Hark! A Vagrant:

I drew this comic on paper for the first time in a while! Feels good. While working on kids books, I was on the digital tablet out of habit.

When you draw comics you get asked a lot about process! Writing and research are big parts of my job, but here is the on-paper bit. It is not really fancy, it is a very light pencil and inks on top, because I want to retain the gesture and expression of the first intuitive line. That’s my strength, so I try to focus on it. We all have a strength! I don’t think we all need to be the greatest artists of all time, but if you’re good at a few key things, go for it, and be proud of that.

I use a regular ole pencil

and a thick paper like bristol

and one of these see through graph rulers (you can get them wherev)

Copic markers for washes (you can also get these wherev, any art stores around you really. Copic is the best kind so they are pricier).

and these brush pens from Jetpens. Every other brush pen (except the Pentel Pocket pen which is also good) drives me insane and most are just BAD. This one keeps a hard tip with a lot of flexibility so it is best.

I should use brushes and inks but I don’t out of habit! Before I had a studio, I would make comics in coffee shops and libraries, so I was carting everything around. I also still like to sit in a ball with the pad of paper on my knees. I have a desk I should be doing all this on but that is where I like to put my garbage.

While on book tour, I visited Salem and got to see the House of Seven Gables! So I am pumped on Hawthorne. How many people have had to read this and suffer essays over the pink ribbons and etc? I used to think that for literature to be REAL it pretty well had to be chock-full of allegory and symbols. But for real, I do love it when my comics get used in a classroom setting, and I often hear from teachers who do that to warm the class up to a topic. That’s great! I should ask for a list of books to cover for this reason. Feel free to email, teachers!

Scroll down on the main site for PONY NEWS

Oh my gosh, it’s Fat Pony!

topatoco:

Hey Fat Pony what’s u-
Uhhhh… hey Fat Pony… we really need you to stay here….
FAT PONY OH NO!!!!!!!!!!!!!
W-Wait, what’s this note???
November 2nd…? What could possibly be happening on that date?
AND WHERE HAS FAT PONY GONE!?

(via topatoco)

Old Finnish People With Things On Their Heads - Lara Sanchez →

god yes

Someone finally made it to the Topatoco warehouses (1200 of them, that is). We will have a launch date announcement asap!

I read this book ages ago, it piqued my interest in the event depicted on the title plate, described on these three pages. I found the book again looking through Archive.org. (link)

For a more in depth look, check out the wiki on Joseph Howe’s Libel Trial.

FREEDOM OF THE PRESS!

If you aren’t watching Greg Edwards aka Sparky Sweets PhD then you are missing out on being a smarter and more entertained person.

smithsonianlibraries:

To the chronicle of false chronicles we can add The Amber Witch. In the mid 1800s, Author Wilhelm Meinhold claimed to have discovered a 17th century manuscript written by a minister during the Thirty Years’ War. In it, the minister recounts the accusation of witchcraft levied against his daughter by a scorned suitor. Meinhold later revealed it had been an elaborate literary hoax. His skills in forgery and attention to historic detail was so good that many still did not believe it was fictitious.
Speaking of skills, the image of a book cover for The Amber Witch comes via Examples of Bookbinding executed by Robt.Rivière & Son (1920), an exhibition catalog from the Leipzig Exhibition in 1914, just weeks before the outbreak of WWI. The Riviere Bindery (now subsumed into Bayntun-Riviere) was a productive and well known bindery in London for almost a century and works from the bindery can be found in many rare book libraries today. The introduction amounts to a footnote in WWI history, describing the fortunate turn of events that saved the books from destruction.

I was joking with Dad on the phone about how our neighbour Flora Gillis always saved a “little treat” for him when he took us around on Halloween, so I drew it up. Flora was one of the best. I hope you all have a nice and spooky halloween!

Click through for the comic, it’s one of the tall ones

(Some of) the best picture books of 2015

kidlit:

Imaginary Fred (written by Eoin Colfer, illustrated by Oliver Jeffers)
Sometimes, with a little electricity, or luck, or even magic, an imaginary friend might appear when you need one. An imaginary friend like Fred. Fred floated like a feather in the wind until Sam, a lonely little boy, wished for him and, together, they found a friendship like no other.
The Princess and the Pony (written and illustrated by Kate Beaton)
Princess Pinecone knows exactly what she wants for her birthday this year. A BIG horse. A STRONG horse. A horse fit for a WARRIOR PRINCESS! But when the day arrives, she doesn’t quite get the horse of her dreams…
The Bear and the Piano (written and illustrated by David Litchfield)
One day, a young bear stumbles upon something he has never seen before in the forest. As time passes, he teaches himself how to play the strange instrument, and eventually the beautiful sounds are heard by a father and son who are picnicking in the woods. The bear goes with them on an incredible journey to New York, where his piano playing makes him a huge star. He has fame, fortune and all the music in the world, but he misses the friends and family he has left behind.
This is Sadie (written by Sara O’Leary, illustrated by Julie Morstad)
Sadie is a little girl with a big imagination. She has been a girl who lived under the sea and a boy raised by wolves. She has had adventures in wonderland and visited the world of fairytales. She whispers to the dresses in her closet and talks to birds in the treetops. She has wings that take her anywhere she wants to go, but that always bring her home again. She likes to make things – boats out of boxes and castles out of cushions. But more than anything Sadie likes stories, because you can make them from nothing at all.
Interstellar Cinderella (written by Deborah Underwood, illustrated by Meg Hunt)
Once upon a planetoid,
amid her tools and sprockets,
a girl named Cinderella dreamed
of fixing fancy rockets.
With a little help from her fairy godrobot, Cinderella is going to the ball! But when the prince’s ship has mechanical trouble, someone will have to zoom to the rescue.
Bug in a Vacuum (written and illustrated by Mélanie Watt)
A bug flies through an open door into a house, through a bathroom, across a kitchen and bedroom and into a living room … where its entire life changes with the switch of a button. Sucked into the void of a vacuum bag, this one little bug moves through denial, bargaining, anger, despair and eventually acceptance – the five stages of grief – as it comes to terms with its fate. Will there be a light at the end of the tunnel? Will there be dust bunnies in the void?
Sidewalk Flowers (”written” by Jon Arno Lawson, illustrated by Sydney Smith)
In this wordless picture book, a little girl collects wildflowers while her distracted father pays her little attention. Each flower becomes a gift, and whether the gift is noticed or ignored, both giver and recipient are transformed by their encounter. “Written” by award-winning poet JonArno Lawson and brought to life by illustrator Sydney Smith, Sidewalk Flowers is an ode to the importance of small things, small people, and small gestures.

ya!

Comics Artist Kate Beaton Discusses Her Hilarious New Book | Bitch Media →

Talking to Bitch Media!!

Vote today CANADA!

I voted the other day and Emily Horne was there! This is an accurate historical recreation of how COOL IT WAS

this is the best thing of all time

not even hyperbole

how have I been unaware of this archive?

Old time radio

Tony Cliff's Next 'Delilah Dirk' Adventure Serialized Online →

Delilah Dirk by Tony Cliff is one of my favorite comics series, so this is great news! I got to read The King’s Shilling (for blurb purposes) and I adored it.

Delilah is here!