And now, today’s Meditation for the Comic Creator:
I’ll aim…comics at a wide, media-literate mainstream audience and slowly but surely help generate that audience, just like you. I’ll continue to learn from stuff I think breaks new ground. If at the moment I think comics aren’t being sexy enough or FuturePop enough or incendiary enough, I’ll attempt to fill the gap with the sort of thing I want to read.
Grant Morrison, interviewed by Warren Ellis.
Watch this, it’s only 15 minutes:
Where will you find your time? What will you do with your cognitive surplus? I have definite plans for mine. Big plans.
[My Leap Year is a 12-month life project (begun 11/01/07) at the end of which I intend to be writing full-time. 365 small steps = 1 giant leap.]
I had insomnia a couple nights ago. It’s a doubled-edged sword for me, and can be both a blessing and a curse.
The blessing: good time for creativity. This time I worked out the entire premise for my Zuda entry. Last time–a couple months ago–I was hit with the concept for an entire line of nonfiction books which I have since begun work on.
The curse: no sleep. I’m too tired the next day, or sometimes the next couple days, to immediately geto to work on whatever creative inspiration I had that night.
[My Leap Year is a 12-month life project (begun 11/01/07) at the end of which I intend to be writing full-time. 365 small steps = 1 giant leap.]
Well, it was a little over a week ago, but NYCC was fun. Friend Mark Sable’s own con report has put my lack of posting to shame with its thoroughness. It might have been my favorite con I’ve attended to date. The combination of all the publishers, almost none of the Hollywood, the still-manageable size, catching up with old friends, meeting new friends, planting seeds, perhaps seeing a few seeds sprout and being back in NY for a little while was a good one.
Conventions are a lot of walking. I always know this in my head, but my body seems to forget the actuality of it until I’m there. I’ve decided that this summer at SDCC I’m going to do a pedometer experiment. I’m going to wear a pedometer the entire weekend and see just how much walking I do. From stepping off the train and walking to the hotel to getting back on the train again. I think the numbers will be surprising.
But like I said, a good convention. After a bit of a lull, I’m starting to feel like this whole Leap Year project is truly going to pay off.
Oh yes, and I’m now on Twitter.
A collection of modern parables from some of the world’s best independent animators, web artists and comic creators. From personal introspectives to fantastic fictions, each short tale provides its own unique glimpse of the elusive (and eternal) truths of life. The result is a rich volume full of faith, love, grace and beautiful sequential art. Features my story UNCOMMON with artist Caroline Parkinson.
There is also an interview with artist Caroline up on the Parable website, wherein she talks a bit about our collaboration. You can also get a peek at a page from the story.
In stores November 2008 from Viper Comics.
More work in the Eagle, Eisner and Harvey Award nominated anthology!
This time it’s the PLUMMET flash comic with artist Daniel LaFrance, which you saw first on this very site, as well as the 8-page FILLING IN THE GAPS with artist Carlos de Anda. The latter was completed years ago (maybe as many as five, now that I think of it), but this is the first time it will ever see print anywhere. It has been edited since then, but was only the second comic script I had ever written.
Again, no specific release date yet. May or June.
Reprints my story PAPER CUTS, a 16-page “autobiographantasy” with artist Noel Tuazon exploring the strange relationship between man and advertising.
I do not have an exact release date, but probably early next month. I will update you when I know more.
Incidentally, the solicitation art above is by Michael Peters, another friend and collaborator. He’s hard at work on his creator-owned book Crescent City Magick, but hopefully when that’s finished you’ll get to see our short story PERSPECTIVE.
[My Leap Year is a 12-month life project (begun 11/01/07) at the end of which I intend to be writing full-time. 365 small steps = 1 giant leap.]
It’s been over a month since I’ve updated this blog, and I promise I’m appropriately embarrassed.
You’ve probably noticed that, as of today, the site has a new look. The header is art is from a project in the works titled Jenny Somenumber. Pencils and inks by Michael Nigro, letters by Patrick Foster, colors unknown until I can get more organized. I’m also most of the way through a massive updating of the Comic Creator Services page. All those dead or outdated links are fixed ,deleted or updated.
I have several new projects on their way to stores, and will be putting those up in just a few minutes.
I will also be winging my way to New York Comic Con this weekend. It will be my first time at this particular convention…should be interesting!
I’ve been thinking about this article by Kevin Kelly (who’s been mentioned before on this blog) ever since I read it on Thursday. I think everyone interesting in a career as a creative in the 21st century should read it:
It’s particularly interesting to me this year because of my focus on wanting to be making a living with my writing by November 1st
This my first flash fiction since November. It’s good to be back. This is also the first of these originally written out longhand. Enjoy!
FROM WHITE TO NOTHING
The first time he saw her was only for a second. He was just a kid, deep in a magnolia tree, trying to find a branch high enough and sturdy enough that he could make the jump onto Brian’s second story roof. When Brian said something, he looked over his shoulder and glimpsed her standing next to his friend before immediately having to return his attention to his precarious perch. Once he got his bearings again she was gone. When he mentioned her, Brian had no idea who he was talking about. She had been wearing the color white like it was clothing.
She was never the same color twice.
She was the red of blood behind a thin membrane when she slid into his bed and between his dreams and consciousness. He was thirteen then and would be able to perfectly recall the sensation of her breath against the hollow behind his ear for decades to come.
When he graduated college she was a blue so pure he couldn’t understand it. She was summer yellow the day he married. He saw her each time his wife was pregnant, her own belly rounded with potential. She was a different shade of green for each child.
She made many appearances through the years. She never spoke and, other than that first conversation with Brian, he never spoke about her. She was his private and perpetual mystery.
Now he lies on his final bed, slipping between waking and sleeping in an unnoticeable manner. A thin plastic tube is part of his respiratory system. Little more than phantoms, people come and go at the edge of his reality. But when she arrives she’s solid and real. Almost painfully so. She’s the color of empty and nothingness. So much so that she doesn’t exist.
But he no longer exists, either. Now he’s her mystery.
