After a long comedy of errors, it appears that Issue #3 has finally gone to press. It should ship
on Monday and be in comic stores worldwide on Wednesday the 17th, on the 24th at absolute latest.
The Online Store is now open for preorders, which will ship as soon as I
receive the promos.
Library Party!
Jim Ottaviani of Two Fisted Science fame
and I gave a library talk about comics today. It rocked. We had tons of fun. The librarians at
the Ann Arbor District Library actually said “We’ve
never had an audience laugh that hard at a Library presentation before!” I even got another gig
out of it – this time for Teen Read Week in October. This year’s theme is “Get Graphic at your
Library!”, so you can imagine how happy this makes us comics folks.
While Jim O won’t be joining me for any other talks on the schedule (yet), I must encourage any
librarians or teachers who are reading this and considering asking one or the other of us to talk
at their library or school to have us both in for a simultaneous presenation. We’re much more
fun as a package deal. You can email me or Jim if you’re interested.
Wizard World!
I made it home from Wizard World Chicago in one piece.
Normally, this wouldn’t have been an issue, except for the fact that I did a 23-hour roadtrip to
get there. It went like this: Get up at 5am. Shower. Pack last minute essentials. Fill self
to brim with caffeinated beverages hot and cold. Pee. Get in car and drive 4 hours nonstop to
Chicago, only obeying the speed limit in Indiana where the cops are nazis and I’ve been ticketed
before. Arrive at Wizard World Chicago armed with 200 free copies of Vögelein #2, fliers,
stickers and posters. Give away hundreds of copies of the comic. Talk to every retailer that
carries Independent comics. Grovel before the feet of Terry Moore, Mark Crilley, Steve
Leiber, Ted Nafieh, Jill Thompson, and Mark Smylie, Chris Staros and James Kochalka . Snag freebie
comics from Paul Sizer. Try my
damndest not to drool like a knockneed schoolgirl over Carla Speed McNeil’s original art. Buy copy of, and last page of, Talisman TPB.
Go out to dinner via the eL with Pam
Bliss, Rachel Hartman,Speed and CatBoy,Layla Lawlor, and three other people
whose names I promptly forgot after being introduced — it was that kind of night . We were led
through the wilds of Chicago by the intrepid Tim Broderick,
who directed us to a faaabulous Thai restaurant. Get back in car at 11pm. Fill self to brim with
caffeinated beverages hot and cold. Pee. Drive like hell, ignoring Indiana speed limits. Arrive
in caffeinated stupor at 4am.
I had a great freaking time. Next year, however, a booth — and a hotel room — is positively in
order.
I really had no idea what a real comicon was like. I had nothing to compare it to — I’d only
been to the Detroit Shows before. Motor City ComicCon is … nice and all, but, well, it just
can’t compare to the kind of media orgy that WWC stages. Maybe I can even do SDCC next year.
Wahoo.
Tart Preview!
Okay, so the wonderful folks over at Sequential Tart have done an awesome new preview of Vögelein #3 in the Tart
Teaser section of their June issue. They wanted exclusive material, so I have removed the
previews of #3 from the site, but never fear – you can hop on over to their Tart Teaser here. There are also two
never before seen pages in their preview, so you can see them before you buy them!
Midsummer Night’s Dream
Last night I went to a performance of Midsummer Night’s Dream at Nichols Arboretum in Ann Arbor. It was absolutely
breathtaking.
For those not in the know, Nichols Arboretum, locally known as “The Arb”, is a hundred- acre park
smack dab in the middle of Ann Arbor. It’s cultivated, yes, and a bit organized, and there
are fire hydrants here and there, but it’s pretty fairly wild. It ranges from heavy woods
to riverbank to a valley with amazing vistas – and the play took place in all those places. You
see, when the scene changes, the scene changes. The audience gets up and hikes to the next
location, and the players often run along in their midst, and sometimes act whole extra scenes as
they go.
Entire scenes take place in gigantic old cypress trees. They’ve hired a troop of children, from
those almost too small to walk to teenagers, and painted them up as faeries. They hide in the
scenery, tittering throughout the performance, so you know that the woods have eyes.
Occasionally, they pelt the onlookers with grass and sticks, or hoot with noisemakers and faerie
wands. Puck was in triplicate – they had three young women in tatterdemalion to play him, and it
came off perfectly. Robin Goodfellow was a writhing, trilling mass of mischief, and seemed to be
everywhere at once.
The night I saw the performance, it rained heavily (and I mean heavily) two hours before
the first act. Almost magically, the clouds rolled back, and left The Arb in the lusty, golden
mist that only comes after an evening thunderstorm. Everything was coated in a thin, soft gauzy
haze of fog, and covered with dewdrops.
In addition to the help from Mother Nature, the actors were amazing, and completely willing to
fling one another around the scenery. It was easy to hear and see everyone on stage, which was
good, because facial expressions played a huge part in the acting.
There will be additional performances June 15 at 7pm, June 16th at 3pm. June 20, 21, 22 at 7pm
and June 23 at 3pm. Tickets are $10 at the Washington Heights entrance to the Arb. Given the
movies I’ve seen recently, your money will be far better spent here. Bottom line: If you’re
within driving distance of Ann Arbor, go. Go tonight, if you can. Bring everyone you know.
Word of Advice
Ladies, if you’re buying a bike in the near future, blow the extra $30 and get yourself a
girl-specific saddle. You won’t regret the purchase.
Geeky girls.
So my buddy Jen and I went to see Star Wars: Attack of the Clones. I won’t bore you with my
review, as I generally didn’t like the movie that well. Everyone who’s seen the movie already
knows what the film’s one truly redeeming moment is, and everyone who hasn’t seen it shouldn’t
have the surprise spoilt for them. But I will say this: Jen, me, and everyone else I’ve talked
to agree that the big-guy fight scene in SW:ATC knocked the socks off the one between Gandalf and
Saruman in Lord of the Rings.
Tolja I was a geek.
Vögelein Supporter Saaaa-lute!*
One of the super nice guys who bought extra copies of Vögelein at Motor City this year
emailed me so that he wouldn’t have to languish in obscurity in the post below. Belated
greetings and thankyous to Tim Hunt and his buddy Jeff, who went out of their way to make sure
other people heard about my little windup faerie.
* Say it like you’re on Hee Haw, y’all.
Purty Stickers!
They’re swag! They’re Free! Now you get free Vögelein stickers with each and every order
from Vögelein.com. Send me a SASE and get one for free, or 4 if you
send me a dollar. You can get a sticker of the promo poster, the covers to issues one and two, or
pin-ups of the Duskie and Vögelein. I won’t add them to the PayPal store because the images,
kinds of sticker back and sizes are going to change at my whim…. they’re freebies, after all.
Motor City is oooover.
Motor City Comicon was a total blast. Got to meet and greet many wonderful folks, including Wendi and Sean Strang-Frost, Pam Bliss, Matt
Feazell, Maureen Honoré,
Sean Bieri, Suzanne Baumann, Jen Hachigan, Paul Sizer and of course, Jim Ottaviani. How grand it was to finally put
faces with the names of folks I’ve been emailing with for months now!
For some reason, I got stuck far, far away from most of the crew, who were all arranged in an
enviable line of small-press solidarity. Still and all, they were directly across from Porn
Alley, so at least I didn’t have to look at …ahem… augmented boobies all weekend. Instead, I
was waaaay over by all the TV talent, so I got to see all the costumes… most of which were
actually quite good this time around.
I would be very out of place if I didn’t take time to thank all the wonderful folks who stopped
by: Loren and crew from the WEF, Stacy Durham (Bring your work next time!) from Garden City,
Steven Bates from Bookery Fantasy, Shane
Goodfellow, who came in all the way from Sarnia, Brian “B” Johnson, whom I haven’t seen in
literally five years; Gary Bratzel, Mike Bellinger, and Dave, Sabrina and Diana Harlan-Stein who
all came by to visit; my “Warehousing Agent” Sol Foster who lugged along 2 extra boxes of
Vögelein comics just in case I ran out; and the guys (whose names have been lost to me in
the post-con mental blur! Sorry! Email me if you’re them!!) who bought extra issues of the comic
to take back to their LCS so they could help hype my book. All you guys make it totally worthwhile
to keep working on the book. Thanks for the support!
Dinner on Friday (La Shish) and Saturday (KING OF SUSHI!) was grand. Conversation drifted from
the odd to the downright wierd, but was always fun. Hanging at the sports bar with the crew on
Saturday was grand as well – lots of sketching and bad jokes.
I got tons of minis from authors I’d never read before, and have fallen head-over-heels for Sean
Bieri’s Cool Jerk and Homo Gal. Other good picks were Jen Hachigian’s Lore, the new
Johnny Public(Where’s the trade? huh? huh?! GET CRACKING!) Pam Bliss’ B-36 and
Hopelessly Lost Steve Leiber’s Me and Edith Head and this totally amazing new book
I just found called “Infinite Kung-Fu” -Kung Fu fightin’ ZOMBIES. I mean, come on – Kung
fu, Zombies, how much more do you need out of life?
All round- a grand show.