cooling Bra Pro can actually have a great impact on your life.

I, uh, do not have a need for such a foundation garment. Thanks?

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¹ Which I once described as moody, dreamy, whimsical-on-the-verge-of-disturbing paintings and that they reminded me of fairy tales, at the moment just before everything starts to go seriously wrong.

² Meaning that large amounts of people injected into the travel stream will interact with the greatest number of other people, making disease vectors all the more effective.

Sometimes, what you want to talk about just drops in your lap. Hooray for late-summer Kickstarts.

• Say what you will about Zach and Kelly Weinersmith, but they get it. They get their audience and know exactly what they are like¹ and are more than ready to dish it up to them. The academia-themed boardgame, Every Else Thinks This Game Is Awesome, has blown through its Kickstarter funding goal in a about four and a half hours (presently it’s sitting at 180% of goal), and will likely be hitting the stratospheric levels associated with a Weinersmith joint, including globs of stretch goals that make the final product awesomer.

  Me, I decided to back as soon as I saw the grad students were represented by interchangeable pawns with no control over their own destiny. All of the rewards where you got to influence or appear in the game are gone, but 943 people (as of this writing) can grab the reward level where a special card signed by the Weinersmiths² is included in the game. This one looks fun, it’s already funded, it’s basically zero risk given prior Weinersmith Kickstarts, so give it a look, yeah? Oh, and check out the video on the campaign page, it features a great variation on the soundtrack record scratch.

• Also up for Kicks and Starts, the 30th — you read that right, three-zero — campaign from Iron Circus, the latest iteration of their ongoing fairy tales from around the world series, Cautionary Fables and Fairy Tales: North America. Notably, the stories are told by Indigenous creators, which really should be a given but isn’t yet, so good on Spike and everybody at IC. Then again, Alina Pete has been part of the IC family forever, and is herself a member of the Cree nation, so keeping the stories in the hands of the people they originated with was probably more of a given than at any other publisher.

  Usual Iron Circus deal is in effect: every US$5000 over goal raised results in a US$5/page increase in pay to the creators; as of this writing (a day into the 18 day funding period), creators are making an extra US$40/page, and about to hit US$45. According to the FFF mk2, we’re headed for US$155K +/- 30K in funding; hitting the low end of that range would result in a US$105/page bonus, in an industry where mid-major publishers may pay less than that total per page. We’re more than a full day away from being able to calculate the McDonald Ratio, but it would come to at least US$185K, based on what’s been raised in the first two days³.

Spam of the day:

Tool to read messages from friends on FACEBOOK

That would be FACEBOOK. The purpose of Facebook is to read messages from friends on Facebook.

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¹ Damn you, Sports & Leisure category, damn you to hell!

² And featuring facts about both weiners and smiths.

³ Remember, Kel McDonald’s rule of thumb is the money raised in the first three days of the campaign is approximately one third of the eventual total.

There are places in this world that are constituents of nations, yet apart; they end up traded between empires and yet somehow remain unchanged. In North America, the best example is New Orleans; New Orleans stands on its own, not part of America any more than it was part of New France or New Spain. It is older than America, wilder, and stays a part of America only out of a sense of bemused sufferance.

Across the ocean, there was a people that occupied great swathes of the continent and the islands to the west, its people living with the sure knowledge of the fae folk and the way they interfere with the lives of humans. The great empires came to displace them — although the empires were sometimes kept at bay by a hero or two and the help of a magic potion — and the people were displaced, pushed to rocky places, hard by the hazardous sea: Scotland, Ireland, Brittany.

The stories are old, in these pushed-to places, and the promise no easy morals. There are punishments for being wicked, but also for turning your face away from the wickedness and pretending it doesn’t happen or isn’t your problem. The Daughters Of Ys is based on one of those old stories, and it has a new graphic novel adaptation from :01 Books, who were kind enough to send me an advanced review copy¹. There’s almost nothing we’re going to say here that isn’t on the back cover or the first five pages, but you may still consider there to be mild spoilers.

It’s written by MT Anderson², who has a fine ear for dialogue. The words that come from his characters sound just a little bardic, a little musical, a little fairy tale-formal, but at the same time natural feeling. It’s easy to imagine them being told around the fire, with just a touch extra dramatic emphasis and the promise this what my grandmother said she saw and heard.

The art is by Jo Rioux (past winner of the Joe Shuster Dragon Award for Cat’s Cradle, her debut graphic novel), and it is a marvel, combining the effects of pencils and pigments, and looking just a little like a cross between ancient vellum illuminations and tapestry embroidery. All of her characters look just a little bit haunted nearly all the time, except for the times that they look like there’s a hunt going on. Of course, sometimes they are hunting, and sometimes they are hunted.

Nobody in the book comes off entirely well, and only one character seems to have a full understanding of what his life actually is — that a blessing that keeps him fed each day is actually a curse. The story is set in what sounds like a made-up place, but is eventually revealed to be real; the now-ancient city of Quimper, the cathedral, the bishop, King Gradlon of Kerne all are or were part of the Brittany landscape. In a country whose names persist to this day (and across the Channel in Cornwall as well), who’s to say if the submerged city of Ys is legend, or a long-repeated object lesson for kings and princesses³ to learn how their forbears failed.

My copy of The Daughters Of Ys by MT Anderson and Jo Rioux says that it releases tomorrow, 12 May, but the website lists the release date as 11 August; I got the book in the Spring 2020 collection of advanced review copies about three weeks back, so it may have been pushed back for pandemic reasons. If you have to wait another three months to read it, let that fuel your anticipation, because it is very, very good. Consider it a top choice of gift for yourself of the reader in your life, let’s say age 12 and up.

Spam of the day:

File has been corrupted

No, see, you have your tenses wrong. If I click on your link then my files will become corrupted. Future, not past.

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¹ As it’s not the final version released to shops and libraries, the usual disclaimers apply: there may be differences between my copy and yours, but this story feels complete. I didn’t find any issues in production that required correction.

² Whose The Astonishing Life Of Octavian Nothing you may recall took the National Book Award for Young People’s Literature in 2006, the year that American Born Chinese was nominated; no shade, Octavian Nothing is an astonishingly good book, and Anderson followed up with a graphic novel finalist of his own in 2018: The Assassination Of Brangwain Spurge. Dude comes up with the best names.

³ In the legends, the daughter, Dahut, is immodest, immoral, and consorting with otherwordly powers; she’s clearly the villain of the tale. Anderson gives her a sister, Rozenn, to spread the consequences around. If Dahut falls because her hands are bloody, Rozenn is too concerned with keeping hers clean by intentional avoidance. Their father has a temperament that mixes both daughters, feigning innocence of crimes while demanding the spoils.

Editor’s note: Please enjoy the first part of Fleen Senior French Correspondent Pierre Lebeaupin’s con report from the 2019 Saint Malo Comics Festival. Take ‘er away, FSFCPL!

It would be an exaggeration to say that Saint Malo is lovely at the end of October, but the weather was pretty agreeable, as it has tended to be for my previous visits. For instance, while there was rain, most of it happened outside opening hours: when this happens, it makes the inside of the tents, where signings take place, rather noisy. This was the ideal backdrop for a new edition of Quai des Bulles and for me to cover it, and I was able to cover a broad cross-section of interests for sharing with Fleen readers.

• The first discovery of note was the redone Palais du Grand Large, the convention center in which most of the activities take place (exhibitions, meetups, concerts, etc). The most notable change was the improved entrance and atrium, resolving some of the overflow at the entrance, but most significant was, as I learned, the fact that Quai des Bulles was the first event to take place in the redone center, and that they had only been able to access it one week earlier.

  This was simultaneously testament to the significance of the festival that renovations were scheduled so the festival would be able to benefit from them, and a sign of the willingness of the festival to field test the improved infrastructure. While there was some unfinished business (for instance, I saw a sticker on a wall reading Reprise peinture, i.e. “Paint to be redone”), the festival activities did not seem to suffer from it and the center was fully functional (restrooms, in particular, withstood the load gracefully).

• Friday already had fantastic programming with a meetup with Pascal Jousselin, interviewed by Arnaud Wassmer, to talk about his creation Imbattable but also his career. You may remember Jousselin from previous coverage, and this time I was able to transcribe the talk and take photos since it took place in the Amphithéâtre Maupertuis; I expect that to take its own post. Many children were in attendance, as Friday tends to be children’s day (we were in a school holiday break).
• In between two events I was able to look at the exhibition they called indie americans, centered on small press creators. I must admit the only names I recognized were Derf Backderf (who was on site, though I was not able to attend the meetup) and Liz Prince, and there was no one associated with webcomics, but this shows a willingness from the festival to look outside the beaten path for talents and phenomenons to showcase.
• In the signing area, my first visit was to the Ulule booth, featuring Maliki, Laurel, and Yatuu, the heavyweights of French online self-publishing: they total more than 50,000 books_cce preorders from their Ulule campaigns between them. Furthermore, such a concentration can only happen in Brittany, as Laurel has expressed she would only sign there (which has been the case so far), such a location is also preferred by Maliki, as they also live in Brittany, and logistics favor it, as they now have three young children and six cats between them three (Maliki and Laurel have been known to watch each other’s children and cats when only one of them signs, but that can’t be the case here). It was also the first time in many years that Souillon (Malikis representative for such events) would booth in a traditional French comics festival (he often signs at Angoulême, but hosted by a bookshop).

  In short, this was not a sight to miss, and throughout the weekend I saw all three sign books while their respective partners would handle merch, transactions, etc. (or at least two of them; the partners team tended to rotate). In particular, Souillon’s line was packed for all three days, from opening to closing; at no point was I able get a clean shot of the booth.

• Saturday began with a meetup with Laurence Croix, listed in the programming as Imbattable’s colorist, but the talk went way beyond that small part of her activities to cover what it means to color a comic book, so it was transcribed, as well, and will be its own post. In particular, while Laurence Croix does not draw, a number of female French webcartoonists, such as Thorn or Maëla Cosson, make a living by coloring published books, so it is interesting to see their place in the publishing flow.
• Later in the day, I was able to visit the Lapin booth, their first at Saint-Malo in three years. Not that I had a particular need to see them, for instance I saw most of them for Lyon BD, but it was good to catch up with the creators and the books that had become available in the meantime, which allowed me to get ahead with some of my Christmas shopping.
• On Sunday I was able to take some time to attend a fairy tale performance, with Olivier Supiot drawing live. This time it was a number of short tales in quick sequence, and the experience was just as enjoyable as the last time; it’s fair to say the festival does not merely keep children occupied with cheap entertainment.
• Immediately after that I attended a meetup with Mark Waid where he introduced his new project at Humanoids, Ignited. While his process, including for these books, is firmly rooted in mainstream US comics traditions (he mentioned making them superpower-based so as to avoid stories perceived as boring, and when asked about the lead time he confirmed he was able and willing to adapt to current events with a lead time between writing and floppy publication of three months) such that his work is not necessarily what we are most focused on at Fleen, I appreciated his willingness to create bridges between US and French-speaking audiences (he mentioned the books, at least the TPBs, publishing simultaneously) and the process by which he tackles these difficult subjects, for instance he mentioned making sure he was paired with a non-white co-writer, and consulting shooting survivors early in the writing process.
• I was able to chat with creators Charlie Genmor and Holly Rectum, who you may remember from my Lyon BD report, since each of them was now published by Delcourt, and we were able to chat about their non-binary coming-out zine and Charlies delightful LGBTI+ mermaids: besides the Delcourt signing they also had their own booth under the Bande de Déchets (Garbage Gang) collective where they were able to sell prints of their mermaids, so of course I bought one.
• Finally, I was able to experience an unreleased story of Imbattable that was designed specifically for the location, the building La Grande Passerelle, with the panels, and sometimes just the characters, being printed at macro size and being plastered on the walls, but also the ground, and many other situations such as on the side of a parked car (purposefully put there, of course). In the end you had to go outside and make a full rotation around the building to be able to follow the story, which as a result would be hard to publish elsewhere, though photos can be shared.

  At the same location Imbattable was the subject of its own exhibition, though it was cleverly used as a way to illustrate comics concepts; and they took it very far, as the concepts included comic bubble shapes or lettering effects. Régis Thomas put in effort to make the exhibition follow a narrative of how a story is created, from conception to colored page through intermediate stages such as layouts, inking, etc, going as far as to imagine the kind of script that would be created for a page if it had been necessary to hand it off between the writing and drawing steps (in practice, Jousselin does not need to formalize in such a way given he both writes and draws).

  The last part, centered on coloring, shows not only the usual coloring work but also how colorist Croix had to get involved in the magic of comics: her work had to be tightly coordinated with the plot in a story in tome 2 that involves color-based powers; I won’t say more. The examples are well-chosen, resulting in a very didactic exhibition where I managed to learn a thing or two, so kudos for Régis Thomas for setting it up.¹

As always, we at Fleen are grateful for the contributions of our BD desk and the comprehensive reporting it offers. Many thanks to FSFCPL for this, and the additional reports in the coming days.

Spam of the day:

Moskinator is a portable, solar insect zapper that removes troublesome insects in a quick, effective and hygienic manner.

You say it’s solar, but later on you say it’s USB powered. Are you implying that the Sun is compliant with USB-C? Neat trick if true.

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¹ I also learned on the occasion of the festival that Imbattable had been translated in English and published on Comixology [Editor’s note: The translated title is Invincible.], but I cannot recommend that edition: besides the general issue of DRM-laden digital books such that you may lose access to your copy without you being able to do anything about it, there is the fact Comixology can only emulate, at best, the additional printing pass applied to book 1 (with words instead to point at the phenomenon), and more seriously some of the creative choices, such as some precisely highlighted in the exhibition as part of lettering, have not been reproduced in the English-language version.

This is all the more problematic when the choices not carried over are remarked upon by the characters! (It’s complicated. Let’s just say that, in Imbattable, the fourth wall may be closer to you than it appears.)

Well, goodness, a whole bunch of stuff has occurred since last we spoke. Let’s look at just a few things, ‘kay?

• This past Saturday saw the Harvey Awards handed out at New York Comic Con; you may recall that this year’s nomination slate was really very strong. While the official page hasn’t updated with the winners list yet, you can find the laureates around the web, say at Newsarama.

  The three categories that I was most invested in — the three categories where there really couldn’t be a bad choice to receive the statue — were Book Of The Year (Hey Kiddo by Jarrett J Krosoczka), Digital Book Of The Year (Check, Please by Ngozi Ukazu), and Best Children’s Or Young Adult Book¹ (Laura Dean Keeps Breaking Up With Me by Mariko Tamaki and Rosemary Valero-O’Connell). The last of them, particularly, is going to run out of room on the cover for stickers proclaiming the Harvey and Ignatz wins, especially if it’s keeping some space for next year’s Eisners.

• Saturday was also 24 Hour Comic Day, and while there are literally too many excellent works to point out, I would be remiss if I didn’t share a modern fairy tale by Melanie Gillman. A young woman feleing unloved in an arranged betrothal finds herself beseeching the Goddess Of Mishaps for help, and it’s damn near perfect.
• Heidi Mac spent the morning at the ICv2 2019 Conference, held adjacent to NYCCC. You can find her livetweets via this search, but the one you want to pay attention to is this:
  

  The slide that shocked ComicsPRO showing size of manga and kids genres.
  #nycc2019 #icv22019 #nycc

  

  In case you don’t feel like zooming in, more than two-thirds of all comics sold fell into one of two categories: Juvenile Fiction (41%, think Raina and similar) and Manga (28%). Superheros were the third-largest market category, but they account for one comic sold out of every ten. This is why C Spike Trotman has been most vocal about the YA offerings from Iron Circus.

• Finally, especially for those that perhaps over-indulged in 24HrCD or maybe are pushing it too hard for Inktober? Stretch.

Spam of the day:

15 Military Discounts Only Available To Those That Served Our Country

While it is true that I have, probably in the depths of the US Army Cadet Command at Fort Knox, a form 139-R from 1985 (enrolling me in ROTC so I could take two mandatory, 1-credit classes, which my college required instead of physical education), complete with an X in the box labeled I decline to state that I am not an conscientious objector and a strikethrough in the loyalty oath section, I cannot say that I served in any meaningful fashion as that concept is generally understood. But given that your email came from Hesse, Germany (from a domain registration that has existed for a whole 12 days), I’m going to doubly say that no, I haven’t served “our” country.

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¹ Okay, one complaint — there’s a world of distance between children’s books and young adult books, leading to YA books that are distinctly at the upper end of the age range like Laura Dean, Hey, Kiddo, and On A Sunbeam contending with books intended for a much younger audience like Mr Wolf’s Class #2: Mystery Club (7-10) and New Kid (8-12). Yes, the over-proliferation of categories is, but maybe split this one into pre-teen and teens-plus?

There’s a bunch — and I mean a metric bunch — of graphic novels in the midst of dropping, and that means it’s time to tell you what I think of them. We start out today with two from the fine folks at :01 Books, who were kind enough to send a pretty big selection of just-released and about-to-release titles over to the Fleenplex. They’re very different, but I think there’s a common thread between them that I’d like to explore, so strap in and as usual, there be spoilers in these waters.

At first glance, Stargazing (words and art by Jen Wang, colors by the incomparable Lark Pien) and Mighty Jack And Zita The Spacegirl (words and pictures by Ben Hatke, colors by Alex Campbell and Hilary Sycamore) couldn’t be more different.

Aside from the fact that they’re both written for kids 8-12 years old, Stargazing is a mostly quiet exploration of culture and friendship between elementary age girls in a Chinese-American neighborhood in California, and Jack/Zita is part rip-roaring modernist fairy tale, part space opera, with the fate of Earth in the balance. One’s a standalone inspired by real life, the other is the culmination of one trilogy and the coda to/crossover with a second trilogy.

And yet there’s this bit in both about making friends, about how your current friends react to your new friends, about realizing that you can fall short in being the friend that’s needed. There’s this bit in both about how especially girls of a certain age — from pre-teen to not-quite teen — can react to each other, a behavior that can only be described the the word meanness. There’s this bit in both about how rash decisions and thinking with your fists can make for larger problems (even if one only leads to in-school counseling and the other leads to maybe giants killing everybody you love).

Which is to say, the trappings of the story are probably less important than how they speak to their characters.

Stargazing is a welcome return to form for Jen Wang; I famously — and, given the near-universal acclaim and awards bestowed, almost singly — thought her last graphic novel suffered serious structural story problems¹. The heart and friction of how people become (and stop being, and resume being) friends was there, but the broader message failed. Stargazing, like her superlative Koko Be Good, focuses on the people at the heart of the story, and the struggles that they face are very much personal.

Christine and she’s-our-neighbor-and-your-age-you-should-be-friends-okay-Dad-fine Moon approach life in different ways — Buddhist vs Christian, vegetarian vs not, free spirited vs family expectations of excellence — to the extent that Christine wonders how much Moon actually belongs to the same tradition. Moon’s confident and funny and (in an assessment that borders on extremely sad self-awareness for a 10-12 year old like Christine) possibly not Asian.

They adapt to each other and become friends, but there’s something weird under the surface that Christine can’t put her finger on: a certainty that she’s not of this planet, and a volatility that can lead Moon to act with her fists seemingly without warning.

Which, it turns out, has a knowable, physical cause. This might have been a too-pat resolution to the story, except for the fact that it’s based on Wang’s own experiences. If the story wraps up in a happily-ever-after finish that’s a little unsatisfying, I think it’s only because the reveal and resolution take place too quickly. There’s nothing wrong with the first 160 pages of Stargazing, but the conclusion needs the space to breathe a little².

Overall, Stargazing reminds me of This One Summer (which, if you don’t know how good that book is, it is necessary reading for anybody that cares about what comics can be), and I can only think of how much more Wang could have done with the page count afforded to that book. Yeah, yeah, 8-12 year old readers vs 12-18, but I think the younger kids can handle the page count.

Mighty Jack And Zita The Spacegirl is more about the former (not to mention Lilly, occasional Goblin King, who doesn’t get title billing) than the latter, which feels appropriate. Zita’s been through her journey from untested to rookie to expert-level saver of worlds and inspirer of people. Lilly’s gotten used to being King of the goblins (maybe a little too much as her carelessness gives the giants their opening to threaten Earth from the places beyond), but Jack’s still trying to figure things out.

Sometimes he’s cautious and ends up regretting it. Sometimes he’s decisive and ends up regretting it. Sometimes he doubts he’s up to the task, but all those regrets are really stem from no more than being new to the Jack business. Recall that Jack isn’t just a name, but a title: The Jack is a protector of Earth, clever and brave. When he has the information needed to make the next decision, act on the next situation, the regrets don’t manifest. Give him as long at the Jack business as Zita’s had at the Spacegirl business and he’ll be masterful.

Heck, he’s already got the big picture thing covered. When the giants finally break through to Earth (in Jack’s backyard, no less!), he stands armed with nothing but a sword-sized key. With him are one Goblin King and a double handful of waist-high goblins, one dragon (who will only promise to take Jack’s sister to safety), a pony-sized mouse, a few assorted aliens³ and robots, a former (unarmed and somewhat hapless) Man In Black, a pair of lovable space rogues, and his Mom, all prepared to get squished⁴.

The giant king promises that his murderous band will provide the impetus for humanity united into an Age Of Heroes, just fight us. Jack’s answer is clever, and brave, and wise:

Nope. We’re not divided. We’re standing here. Now. Together. And we won’t let you bring violence and pain to this world in the hope that some good will come of it.

All we can do is what’s best in the moment before us. So we’re sending you home, here and now. You may have come to invade our planet.

But you picked the wrong backyard.

That wisdom comes at a cost — the Jack must stand on guard, and that means staying in the same small town, which will be mundane and boring unless dangers arise again. It means saying goodbye to friends who get to go on adventures in space. It means growing up.

But if there’s one thing that Hatke (juggler, acrobat firebreather, archer, I think tightrope walker, and a bunch of other things) has demonstrated in his own life, growing up doesn’t mean the end of adventures, it just means different ones most of the time. Jack’s already got clever and brave down, and he’ll continue to grow wise. The world may not have an Age Of Heroes, but it sure has one hell of a Jack.

Stargazing releases from :01 Books tomorrow, 10 September, and joins Mighty Jack And Zita The Spacegirl in being available wherever books are sold.

Spam of the day:

It’s all about Perfect Timing

Surprisingly, this spam did not turn out to be about some weird sex thing.

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¹ Her previous, In Real Life, I thought was a faithful adaptation of a story that wasn’t great, but that’s on Cory Doctorow, not Wang.

² I had similar feelings about Pashmina by Nidhi Chanani, which I loved, but which also felt rushed in the back quarter. Both books deserved a higher page count.

³ The most formidable of which has already said Strong-Strong proud … fall with friends.

⁴ Until the Spacegirl shows up with more robots, one of which is the size of a small moon, in low orbit, and has a firing solution, at which time the squishing becomes unlikely. Just work with me here.

[Editor’s note: Yeah, pretty much forget the earlier disclaimers. This time I’m going for exact quotes.]

There’s something refreshing about giving Ursula Vernon a microphone and no set topic list for an hour. With her A/V tech/husband, Kevin Sonney¹, by her side, she projected slides of her artwork, digressing as the mood struck her on each. Oh, and for those that don’t know, Ursula Vernon is also T Kingfisher when writing for adults, the difference between them being, T Kingfisher wears a hat. I mean, I’m wearing a hat now, but it’s because my hair … yeah.

Let the quotes begin!

I had a blue period because the only ink bottle I could get the cap off of was blue.
— Explaining why the crested caracara was that color

I just like painting stone.

Sometimes you want to get back to your roots, but not enough to draw humans.
— Explaining why she painted Pen-Guin the Barbarian, decked out for war and murder.

Turnips are inherently funny.

Oh, God, they produce so many eggs.
— On the keeping of chickens

Ursula: The chicken had a tragic backstory …
Kevin: I’m not made of stone.
Ursula: … which lead to multiple adults unironically stating We just want what’s best for the chicken.
— On how they wound up with the Strong Independent Chicken. Also, Kevin is a Disney Princess, animals just flock to him.

I had the grandiose idea of doing steampunk moths.

Oh, the pear …
— On seeing the Biting Pear Of Salamanca, which came about because Vernon was drawing a lot of fruit, but was also inspired by how Rob Liefeld draws teeth but again didn’t want to draw a person. Most people only focus on the pear and not the fact that it’s clearly a tourist attraction and so the little rodent in the foreground is photographing it. Nearly everybody overlooks the giraffes in the background but come on, you can’t have too many giraffes.

Inspiration knocks on the door occasionally. Spite will bang on the door all year long.

Kevin: I HAVE INSTRUCTIONS IF YOU START AN EPIC.
— On what to do if Ursula decides to start another strip the length of Digger. They involve a shovel and an unmarked patch of land out back.

At least it’s prime!
— There are eleven volumes of Dragonbreath, not ten.

It’s all right, the fox can’t hurt you anymore.

Spinning wheels are really hard to draw … but hamster wheels are easy to draw.
— On how a desire to tell a fairy tale became Hamster Princess.

Don’t get me started on potatoes … [Kevin nods pointedly] … the Russet Burbank is an abomination.
— She’s got opinions. This came at the end of a question if her degree in anthropology helps her writings. It lead to the point that you should get the food right, that not everybody eats the same things, and that in general there should be fewer potatoes in your faux-medieval setting.

The answer is always more sauna.
— On consulting with a Finnish folklorist to see if she got details right in The Raven And The Reindeer, and being told that the folklore and food were fine, but there wasn’t enough sauna in the story.

I have much less trouble than is emotionally healthy.
and
Many children’s book authors are frustrated horror authors.
— On any difficulty she may have code-switching between the two genres. Turns out kidlit authors get told you can’t write that, it’ll scar a kid fairly frequently, leading to frustrated ambition and resentment. All of those scenes get more and more horrifying until they’re ready to explode in a brain-melting cavalcade of madness and terror.

Or, you know, you’re Ursula and just fight with your editor on Twitter. No big².

Spam of the day:

Please review how you can easily produce quality videos to show or communicate more about Fleen.

This spam purports to come from somebody named Orko and … no. Just no.

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¹ Ursula and Kevin are capital-M Married, with an innate feel for where the other is, mentally, at any given moment that omega-level psychics would envy. Of course, they mostly use that knowledge to mess with each other for extremely dry comedic effect.

² That’s what she said!