There is so much good stuff available today, it’s almost embarrassing. I honestly don’t know where to start.

• Out today! Raina Telgemeier has dominated the New York Times bestseller charts for graphic novels with Smile and Drama, and since the Smile sequel Sisters hits today, the only questions to be asked are How long will she stay at #1? and Will she manage the trifecta of Drama coming back to the list? (Smile hasn’t left in more than two years), and Will she pull off the trick of holding the first three positions simultaneously?

  My predictions: At least a month, Probably, and I’d bet ten bucks on it.

• Out today! But it won’t be a sure thing that I win that ten bucks, because Telgemeier’s Scholastic imprint-mate, Kazu Kibuishi also releases Amulet 6 today. It’s been a long time coming too, what with Kibuishi’s illness in 2012¹, and illustrating the 15th anniversary Harry Potter covers last year, so expect a mountain of demand at bookstores and libraries. Kibuishi and Telgemeier are about to make third quarter very, very lucrative for their publisher.
• Out today! Scott C has his newest book (his first solo kids book, if memory serves) releasing today, which means you need to make with some hugs. You can, as Mr C observes, hug the person to your left, your right, in front of you, or just the air. Give it a try! And don’t miss out on the HUG A BOOK WEEK events coming up starting on 6 September — hugs, signings, hugsercise, parties, hug obstacle courses, exhibitions, hugs, pizza, and hugs are on deck, with info available at HUGMACHINEBOOK.com. Just keep ’em little kid-style hugs, not creepy congoer-style, and we’ll be good.
• Out today! MC Frontalot isn’t a webcomicker, but he’s practically a webcomics character (have you seen the covers of his CDs?). Question Bedtime releases today, with phat [nursery] rhymes for all ages. It’s like a regular rap album, but no need to be concerned if your mom hears you playing it for your niece and nephew.
• Not specific to today but what the heck! David “Mr Anthology” Malki ! has written a piece in a new anthology of fiction, one that has unlikely and/or hazardous Kickstarters as its unifying theme. HELP FUND MY ROBOT ARMY!!! & Other Improbable Crowdfunding Projects has a ton o’ contributors and is available for your Kindle or Kindle equivalent now. Read it, but don’t get any funny ideas, you.

Spam of the day:
None today; I’m in too good a mood to spoil it.

_______________
¹ Bacterial meningitis, the effects of which lingered and robbed him of months of productive time. Speaking with him last year, he told me how recovering necessitated a completely different approach to writing, and that the Harry Potter covers gave him the time to rewire his brain. My suspicion is we’re going to see his new, more structured process of writing results in a tighter, more cohesive story … and Amulets 1-5 were already damn strong on the story end.

Let’s just hit you with a quick list of things that caught my eye today, and then we can all enjoy the weekend.

• What with all the (entirely justified) attention given to the comic-making juggernaut that is Raina Telgemeier, the world at large sometimes overlooks her biggest booster and cheerleader — namely, her husband, Dave Roman. Roman and Telgemeier have been travelling a bit since SDCC, checking out sites and ice cream places far and wide, but now it’s time to get back to the dual tasks of making awesome comics and teaching the next generation to make awesome comics:
  

  I doing a comics-making workshop at the New York Public Library, St. Agnes Branch, on [Thursday] August 21 from 2:30pm -– 4:00pm.

  This is part of the library’s Authors & Young Writers 2014 program, which is pitched to kids in 4th through 7th grades; you can follow that link for directions to the Upper West Side, and to pre-register.

• RIP KC’s ass, but also please note what is written underneath that pictorial representation of an ass-related tragedy:
  

  Next week, we begin… The final chapter of Graveyard Quest. For pretty much all of August and a little Spillover in September, we will see how it all ends.

  In my opinion, Graveyard Quest is Green’s best longform work at Gunshow, even outshining The Anime Club. Speaking of which, there’s a small Anime Club-related character study up at The Medium. Oh Mort, you are such a jerk certainly factually correct in all things and clearly have your mother’s best interests at heart.

• It’s been just about exactly a month since Shaenon Garrity and Andrew Farago welcomed their first child into the world, and one would hope that the grand adventure they have embarked upon is treating them easily. Although I’ll note that I ran into Farago briefly at SDCC and he had the look of sleep deprivation madness, and then there was this brief Garrity note on the Twitter machine earlier today:
  

  Tonight, nothing in this world would make me happier than if the baby could learn to fart without screaming. #parenthood

  So much is left unsaid. Is the child screaming in delight, because come on — farts! Or does he get startled by the physical, auditory, and olfactory sensations, reacting in fear? Perhaps it is a scream of pure challenge: World, I send forth this tangible notice of my existence! Tremble before me! In any event, I suspect that the fart/scream decoupling will have to occur before Garrity contemplates returning to Monster of the Week to take on season five of The X-Files, so lets hope the child in question gets on that quickly for all our sakes.

• Good news:
  

  Vattu page 572 http://www.rice-boy.com BOOK 2 IS FINISHED

  Vattu is a monumental accomplishment. I wonder how much more there will be?

  2 MORE BOOKS TO GO

  Oh, well that’s good, then. Okay, looking forward to Book 3 next week.

  No Vattu updates for about a month, now! Gotta write and work on other stuff.

  Well, poop. Citizens are urged to remain calm. If only there were a good reason for the hiatus!

  I hope that is cool with everybody. Main concern is that book 3 is the most densely-plotted thing i have ever written…
  …and i need to nail down some stuff in the writing. it will be better for this break.

  Based on past pronouncements from Evan Dahm about where in the story various things were happening, we may well expect Books 3 and 4 to be considerably longer than 1 and 2. Okay, Dahm, you’ve got your month, and furthermore, I’m looking forward to what you will do with this story.

Spams of the day:

Have you ever considered about including a little bit more than just your articles? I mean, what you say is important and all. But imagine if you added some great images or video clips to give your posts more, “pop”!

And …

Write more, thats all I have to say. Literally, it seems as though you relied on the video to make your point. You definitely know what youre talking about, why throw away your intelligence on just posting videos to your site when you could be giving us something enlightening to read?

I’m just going to let the two of you fight this one out.

Welp, Saturday was Saturday, meaning it was the busiest day, but it was an odd kind of busy; the lulls were shorter and the rushes were longer (that’s normal), but the buying pace was definitely off from Thursday and Friday. I didn’t register seeing so many Saturday badges, so maybe it’s a case of four day attendees saving their money for Sunday?

In any event, I won’t try to draw any conclusions beyond the fact that two separate people came up to the Dumbrella booth cash register, waved a sticker in my general direction and threw a dollar bill at me before walking off without the minimum level of human interaction. For the crime of acting like Rich Uncle Pennybags (who I saw on the floor) tossing a hundo at somebody desperate to buy food, you people are banned from ever buying anything again. Have fun obtaining food and shelter.

• My intentions to see the Steven Universe panel¹ were thwarted by the Hilton Bayfront Indigo Ballroom line management policy. I walked down around the far south end of the convention center (past the famed Hall H line, which was moving as people were let into the giant room) and followed the signs for Indigo. There was a very convenient grab-and-go food stall set up across the aisle, a few people lined up near the entrances, and a staffer who immediately intercepted me to instruct I go downstairs and out the building. If you’re going to stage a line outside, why direct people inside with the signage?

  Then I saw the line, which went that way for several hundred people, then back this way then kept going until this way became that way again; I’m going to guess there were maybe two thousand people in line, not moving, 20 minutes before the panel was due to start. As I decided that wasn’t happening and made my way back towards the convention center via the bay, I passed the end of line volunteer, who was being told by a protesting man But the panel doesn’t start until 1:00! So whatever tricks they’ve learned to keep people moving and crowds properly staged for Hall H apparently haven’t been applied to Indigo, and in future iterations will have to be.

• So I went to talk to Matt Inman about his Eisner win the prior night. You may recall that Inman had two nominations, for Best Digital Comic and for Best Short Story, one of which was a good nomination and one of which was less so. The short story nomination was good — digital-only work was going head-to-head against printed work as if they were both comics because hey, they’re both comics. The digital nomination was the less good, because the Eisner committee is again applying its own criteria inconsistently. They’ve set up the category to indicate that only long-form works are allowed, but then they have repeatedly nominated works that don’t meet even the most generous interpretations of that criterion².

  Inman and I shared puzzlement that he if he was going to win, he won for Best Digital Comic (because The Oatmeal doesn’t feature long-form works, or characters, or plot; these days it’s mostly a variant on autobiography) and not for Best Short Story (unless voters took his short story — about having his house burn down when he was a kid — as representative of his general work, which is hilarious because by its nature a short story isn’t a long work, and thus wouldn’t qualify for the digital category).

  It’s kind of a mess, it’s going to continue to be kind of a mess until webcomics effectively cease to be considered a different type of comics (a change that can’t come too soon) and it’s frustrating, but Inman was genuinely happy and honored to have a little statue with a spinny globe on it, so that’s all right. Also, work continues apace for this September’s Blerch Runs, which project seems to be making him really happy. Speaking of which, I also ran into Pat Race, whose SDCC Saturday 5K fun run efforts netted five participants, or a 25% growth on last year. Well done, Pat! Keep on racing, Race!

• About the same time I was also lucky enough to spend five minutes chatting with Raina Telgemeier, who is just about a month away from having three books simultaneously on the New York Times graphic novel bestseller list, as Sisters will likely take the top spot, Drama will return as interest in all things Raina peaks again, and Smile hasn’t left the list for more than two years. Everybody that’s ever said Comics is in trouble, comics needs new readers, comics is stagnating needs to shut the hell up. Week after week, new readers (who could become lifelong readers of comics if you would give them something to read) pick up a book by Kazu Kibuishi, or Gene Yang, or Mike Maihack, or Andy Runton, or Dave Roman, or Faith Erin Hicks, or Hope Larson, or Yuko and/or Ananth, or a dozen other names but especially Raina Telgemeier.

  These books are words and pictures; they’re comics and they make reluctant readers into enthusiastic readers and just like that one off panel voice at the beginning of Understanding Comics who protests But you didn’t say anything about Batman³, if you deny that this is where Comics needs to expand its horizons to meet the readers, you need to be frog-marched out of the discussion until you accept the terms of the discussion.

• And then in the afternoon I met Bobak Ferdowsi, and thanked him for his work. He was gracious, and modest, and gave all credit for success to the thousands of people working in concert, but you will never convince me that there isn’t something special about the person in the Flight Director’s chair, the one who has to look at those controllers, with their back rooms of experts, distill down a lot of information and be the one voice to convey the decision: Go or No Go.

  He may be a little puzzled that he wound up as the public face of Mission Control, but he is, and like every controller and director in a line back to Bales, and Aaron, and Craft, and Kranz (look ’em up, their names should be taught to every schoolchild), and thousands of others, he is a goddamn hero and embodies what can be accomplished by people that work hard, work smart, and work together. The timing didn’t work to see if I could have earned my spot in the Flight Operations Center, but I will never be bitter about that as long as the likes of Ferdowsi and his colleagues did make it there.

• We drifted away from comics for a bit there, didn’t we? I did make it to one panel yesterday, as the comics journalists (Heidi Mac, Jill Patozzi, Joshua Yehl, Matt Meylikhov, Rich Johnston, and The Spurge, who I was pleased to finally meet in person) held forth on the news cycle, useless stories, unexpected things that blow up huge, having publishers or editors to run interference for you, and what’s changing about how comics get covered.

  Macdonald, Johnston, and Spurgeon fell into a familiar interaction (having done this panel with each other multiple times), as the various exemplars of old school approaches (Spurgeon especially doesn’t believe in chasing hits or writing for popularity), and Pantozzi, Yehl, and Meylikhov (all of whom are recently into senior or supervisory roles in their outlets) bringing fresh eyes to the discussion. Also, Spurgeon was curmudgeonly in a charming fashion, declaring his biggest desires for his journalistic endeavours were to do better and have a sandwich.

  Unfortunately, time ran out just as Macdonald and Johnston were about to get into it over Johnston’s assertion that he’s not a journalist, so be sure to catch the next time that panel comes around. As the group was clearing out, the next panel was coming in, meaning I got to congratulate Brigid Alverson for her contributions to CBR, which took the Eisner for comics news this weekend; it’s well deserved.

I didn’t personally catch sight of a lot of good cosplay, but here’s link to a Link.

Panels to watch for today:

• Panels and Pictures at noon, 32AB; graphic novels for kids, with Sonny Liew, Emily Carroll, Mike Maihack, Kazu Kibuishi, and Raina Telgemeier
• :01 Books at 3:30, 26AB; Faith Erin Hicks, Gene Luen Yang, Lucy Knisley, and Paul Pope

Spam of the day:

Why couldn’t I uncover this checklist months back when i was looking for it. In any case, I’m glad I have it now. Thanks for sharing.

I dunno, maybe because I wrote it six days ago?

_______________
¹ Okay, and to ask Ian Jones-Quartey when RPG World is coming back; I’m evil.

² Example: Dylan Meconis’s excellent Family Man is an ongoing story with more than 300 pages, and hasn’t been nominated. Dylan Meconis’s Outfoxed is a 22 page one-off and was nominated in 2012. It’s “longform” in the sense that it’s got definite characters and isn’t gag-strip oriented, but that’s it.

And yes, I do talk about Dylan a lot in the context of incorrect decisions by awards voters because her work is awesome and should win everything.

³ McCloud: There’s always one….

The Scholastic/Graphix crowd might be the most polite at SDCC. They had their big party last night, which happened to be about ten floors below my hotel room, and the only time I noticed the noise was a big, happy roar after the mostly-inaudible introduction: mumble mumble Raina Telgemeier!

Classy folks, good neighbors, great books.

I swear I came up with that title before I saw that the first panel listed on Saturday is for The Simpsons.

Saturday Programming
Cartoon Network: Steven Universe
10:00am — 11:00am, offsite
Well, sort of offsite; much like the STRIPPED screening at the Marriott, the Steven Universe panel (with series creator Rebecca Sugar and supervising director Ian Jones-Quartey¹ plus the voices of Steven, Steven’s dad, and all three gems) will be outside the convention center, but part of the show and thus require badged access. In this case, the Hilton Bayfront (that’s the one on the opposite side of the convention center from the Marriott, past the meadow where they line up the Hall H crowd for four days), in the Indigo Ballroom.

Writers Unite: Writing and Pitching Comic Stories
10:00am — 11:00am, Room 25ABC
If you can’t make it to the Bayfront Hilton, this session featuring the ubiquitous Jim Zub looks like a good alternative.

Diversity in Genre Lit
10:00am — 11:00am, Room 7AB
Okay, this is getting spooky; the even more ubiquitous (at least at this show) Gene Luen Yang will be on the panel here …

Avatar the Last Airbender: Legend and Legacy
10:30am — 11:30am, Room 24ABC
And, allegedly, here as well. Okay, at least this isn’t two sessions in exactly the same timeslot like yesterday, but given the distance he’d have to cover to get from 7AB to 24ABC, Yang couldn’t spend more than 20 minutes in the first if he wanted to make the start of the second. Does he know that he’s apparently being shuttled from panel room to panel room all weekend long without so much as a bathroom break? And will we see the ever-elusive triple booking to go with two (and counting) doubles? Let’s find out together!

Berkeley Breathed: The Last Comic-Con Panel!
12:00pm — 1:00pm, Room 9
Whoa. Breathed is almost as reclusive as Watterson. All these influencers on Generation Webcomics are coming out of their cloistered retirements.

Spotlight on Bryan Lee O’Malley
12:00pm — 1:00pm, Room 28DE
Everybody knows that Seconds is out this week, right?

We Are BOOM!
12:30pm — 1:30pm, Room 24ABC
The description starts with a blurb about a deal with 20th Century Fox, and a movie staring Denzel and Marky Mark, but I know I’m not the only one that thinks all of BOOM!s interesting stuff is coming on the all-ages end of things. To that end, I’ll note that Noelle Stevenson of Lumberjanes and the Frank half of Becky and Frank (of numerous Adventure Time backup stories and The Amazing World of Gumball) are the participants what caught my eye.

CBLDF: Banned Comics!
1:00pm — 2:00pm, Room 30CDE
Featuring Gene Luen Yang. I should get a running count of how many panels he’s on. I’m starting to think my kidding about him being held prisoner by the showrunners is more true than I meant it to be.

Spotlight on Lucy Knisley
2:00pm — 3:00pm, Room 28DE
Lucy Knisley is one of the very best creators we have, and the only one that makes me physically hungry reading her work.

30 Years of Usagi Yojimbo!
3:00pm — 4:00pm, Room 28DE
I am sometimes puzzled that you don’t see more written about Usagi Yojimbo until I realize that after three or four months you run out of ways to say Yep, Sakai put together another master class in comics storytelling, art, layout, and pacing. Uhhh-gain. He’s had a hell of a rough year, and I think everybody showing up to give the guy a little love would be an excellent thing.

Comics Journalism: The Hulk Takes a Butt Selfie and You Won’t Believe What Happens Next
6:00pm — 7:00pm, Room 23ABC
My nominee for best panel title of the show.

TeeFury-Practicing Nichecraft: Marketing & Brand Development for Independent Artists
6:30pm — 7:30pm, find it yourself
Seriously? They gave a self-promotion panel to frickin’ TeeFury? It is the end times.

Best and Worst Manga of 2014
7:00pm — 8:00pm, Room 23ABC
Props to my buddies Brigid Alverson, Christopher Butcher, and David Brothers (and also Deb Aoki, who I don’t know personally but whose writing I find smart and insightful) for sharing their wisdom so late in the day when by rights they should be at a bar enjoying a well-earned drink or eight.

Sunday Programming
Panels & Pictures
12:00pm — 1:00pm, Room 32AB
There’s some counter-intuitive staffing on this panel devoted to graphic novels for kids. Kazu Kibuishi, Raina Telgemeier, Mike Maihack, Sonny Liew (artist of The Shadow Hero, written by Gene Luen Yang, who will apparently be in a coma at this point since he’s not on the panel) all make sense … the curveball comes from the inclusion of Emily Carroll, whose work I absolutely adore, but never thought as for kids. Then again, kids love to have the bejabbers scared out of ’em, so I can see them eating her stuff up. Well done, panel organizers!

All-Ages Comics Have Arrived
1:00pm — 2:00pm, Room 24ABC
Gene Luen Yang will be dragged from the medically-induced coma that he’s been in for the past twelve hours long enough to talk with the likes of Dave Roman, Ian McGinty, Dave Petersen, and moderator Shannon Watters.

Fund My Comic
2:00pm — 3:00pm, Room 29A
Everything I said about the Kickstarter panel on Thursday would also apply here, except they included Kel McDonald on this one. Still offering that dollar to successful crowdfunders to attend.

Keenspot 2014: Giant-Size Panel of Pure Weirdness
3:00pm — 4:00pm, Room 4
The blurb says this is the 14th year for the Keenspot panel and that sounds about right. What caught my attention was the inclusion of DJ Coffman, who we haven’t seen in the webcomics scene for some time. Interesting times we live in.

First Second in Conversation
3:30pm — 4:30pm, Room 26AB
Readers of this page know I stand second to no man in my admiration of :01 Books, and they’ve got four of their very best in conversation: Paul Pope, Faith Erin Hicks, Lucy Knisley, and the restless ghost of Gene Luen Yang. This is my fourth must-attend of the weekend, and if I’ve got my math right, Yang’s eighth panel of the show. If you see him on the floor, maybe pass him some snacks?

Spam of the day:

In just the woman previous ones coming via our lawmakers yet optional places of work, Gurus if i could truthfully come with the actual most jane’s seminars elizabeth LBJ program relating to arrest important affairs collage tx of, Precisely your sweetheart learned.

You know how artificial language-construction systems are getting to the point where they can persuasively simulate like a 13 year old Ukrainian kid? Yeah, this was apparently written by a system that simulates a drunken libertarian brand marketer.

_______________
¹ I’ll give you a dollar if you ask him when RPG World is coming back.

The sun set on one Jim Zub project today, as the reboot of Makeshift Miracle (story, as always, by Zub, with redone art by Shun Hong Chan) reached its conclusion today. Now that the entire story is there, I hope that Zub will put the original back up, so we can compare the two versions, page by page. Zub may not like his original (and ten years less-assured) artwork for Makeshift Miracle, but I thought it had some real charm. An authentic this is coming from a singular POV and it different from other stories character, if you will.

Regardless, this is the Hardest Working Man In Comics, so he can’t wrap up a project (even one where most of the lifting was already done) without having new ones to take up every moment of his waking life. In addition to Skullkickers rampaging towards its fifth-arc conclusion¹, and Samurai Jack has been extended again², and nobody³ can find an issue of Figment #2, Zub will be launching another creator-owned series next month.

Here’s the deal: Zub has become a damn hot writer (for more different publishers than I can count) on all kinds of different stories (fantasy humor; all ages; character studies; licensed characters) and achieved some pretty broad name recognition over the past couple of years. He got there because he’s been working his ass off for the past decade, and honing his craft every. single. day.

Not everything he writes is to my liking⁴, but he has become a writer for whom it is always appropriate to give the benefit of the doubt. I will read at least issue #1 of anything Zub writes, and so far I’ve got about an 80% conversion rate to being an ongoing reader of whatever comes after #1. I didn’t need to be told that Wayward is getting compared to Buffy to make a mental note to put it on my pull list; the magic words were Written by Jim Zub.

I’m mentioning this because even though Zub’s got the magic touch, it’s possible to get caught short. Marvel is scrambling to take Figment back to press because the demand was far greater than retailers figured (cf: I can’t find a copy), and I have a feeling the same thing could happen to Wayward. If you like good comics, if you’re willing to bet the cost of one moderately fancy drink at Starbucks that it’ll be worth your while, now is the time to tell your local comic shop. New titles rarely get generously ordered (cf: once more, Figment), and the more demand that’s seen now, in advance of release, the greater chance we have of a) all getting a copy; b) Image sees the value in a creator-owned title, the economics of which are fraught with risk and fear.

I don’t ask y’all for much, and this is really for your benefit as much as it is for one of the most frighteningly-skilled writers in comics today. Check the previews and read what people who’ve seen advance copies have to say. Decide whether your money is better spent on yet another renumbering or line-wide crossover that will change everything (until next month) or something new. Then tell your local shop, I need a copy of Wayward when it launches. Do it for the children.

And just maybe, if Wayward hits big and Figment continues to grow and Samurai Jack becomes an ongoing, and skulls continue to be kicked … maybe Zub will let himself take a day off.

Nahhhhh.

Spam of the day:

mean median mode and range

You may be a spammer trying to con people into buying counterfeit boner pills, but if you know statistics you’re still my people.

_______________
¹ And I can’t find the recently-released #28 anywhere, dammit.

² Remember, it was originally going to be a five-issue miniseries; it’s now going to at least issue #20.

³ Including me, again dammit. I’m not even entirely sure which nostalgic Disney property it’s based on, I’m buying this because Zub got me hooked and I want to see where it goes.

⁴ But that goes for all of the comics creators I follow, with the exceptions of Jeff Smith, Terry Moore, and Raina Telgemeier. Everything they write I love.

Very little going on today, except for a repeat story that I feel bears mentioning again, mostly because it reminds me of the best that can result from the unmediated proximity of creators and audience.

KB Spangler writes and draws A Girl And Her Fed¹, as well as prose novels set in the same world². Some also know that she writes perhaps the most hilarious³ home-renovation blog known to humanity. It’s sporadic because the immense amount of work her home requires would leave any rational person unable to muster the energy to type.

I mention this because (off the top of my head) her house (which was inspected — twice! — prior to purchase and given a clean bill of health) has required:

• tree removal to prevent dead trees from falling destroying the house
• extensive landscaping to redirect water runoff away from the foundation before it destroys the house
• rebuilding of load-bearing structures in the basement to prevent the destruction of the house
• redigging of the drainage system so that the sump pumps don’t direct water directly back into the basement, which could undermine the foundation and destroy the house
• repeated use of chemicals that rightly belong on the list of some international convention against WMDs to remove ivy that threatens to overrun all and possibly destroy the house
• extensive repairwork to a long-neglected pool so it doesn’t spontaneously burst and destroy the house
• a moderately uneasy coexistence with a six foot long snake in the attic

I mention that last one because it’s the one that doesn’t keep her up at night wondering if it wouldn’t be simpler to fake her death and head for Mexico. Also because a it at least removes the possibility of mice as an annoyance. All of this was before she and her husband had to have Hired Dudes out of the house to determine what it would cost keep an entire corner of it from spontaneously sinking into the earth. Answer: all of the money.

In times like this, when you are watching every bit of money you and your spouse make go to keep a roof literally over your head and not collapsing around your ears, there is only one thing to do: give away your work. Because Spangler gives away her ebooks if readers can’t afford them [no permalink]:

Brown and I just spent a hell of a lot of money to keep our house from falling in on itself, and I know on days like this I could really use a free story or two. If your house is falling in, or if the bills are adding up, email me. Tell me which .pdfs you want. If you feel awkward about it, don’t. Pride shouldn’t keep you from stories. Just tell a friend, or leave a review, or buy a copy when you’re back on your feet.

So this is me telling you all that Spangler’s stories are well worth the very small amount that she asks of those that can afford it, and should you choose to purchase them you are not merely helping her keep that benighted roof over her head, you are helping others that really need a story and can’t afford one. I’ve mentioned her generosity before, but I’m mentioning it again because it’s worth mentioning.

Spam of the day:

¤Î2013-14ÄêÇﶬ¥³¥ì¥¯¥·¥ç¥ó¤¬¥ß¥é¥Î¤Ç°k±í¤µ¤ì¤¿¡£¥Æ©`¥Þ¤Ï¥í¥¦?¥¨¥ì¥¬¥ó¥¹(Raw Elegance)¡£¥·¥ç©`¤¬¥¹¥¿©`¥È¤¹¤ë¤È¡¢»áˆö¤Î±Ú¤ÎËÄ·½¤ËÓ³¤·³ö¤µ¤ì¤¿Ã¨¤äÅ®ÐÔ¡¢¥Õ¥¡¥ó¤Î¥·¥ë¥¨¥Ã¥È¤¬Ò»”Ť˄Ӥ¤À¤·¡¢¹¤ˆö¤ÎŽüÐæ¤ò˼¤ï¤»¤ë¤è¤¦¤Ê¥ß¥¹¥Æ¥ê¥¢¥¹¤Ê냇ìšÝ¤ÎÖС¢

A little trite, but still some insight there.

_______________
¹ AKA My buddy, Otter, and obligatory disclaimer: I wrote the foreword for her first AGAHF collection on account of I not only love her work, we’re friends in the no questions I need bail at 3:00am sense of the word.

² Which she’s spent considerable time and effort to get converted to Braille so that vision-impaired readers can read her books instead of just passively listen to an audiobook.

³ In a laugh-so-you-don’t-cry sense.

Received in the mail today: one copy of Meredith Gran’s latest Octopus Pie collection, Dead Again. I can’t wait to read it tonight¹; I think this is the pivot pint where Gran went from Damn good comic take on life to Amazingly revealing examination of our lives and times (with jokes). Highest recommendation.

• Statistically speaking, Danielle Corsetto will be coming to a place near you this summer, as she heads off on a ten-year stippiversary signing tour of more than 20 cities. Naturally, such an undertaking requires time, planning, and plenty of gas-and-toll money (if my map-reading skills are up to par, she’ll be passing through 30 different states, with stops in 18 of them across a period of six weeks and some 14,500 km).

  And yet her biggest concern is having enough money to pay artists to put up guest strips in her absence, so she’s Kickstarting the whole shebang and has hit about 75% funding in the past four hours or so. She won’t be getting rich on this tour, and considering six weeks away means six weeks of not working on strips that could fill her next book or other merch that would pay for little things like rent and groceries, it seems like a break-even proposition at best. Giving a few bucks to this campaign isn’t to benefit Corsetto — it’s to benefit your fellow fans. Just sayin’.

• One place that Corsetto won’t hit on her tour (mostly because she’ll be back home for a month by the time it rolls around): SPX in Bethesda, Maryland (but that doesn’t mean she won’t hit it after her tour). But lots of other people will be, and I went down the initial exhibitor list to see which creators you might want to make plans to see. As always, this is a preliminary listing, produced by scanning more than 700 names, so my apologies if I’ve missed anybody. That being said, webcomickers and natural allies at the show will include:

  Amanda Lafrenais, Ananth Panagariya & Yuko Ota, Audrey & Jamie Noguchi, Blue Delliquanti, Box Brown, Braden Lamb & Shelli Paroline, C Spike Trotman, Carla Speed McNeil, Christopher Hastings, Danielle Corsetto (told you), Darryl Ayo, Dave Roman, David McGuire, Dean Trippe, Drew Weing, Dustin Harbin, Eric Colossal, Evan Dahm, Jess Fink, John Green, Julia Wertz, Katie Sekelsky, KC Green, Kel McDonald, Kory Bing …

  [inhale]

  … Madeleine Flores, Magnolia Porter, Matthew Bennardo, Meredith Gran, MK Reed, Molly Ostertag, Monica Ray, Phil McAndrew, Rachel Dukes, Raina Telgemeier, Rebecca Mock, Sara McHenry, Shmorky, Sophie Goldstein, Sylvan Migdal, Tom McHenry, Tom Siddell, and Tony Breed, not to mention your Firsts Second, Topatos Co, Tops Shelf, and other quality publishers. Drop by and tell ’em you enjoy their work.

_______________
¹ Or, more properly, reread it, since I read each of these strips as they updated, and frequently went back to read entire story arcs because they’re that good.

Oh my goodness I’m not sure which of these surprises I should share first. Coin flip! Okay!

• Raina Telgemeier — previously noted on this page (and all other pages that matter) as one of our cartooning national treasures — graphic novelist par excellence and 100-week New York Times bestselling author, must have gotten a thrill this morning on seeing some respect thrown her way by that most establishment of all cultural endeavours, the syndicated comics page.

  Smile got some love from Mark Tatulli¹ Heart of the City strip for today², and given the setup of Heart and her mom arguing about whether graphic novels count as book books, may continue to have its praises sung for the next day or so. I’m guessing that Telgemeier has got to be feeling pretty great right about now.

• About ten months ago, in the dead of the night, the greatest thing known to mankind up to that time was unleashed on an unsuspecting world. I speak, naturally of Tom McHenry’s Horse Master: The Game of Horse Mastery, which laid bare essential lessons about the nature of life, and horses, and the importance of mastering your horse. I’m proud to say that I joined the ranks of Horse Masters, and I have the bleeding stump of a little finger³ to prove it.

  Literally and without any exaggeration whatsoever, life could not be any better than when one is horse-mastering.

  Until now, at least for those going to TCAF this weekend, for McHenry has been busy:

  In case you missed it last night, this is a thing that exists for TCAF

  3 glow in the dark buttons, a completely unnecessary full-color instruction manual, the whole game on a horse-shaped USB drive.

  All in this stylish #HorseMaster box: pic.twitter.com/8FNsDIzMGV

  Then I wept, for I am not going to TCAF. But then McHenry assuaged my grief⁴:

  Ordering info for non-TCAF goers will come soon!

  And there was much rejoicing, and the pupae of horses everywhere did swell with quickening tendrils, waiting for the day they could ripen, and escape, and feed.

_______________
¹ Tatulli actually does two strips and while Heart of the City is pretty okay, his silent and subversive Liō may be the most brilliant thing left in syndication.

² That link may go away in the future, so please enjoy the permanently-linked version at the top of this page.

³ Not to mention a drug habit, criminal record, and seared-in memories of too many teeth in a gaping maw to go along with it. These are the prices of ascending to the political and social elite.

⁴ And coincidentally probably removed the need on my part to physically harm one or more of the friends that would go to TCAF, for a true Horse Master would let nothing stand in his or her way of obtaining this treasure; not family, not friendship, not blood. Oh glob, so much blood.

Relatively quiet weekend, relatively busy Monday. Let’s do this.

• Oh my, that blew up further than I thought it would; the last four days of Smut Peddler 2014 were in the top six days of the full campaign, and the final total just cleared US$185K, for creator bonuses of a staggering $US1700. Well done Spike, and everybody that loves the porns. Which, based upon the previous SP collection and the Sleep of Reason collection, leads us to the conclusion that porn is 2.8599 times as popular as horror.
• Speaking of Kickstarts, the latest book from Johnny Wander creators Yuko Ota and Ananth Panagariya¹ has just gone up, meaning you’ve got a chance to get a copy of Cuttings in a handsome hardcover, or an even-handsomer limited-edition hardcover. It would appear that this collection also includes perhaps my favorite Ota/Panagariya collaboration: PONY COP. Everybody jump on this so I can get PONY COP in a handsome hardcover book, please. As of this writing, Cuttings is just shy of 40% of the way to goal, which is just shy of 60% too little. Step it up, people. Do it for the children.
• TCAF, one of the best shows on the comics show calendar, runs this weekend in a now certified crack-smokin’-mayor-free Toronto. Today, the full programming slate was released, with multiple tracks of goodness packing the two days. There’s a full track for children (Kean Soo! Jeff Smith! Dave Roman! Ben Hatke! Raina Telgemeier!² Kazu Kibuishi! And many more!), a Canadian reading series (Tony Cliff! Karl Kerschl!Jillian & Mariko Tamaki! And more!), round tables and interviews and profiles (Lynn Johnston! Chip Zdarsky! Jeet Heer! Box Brown! Spike! Katie Shanahan! Rachel Duke! Mike Maihack! Noelle Stevenson! Kate Leth! Tom Spurgeon! Heidi Macdonald! Kate Beaton! Meredith Gran! KC Green! Tom McHenry! Jess Fink! Faith Erin Hicks! Becky Cloonan! Cameron Stewart! Becky Dreistadt! Ryan North!), and, of course, George.

  If you think I’m linking to anybody other than the mononymic George, you’re crazy.

• Not to do with Kickstarts, Cuttings, cats, or comics arts festivals, and possibly my even mentioning it could spiral out of control and cause the creator in question to ‘splode, but what the heck: Randy Milholland has heard the plaintive cries of his many fans and lo he has smiled upon us. There are finally — even now, unto the seventh generation we have waited — concrete plans for the first Something*Positive collection.

  It is a long way off, and will involve a lot of work on Milholland’s part, which means that everybody that’s ever wanted a copy had better be prepared to step the crap up and make a purchase³ when the time comes.

  And there was much rejoicing.

_______________
¹ Who were apparently cats all this time. Who knew?

² Speaking of Telgemeier, she’s just reached an astonishing 100 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list for Smile. Wowzers.

³ I am speaking here directly to the many, many people that have bitched to Randy over the years that because he did a donation drive to quit his day job and draw the strip a decade ago that they are entitled to as much free entertainment as they see fit to demand from him. Without fail, these people are never in Milholland’s records as actually having donated, but they have a massive sense of entitlement anyway. Time to quit the passive-aggressive games and prepare to finally drop some cash, fakers.