The webcomics blog about webcomics

Raina. Just Raina.

She had, in the hearts of her numerous fans, entered the territory of the mononymic, like Madonna or Bono or Frank¹, there is no doubt who you are talking about when it comes to superstars². And today there are things to mention regarding Raina [Editor’s note: okay, fine, Raina Telgemeier] that you should know about, at least if you’re out in the Bay Area.

Firstly, Ghosts is rapidly approaching release date, and that means release parties. Green Apple Books in San Francisco (that would be Raina’s hometown) will be hosting such a party at 6:00pm (reading at 7:00pm) on Tuesday, 13 September (that would be the release date), and while they don’t explicitly say that Raina’s going to be at the party, she is tweeting out the event announcement.

Update to add: It’s confirmed now.

In order to bring some order to what’s going to be a busy, busy night, Green Apple are pre-selling tickets which are good for a paperback copy of the book, and have shifted to a location with ample parking and space away from the main store. No doubt other bookstores will be holding their own events to meet reader demand; if you know of one, drop me a line and I’ll share it.

And in the meantime, whether you can get to the release party or not, there’s a display of original pages³ from Smile, Drama, and Sisters at the Berkeley (that would be just across the bay from Raina’s hometown) Public Library Central branch. They’ve even got five original pages from Ghosts, on view in the second floor through 26 August.

Central’s hours and address are at their webpage, and like all libraries it’s free and open to the public. Since it’s a proven scientific fact that you can never have too much Raina, I’d advise everybody in the area to make the trip and look at some pretty damn great pages while we all count down to the 13th. Given the fact that Ghosts is going to have a print run of 500,000 copies (pretty sure that’s a graphic novel record), you should be able to get a copy without too much difficulty, but I’d put in a pre-order, just in case.


[Media Alert] Behold the Instruments of Righteousness in Super Dung

What?

..eon Tactics!

Oh. Gotcha. Not a good place for the subject line to get truncated.

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¹ Okay, there is a little ambiguity here as to which Frank one might be mentioning: Frank as in Zappa, or as in Becky and.

² Also: George.

³ Hat tip: Mark V of Electric Puppet Theatre. Read his comic!

No Picture And No Spam, I’m Behind Today

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.

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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.

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

Slow Brain Day

Whoo, those until-two-am EMS calls really put a crimp in the next day. It’s late, so this will be brief, as we share news of a couple of enticing product [pre]-announcements.

  • First up Raina Telgemeier is a ways from her next book; turns out that pandemics completely disrupt publishing schedules, which are complex webs of editors, publicity, planning, printing logistics, and supply chains that run from China across the Pacific. Probably isn’t too great for the brain space of the folks that need to put together the books that will be appearing next year and the year after that, either. And then there’s the fact that Raina’s published five monster hits from 2010-2019 and if we want to see the next five, she’s due a breather.

    But even if there’s not a story coming the immediate future¹, there’s still Raina news to keep your eyes on, starting today:

    I’m so excited for tomorrow’s release of ‘Raina’s Day,’ my new 450-piece jigsaw puzzle collaboration with Clarkson Potter! Be sure to check out my website for some sneak-peek photos and ordering information! https://goraina.com/merchandise-puzzle

    That’s a puzzle of cartoon Raina surrounded by all the thoughts that define her, packaged up in a box that looks for all the world like cartoon Raina’s sketchbook or diary. I dunno about you, but I’ve got multiple [grand-] nieces and nephews that are going to go incandescent when they see it.

  • It was not two weeks ago when we at Fleen looked at the latest webcomic offering from Karl Kerschl and noted that The Abominable Charles Christopher’s third volume had been a-borning for longer than anybody would want, but that the wait would be worth it. It would be madness to claim that Kerschl took my plaintive observation as the motivation to quickly throw together a full boo design and get a Kickstart set up — those tasks take forever — but what the heck? He announced it:

    Abominable Book 3 is finally coming! Check out the @Kickstarter landing page to get notified when it goes live!!!
    https://kickstarter.com/projects/karlkerschl/the-abominable-charles-christopher-book-3

    31 May was a very good day for product announcements, yo.

    We don’t know what form book 3 is going to take, or what timeframe to expect it in, but soon enough we’ll have the campaign launch and get those answers. All I know is I’ve got to make room on my bookshelf for a new hardcover² in the near-ish term. Charles Christopher! A malevolent lion! A shouty and ineffectual Gilgamesh! RPG-fan forest critters, awkward owlets, a cockroach shrink, Vivol the bear, Luga the honest wolf, and Sissi Skunk’s shenanigans! Stick it in my brain.

  • Oh, and a followup to Friday: US$580,099, thirty grand above the McDonald’s Ratio, and a full fifty grand above the previous record holder. Dang.

Spam of the day:

We have a special limited offer for you to send unlimited emails. We allow non-permission based emails and you won’t ever get blocked.

You are offering me the opportunity to annoy other people as much as you’re trying to annoy me? And yet you wound up in my spam filters, where I could have easily ignored you forever. You’re not very good at this.

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¹ Which is not to say there haven’t been any stories with her hands in. The death-themed anthology from Iron Circus, You Died, includes a Raina-illustrated story about beloved father, a collection of ashes, and a trip to a theme park that is absolutely not Disney for a surreptitious scattering. It’s heartwarming and hilarious, and Raina makes the most of writer Casey Gilly’s script.

² And, eventually, a fourth book, but we’ll cross that bridge etc.

Webcomics! They’re Good

Hey, want to read about a top-tier comic-crafter from the worlds of print and web and his new project? Or how about a woman with no less skill but earlier in her career about to hit book and comic stores in a big way, to match her deep online following?

  • Folks that have read this page for a while know that we at Fleen have boundless enthusiasm for the personage and work of Karl Kerschl. His webcomics work has, on occasion, had to make way for print work — your Teen Titans, Gothams Academy, Isolae, etc — and if it’s been longer than one might have hoped for book three of The Abominable Charles Christopher to see print or for the story to wrap, well, that’s just reason to wake up tomorrow morning. It’s one of the best, most heartfelt, and simple finest looking webcomics that’s ever been, and it’s free so what have we to do but celebrate that we’ve gotten what we’ve gotten?

    Which is why it’s such wonderful news that we’re getting a whole other webcomic from Kerschl, one that’s updating in issue-sized chunks:

    First issue is online for free!!! Read it at http://karlkerschl.com

    The first issue is that of Death Transit Tanager, a manga-influenced sci-fi story about a young woman, a galaxy that needs traveling, and souls that need conduct to their rest. Episode one can be read right now, and if you like it (he said, entirely rhetorically), the PDF is available for purchase, but Kerschl’s noted that subscribing to his site is a better option, providing a pay-what-you-want (two bucks per month and up) means of supporting his work:

    [A]ccess to full-length process videos, pre-production drawings, sketches, community polls and all sorts of fun behind-the-scenes stuff that doesn’t usually see the light of day. AND you’ll also be part of the discussion by having access to comments on posts.

    Plus discounts on everything in his shop, including convention¹ sales, along with first word on new releases, early-bird access, etc. Kerschl’s simply one of the best creators we’ve got, and Death Transit Tanager is an act of faith on his part — that great comics given away will result in tangible support for him and his family. Give it a read, and see if he’s right.

  • And speaking of webcomics making a splash and seeking new audiences, Image Comics has looked over at Webtoons and said, Hmmmm, creators with established audiences online, maybe they might like to engage in an exchange of money for physical goods and struck a deal with Linda Šejić of Punderworld (and, for good measure another 10% of her audience is over at Tapas). The retelling of the Persephone/Hades myth² (that isn’t Lore Olympus4) will run near 200 pages and release to comic shops and bookstores at the end of August.

    Given the significant number of readers that top-drawing comics have on the aggregator sites (Punderworld has a relatively modest 350,000 verified subscribers; others get into multiple millions), it’s really only surprising that more webcomics haven’t reached deals with publishers — although the vagaries of who gets the right to do so are buried deep in various ToS and I’m not a lawyer — and I expect that we’ll see more of these in the future.

    For reference, 350K would be more readers than any title in 2019 (the latest year for which Brian Hibbs has caluclated year-end sales performance) not by Dav Pilkey or Raina Telgemeier. And would be more than thirteen times greater than the top-selling Image book of that year, the latest Walking Dead Compendium (26K copies sold). Comics doesn’t look like what it used to, and any publisher that twigs to that fact and gives the fans of these very different properties what they want? License to print money.


Spam of the day:

The Kitchen Device You Didn’t Know You Needed Super Sale on the Butter Spreader

A knife. You’re talking about a butter knife. They already have those.

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¹ Conventions were things that we had before the Plague Year And A Half, and will again in the future.

² Hades has been all kinds of hot in the culture for the past bit, so good on Image for striking while the iron is hot³.

³ Yes, I know that’s more of a Hephaestus thing.

4 All kinds of hot.

Basically Everybody Learning To Do Comics Should Consider This

Some of my favorite webcomics are autobio (possibly fake autobio), or are autobio-inspired fiction, at least at their beginning. Even if the creator doesn’t do work that’s even vaguely autobiographical, drawing on personal history (and the realness of feelings thereunto) can enrich fictional characters, bringing them to life in ways that completely made up folks don’t necessarily have. Learn to tell the story of yourself is bound up with learn to tell your own stories¹.

Which is why this caught my eye:

Learn how to transform your personal experiences into visual narratives in our new Comics Journaling workshop. Next session is Sun., Apr. 25, with special guest @hiHelloHans — writer, digital creative, and lifelong maker of auto-bio comics.
More info at http://guestlist.co/events/680421.

That from the Twitterfeed of the fine folks at the Cartoon Art Museum, San Francisco, who are running a series of online seminars aimed at teens (let’s say 14+) and adults who are creative-minded and comics-loving. You don’t have to be a great artist to do autobio! Take a look at Harvey Pekar’s stick figures, which certainly lack the polish of his art partners, but which still express the personal viewpoint that was at the heart of all of his stories.

We’re halfway through the CAM seminar series; Cartooning My Day and Cartooning My Life took place on 11 and 18 April, respectively. Sunday, 25 April will be Cartooning My World, and Sunday, 2 May will be Cartooning My Self; each seminar starts at 4:00pm PDT, runs for an hour and a half, and costs US$20. Reservations have to be made by 5:00pm PDT the previous day, with links sent to participants no later than 2 hours before start time. Speaking of time, be on time, as nobody will be admitted more than 10 minutes after start time.

And while programs like this will be more effective in person once the pandemic isolation ends, I can’t help but think that making at least some programming of this nature available online will make the outreach and education offered by CAM (and other institutions) much broader than it would be otherwise.

There’s countless people that live a world away from San Francisco that would jump at the chance for some of the workshops CAM offers, but which are restricted by time, distance, and room capacity. Here’s hoping everybody makes an effort to include them in the future.


Spam of the day:

This weird-looking food reverses dementia
Though bizarre, Harvard researchers have discovered a shocking link between your sleep and the onset of Alzheimer’ s.The big question is – do you sleep on your side or on your back?
Dr. Will Mitchell, DOM, MS Nutrition

Make up your mind! Are you going to steal my identity by promising a food that cures dementia (first line, signature of fake nutritionist) or by promising a positional cure for Alzheimer’s (bit in the middle). It’s not too much to ask that you keep your bullshit stories straight instead of intermixing them.

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¹ I’m thinking at the moment of a young adult of my acquaintance who’s got a universe of family stories to tell; they just need to set pencil to paper and tell them. Your Naruto-inspired pseudomanga epic? Million of those. Your story of you is unique.

It Is March Again, The March That Never Ended

It is today, roughly, 350 days since New Jersey went into lockdown. Today is, roughly, the 366th day of March, 2020, the Fimbulmarch, which will run for another two years and then end in Ragnarökövid. As far as unending tedium and hiding in the house venturing out in the killer environment only in times of great need to obtain sustenance goes, it could be worse. I mean, there’s lots to binge on streaming at least.

And, this being the nominal first week of the neverending month, there’s some [web]comics events you might want to keep an eye on.

  • Know who’s awesome? Gale Galligan, who had one of the biggest how do I follow that opening act? high-wire travails ever, taking over the Baby-Sitters Club graphic novel adaptations from Raina Telgemeier and all¹. She’s working on her own original graphic novel now, as well as another project that finished around March 240th that was a little bit more important, all of which are wonderful. She’s also been to Bunny Island and survived.

    Know who else is awesome? Ngozi Ukazu, who had a very big couple of years before and during the Inifinte March, what with the release of the :01 Books collected editions of Check, Please!, which are just delightful². She’s been working on her next project, as well as dropping some primo cartoons into The New Yorker and the Tweet Machine.

    Know what’s particularly awesome? Galligan and Ukazu are both serious about promoting the interests and skills of younger cartoonist, those who will someday be their peers. Galligan’s been mentoring since the Before Times, and the pair of them joined forces to promote transparency into page rates. And they’re teaming up again to offer two free workshops on comic making:

    COMICS WORKSHOPS!
    Howdy! @robochai and I are offering two workshops covering fundamentals for comic making. Workshops are free, but space is limited. Apply by 3/5!
    forms.gle/Xaqc6zjTWjuSv9…

    That link will take you to the Google Form to sign up; the two workshops are on Perspective (Saturday, 20 March at noon EST) and Coloring (Satruday, 27 March at noon EST), with connection info presumably sent to registrants.

  • For those looking for happenings between now and Sunday, let this be your reminder that the first week of March is Read AGraphic Novel Week/Will Eisner Week; the ongoing pandemic means there’s less in-person going on than prior years, but that hasn’t stopped the Cartoon Art Museum from organizing a graphic novel read-athon as fundraiser (helping to offset the loss of income from the whole no visitors in lockdown thing). You can sign up via the CAM 99 Pledges page, to support those reading, or to add your eyeballs to the -athon’s effort.

Okay, that’s what’s going on now. We’ll try to keep an eye on what’s happening — and what’s not — in The March That Never Ends. Case in point: it was announced today that WonderCon will be online-only (26/27 March) and San Diego Comic-Con is delaying again until July 2022, with a supplemental 3-day in-person event in November (all details pending as of now).

It’s actually an open question how much society might be back to accessible by summer, but kudos to the showrunners for injecting a little certainty instead of delaying decisions. It’s not a fun decision, but it’s probably the only right one at this time.


Spam of the day:

Elon Musk says he’s a supporter of bitcoin and thinks it will get ‘broad acceptance’ in finance & Bitcoin Rally Takes Crypto Market Value to New Record

Since Tesla announced it had bought a position in Bitcoin on 8 February, their stock has declined by 16.8%, and Bitcoin is down 2.4% (or, more impressively, down 23.1% since their high eight days ago). Your entire contention that I should give you money to put into their two financial vehicles is … misguided.

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¹ In turn, handing the series over to Gabriela Epstein, and now to Chan Chau.

² Reminder: the fourth self-published book is coming, sometime before the end of Evermarch.

The Billy Ireland Library Would Like To Help You In These Uncertain Times

Let’s face it, nobody right now is exhaling or relaxing, no matter how many walking exemplars of impunity are finding themselves being taken into Federal custody in a manner that is simultaneously tragic, enraging, and hilarious. So let us be grateful that the Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum is doing their damndest to bring a little light to us all.

  • On Sunday afternoon next weekend (that would be 24 January), there will be an interactive game of Paper Charades (like they did at CxC this year), which is a non-copyright-infringing game that looks a little bit like Pictionary but which is legally distinct. Raina Telgemeier, Dana Simpson, and Shannon Wright will be there to play along, with folks chiming in from chat to guess what’s getting drawn.

    The fun starts at 4:00pm EST (that’s 1:00pm for those of you on the west coast; everybody else figure it out on your own), it’s free, and open to all, but you do have to register in advance.

  • The following weekend (that would be 30 January), the Billy opens a new exhibit of Walt Kelly’s Pogo, specifically focusing on the political commentary that the eponymous possum and his cohorts gleefully engaged in. Into The Swamp: The Social And Political Satire of Walt Kelly’s Pogo will be on view until 31 October, with a hiatus from 19 April through 11 June.

    Now you may be saying to yourself, Self, hasn’t Gary been pretty adamant that this is not the time to engage in public events, place-going, and suchlike? and in this you would be right. Hopefully we’ll be back to some semblance of public engagement well before the exhibit closes — wearing your masks keeping your distance now, and getting your shot as soon as you’re eligible radically increases the odds of getting there, especially in the back half of the run — and in the meantime, the Billy has restricted hours and capacity.

    Reservations are required (see here), with information on Ohio State’s safety guidelines here. Don’t go travelling just for this until we’ve got the pandemic under control, but once that happens? You’ll want to see this.


Spam of the day:

(Did you order an intimacy?)

No, but I am still waiting on a Negroni, a plate of jamon iberico, and an order of duck-fat fries. Could you check on when those will come out?

June? You expect them in June? Yeah, okay. Thanks.

Birthaversary!

As has been noted in the past, there are certain folks within the webcomics ambit that have closely-aligned significant dates; Ryan North and John Allison, for example, share a birthdate, and I am a co-birthdayist with Jon Rosenberg. Dylan Meconis and her wife, Katie Lane¹, have two birthdays and an anniversary on three consecutive days.

And today, the 6th of October, one may find celebrations of the birth of Ananth Hirshbon vivant, man about town, possessor of the best poker face in history — and also eight years since the awesome wedding² of Holly Jeffrey Rowland.

Today is also the day that we found out who the 2020 MacArthur Fellows are (no [web]comics folks this year, but still a stunning cross-disciplinary collection of people representing the breadth of human endeavours) and the winners of the Harvey Awards, which will be formally presented by streaming ceremony on Friday evening, in conjunction with virtual NYCC.

  • The Book Of The Year and Best Children Or Young Adult Book went to Gene Yang for Dragon Hoops and Superman Smashes The Klan, respectively; the latter is shared with Gurihiru as the artists. The former was up against the likes of Lynda Barry and Tillie Walden’s Are You Listening? (one of my favorite books of the past year), along with Chris Ware, Eleanor Davis, and more.

    The latter was an even more impressive win, as Yang was competing against himself (Dragon Hoops being double-nominated), Guts, Stargazing, and Almost American Girl. It’s pretty unheard of to go against Raina with a Raina-alike book and then defeat both of them with the cheeriest story about stomping Nazis ever. Also, although I never got back to Books 2 and 3 of SSTK, let me say that Yang not only gets Superman better than anybody in the past couple of decades, his Lois Lane is perfect.

  • Digital Book Of The Year went to The Nib which I’m not sure is a book in the way the other nominees were, but certainly well-deserved. Matt Bors and his co-conspirators do amazing work, five days a week.

Because I’m a glutton for punishment, I decided to check back in on the Ringo Awards, due to be announced in a few weeks. It’s finally acknowledged (as near as I can tell, the announcement about two hours after I last wrote about it) that Baltimore Comic Con ain’t happening in person, and the awards will be streamed from the virtual BCC. So, glad to see sanity prevailing.


Spam of the day:

Alison Wethering wrote: Hey, great site! Have you thought about adding a video in response to COVID-19?

I believe that I am firmly on the record that my response to COVID is Isolate and wear a mask, or stay the fuck away from me forever, you plague rats.

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¹ Light-ning Law-yer!!

² No cake at this shindig, there was an ice cream truck complete with Choco Tacos.

The Regis Philbin Of Fleen

As long as I live, I will remember the haunting, off-the-cuff cold open that David Letterman opened his show with on the return from hiatus after September 11, 2001¹. It was the most heartfelt thing I ever saw on TV and there wasn’t a sound to be heard from the audience until near the end, when Dave added … and then, thank God, Regis is here so we have something to make fun of.

Regis Philbin (RIP) was Dave’s go-to guy; when everything else was falling apart on the show, get Regis on the phone, get him over to the studio, and you’ve got your airtime filled.

Round here, when things are falling apart and the posts ain’t coming for whatever reason, that’s when Fleen Senior French Correspondent Pierre Lebeaupin drops a dispatch from his side of the Atlantic and lo, we’ve got screen space filled. It’s been one of those weeks, and FSFCPL has popped in with his usual excellent timing.

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You know these characters who can’t seem to go in holidays somewhere without unwittingly stumbling on adventure? Well, it seems like book events are back in France, and it required your correspondent to go on holidays to figure that out.

Now, it is important to state that while I’ve had some reservations about the French government’s management of the COVID-19 pandemic, the way they manage public events is not one of them: whenever I hear about an event (one that is not cancelled, that is), it is very carefully restricted and managed, with impressive-sounding procedures regarding cleanup and crowd movement. For instance, concerts are always with a sitting audience, and a limited gauge (two or three thousands, no more) to boot; otherwise, such events are simply not allowed. So I was confident going to these events they would be competently managed and provide appropriate safety, if only from their limited scale, and I was interested in the specific setups, which other events could adopt.

  • First, I was in Saint-Lary-Soulan in the French Pyrénées when I learned of a book festival that was to take place just before I was to leave. As La Dép&egraave;che reports, Lucie Plessala the local bookshop owner was dismayed when another festival had to cancel, so she set up her own mini-festival called La Montagne de Livres [Editor’s note: The Mountain Of Books] with about 20 creators.

    When I entered, I discovered as many tables under a tent (provided by the tourism office); each creator was wearing a face shield, which regardless of its prophylactic effect remained useful by virtue of doubling as a name tag. Each creator hawked their wares, but transactions had to go through the bookshop owner herself. Fortunately, some comics were to be found, specifically Rien ne se Passe Jamais Comme Prévu, telling the story of a couple attempting to have children despite infertility, and I was able to chat with the artist while she sketched on my copy.

  • And on the same day, in the afternoon, I got to Pop Con near Toulouse, since my trip back from Saint-Lary had me make a multi-hour train layover at Toulouse anyway, so I only had to take my bike to get there.

    Rather than a convention hall, this con took place at a location that is more often used for weddings, business retreats, etc: a small building surrounded by parkings, gardens, and a field. And they made use of all that: most stands were outside, each under its own tent, and sporting events organized in the field. Most of the indoors area was used for cloakrooms and a very-well-distanced conference room.

    The feeling was that of a mix between Festival Harajuku) for the outdoor and small scale aspect and TGS (I in fact spotted some of the same people, including game developers). The only disappointment was a concert scene that, however small, was encouraging the attendance to sing along, and a karaoke stand, both of which I avoided like, literally, the plague. Obviously, no “free hugger” was to be found, and mask-wearing was enforced at the entrance and well-observed by con-goers.

    Finally, it was the occasion to catch Team Maliki, who we last saw at Japan Tours Festival (the very day before events started being capped at 5000 people, and most of them cancelled as a result). Besides catching up on news, obtaining my rewards for the latest Ulule campaign (even though I’d completely forgotten to warn of my coming, thank you very much for accommodating me!), and getting it sketched, it allowed me to get the newest, hippest swag. Here you can see Souillon (left) taking a break from sketching as part of Ulule rewards in order to sketch for booth customers.

    Cosplayers spotted: a Bowsette (unfortunately forgot to take a photo), a Master of Turtles, and what was probably the most appropriate cosplay for the facemask era, a Solid Snake.

I should note that it was fortunate for both events that weather was so agreeable (maybe a bit too hot, even): even if in both cases the tents would have allowed them to take place under inclement weather, attendance would have certainly suffered, as anyone who shops at an outdoors farmer’s market or at a foodtruck can attest. We will see as autumn progresses whether I can find other events to report from, keeping in mind in this day and age I am unlikely to travel specifically for such an event.


Spam of the day:

Raina Telgemeier negrophil https://google.com deflector obsesses For my money, the best deal of the bunch is this $20 car charger, which includes a 30W USB-C port, in addition to a regular USB port.

This came to the email that’s reachable through the contact us link, and picked out what’s probably the most common name to be found on these pages. Clever spammer.

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¹ If you’ve never seen it, look it up.

Busy Weekend

You know, what with two different sets of comics awards being given out, nominally from different coasts but practically speaking all from the confines of cyberspace.

  • On the delayed hand, you had NCSFest handing out the various NCS Division Awards, along with the Reuben¹. In the Online Comics categories, you had wins by Alec Longstreth (Long Form) and Jim Benton (Short Form); the latter wouldn’t have been my votegetter if I had a vote, but I can’t say it’s undeserving; I can say it was probably the most familiar work for the membership who, as previously noted, notoriously skew old.

    Which might explain why The Reuben itself went to the oldest nominee, one with a career stretching back four decades. A’course, the oldest nominee is the deeply subversive living legend Lynda Barry, whose work is most definitely not what I’d have expected the older members to vote for. It’s hard argue with the choice, and easy to argue that there might not have been a Raina Telgemeier if not for Lynda Barry’s deeply personal, memoirlike work (which started in print when Raina was about 2 years old) blazing the way. So no complaints here — Raina’s mantlepiece is getting a bit crowded anyway — and I suspect every one of the other nominees up for the top prize agreed that Barry was the right choice.

    As a side note, I see that Joe Wos — once a recurring name on this page during his years of directing Pittsburgh’s now-folded Toonseum — was given the division award for Variety Entertainment for his Mazetoons. Congrats, Joe.

  • And on schedule (although distanced), the Ignatzen were also presented on Saturday, and managed a simultaneous best-and-worst outcome in the same category. Do a quick refresh on the dilemma that the Ignatz Awards found themselves in this year and you’ll understand. Rosemary Valero-O’Connell is a creator whose work I deeply admire and, I daresay, a friend. The work for which she was nominated as Outstanding Artist, the short story collection Don’t Go Without Me, is magnificent and entirely worthy of the brick.

    But Valero-O’Connell was also on the jury. And while I stand second to no person in my love of and evangelical fervor for her work, and I recognize the accomplishment of being only the second person to win Outstanding Artist twice² and the only one to repeat in back-to-back years, I wish that it hadn’t happened. I do think that this situation has lessened the credibility of the Ignatz Awards, and I really, really hope that they write some ground rules to ensure that this appearance of a conflict of interest cannot happen again.

    Looking at other winners, Ebony Flowers has had nearly as good a year on the awards circuit as Valero-O’Connell; last year she took the Promising New Talent brick for the short story Hot Comb and this year for the expanded print collection incorporating it (also titled Hot Comb), she’s recognized for Outstanding Graphic Novel. Ariel Ries received bricks for Outstanding Online Comic (for Witchy) and Outstanding Comic (for Cry Wolf Girl); if you weren’t following her work before, you really should be.

    Outstanding Anthology went to Be Gay, Do Comics by the various contributors of The Nib. Look, you know that on a daily basis, it’s the most wide-ranging source of original editorial and nonfiction comics around, with a list of contributors that kicks every ass. Curating their best work on a theme is something that Matt Bors, Eleri Harris, and Matt Lubchansky were going to throw themselves into, and produce something terrific.

    Speaking of The Nib, Whit Taylor’s contributions there have always impressed the hell out of me (as well as everyplace else her work runs), and today she must take some solace in the fact that after two years of utter bullshit being inflicted on her in the form of a baseless lawsuit³, her Fizzle took the Ignatz for Oustanding Series and nobody can remember that other guy’s name. Seriously, I had to look him up, whereas members of The Eleven keep getting recognized for their work. It was a long, expensive, pointless road, but I have to imagine that the heft of that brick is gonna feel really good in Taylor’s hands.


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¹ Yes, yes, common parlance refers to all of these awards as Reubens, but the term proper applies only to the Cartoonist Of The Year, the one chosen by the entirety of the NCS membership rather than those of a particular area. It’s the COTY that gets the fancy Rube Goldbergian trophy, where the division winners get a (admittedly, handsome and heavy) plaque.

² The first being Jaime Hernandez in 2007 and 2012.

³ Which resolved after tens of thousands of dollars of legal fees and the plaintiff not getting his US$2.5 million, which is apparently the going rate for butthurt in the first degree.