March 12, 2010 Toronto—Running the gamut from the acclaimed to the unconventional, the 15 finalists for this year’s Doug Wright Awards were announced today in Toronto.

Hand-picked by an esteemed panel of comics experts, the 2010 finalists represent the finest, most thought-provoking work produced by Canada’s vibrant comics community.

The shortlist contains works that explore diverse subjects, from the legendary life of Kasper Hauser and the fictional life (and death) of a fading TV host, and spans a range of formats, from wordless lino-cuts graphic novels to “manga” inspired by Western Canadian Haida mythology.

The Doug Wright Awards finalists for Best Book are:

Back + Forth by Marta Chudolinska (The Porcupine’s Quill)
George Sprott: (1894-1975) by Seth (Drawn and Quarterly)
Hot Potatoe by Marc Bell (Drawn and Quarterly)
Kaspar by Diane Obomsawin (Drawn and Quarterly)
Red: A Haida Manga by Michael Nicoll Yahgulanaas (Douglas and McIntyre)

The Doug Wright Awards finalists for Best Emerging Talent are:

Adam Bourret I’m Crazy
Michael DeForge Lose #1 (Koyama Press), Cold Heat Special #7 (Picturebox)
Pascal Girard Nicolas (Drawn and Quarterly)
John Martz It’s Snowing Outside. We Should Go For a Walk.
Sully The Hipless Boy (Conundrum Press)

The finalists for the 2010 Pigskin Peters Award (for unconventional, “nominally-narrative” comics) are:

Bébête Simon Bossé (L’Oie de Cravan)
Dirty Dishes by Amy Lockhart (Drawn and Quarterly)
Hot Potatoe by Marc Bell (Drawn and Quarterly)
Never Learn Anything From History by Kate Beaton
The Collected Doug Wright Volume One by Doug Wright (Drawn and Quarterly)

Founded in 2004 (in a dimly lit Toronto bar) to celebrate the finest in English-language comics and graphic novels, The Doug Wright Awards have since evolved into one of North America’s foremost comics awards and one of its most anticipated events.

Wright Awards finalists defy easy categorization, and include past and present masters of the form and off-the-beaten-path newcomers alike, all vying for one of the most unique and coveted trophies in comics.

This year’s nominees were chosen by a five-member panel who chose from works released in the 2009 calendar year. The panel included: comics historian and author Jeet Heer; filmmaker Jerry Ciccoritti; cartoonist Chester Brown; Walrus comics blogger Sean Rogers, and; writer and Sequential.ca publisher Bryan Munn.

The winners are chosen by a jury that includes cartoonists, writers, actors, directors, musicians and, on occasion, politicians.

A featured event of the Toronto Comics Arts Festival (TCAF), the 2010 Doug Wright Awards ceremony will take place on Sat. May 8, at 7 pm at the Toronto Reference Library’s new Bram & Bluma Appel Salon, 789 Yonge Street.

For more information, please contact:

brad@wrightawards.ca
mackbrad@gmail.com

About The Doug Wright Awards

The Doug Wright Awards are a non-profit organization formed in 2004, and are named in honour of the late Canadian cartoonist Doug Wright. The annual awards recognize graphic novels, comics, mini-comics, and experimental comics-based works published in English (including first-translated editions). To be eligible, a work must be a first-edition, full-length or a collection, and created by a Canadian citizen or a permanent resident of Canada. www.wrightawards.ca

About the Toronto Public Library

The Toronto Public Library is the world’s busiest urban public library system. Every year, more than 17.5 million people visit our 99 branches and borrow more than 31 million items. To learn more about Toronto Public Library, visit torontopubliclibrary.ca or call Answerline at 416-393-7131.

About the Toronto Comic Arts Festival

TCAF is a celebration of comics and graphic novels—and their creators—that takes place annually in Toronto, Canada. The next TCAF is Saturday May 8th and Sunday May 9^th 2010, at the Toronto Reference Library, 789 Yonge Street, and will feature Daniel Clowes (Eightball, Ghost World), Jeff Lemire (Sweet Tooth), Dash Shaw (Body World), James Sturm (Golem’s Mighty Swing, Market Day), and Jim Woodring (Frank) and more. For more information please visit http://www.torontocomics.com.

We launched the TCAF website last week, and I think we finally have all of the bugs worked out and the little changes I wanted made, made. We haven’t really done any official PR yet, letting people discover it on their own through word of mouth, but I imagine that’ll change next week some time. I have one really big meeting tomorrow, and then one ridiculously big meeting on Friday morning, so work time and free time is kind of eaten up by that.

In addition to being angry enough to throw a couple of finger-pointy blog entries up, I decided to forgo 5 or 6 hours sleep this week to write a review for Manga.About.Com, on my favourite release of 2010 (to date), not simple by Natsume Ono. Go check it out. It was interesting because About.com has very strict guidelines about format and length, and it’s the exact opposite of my experiences writing here at the blog… or literally anywhere I’ve freelanced. I’m going to try to keep writing reviews for the site, because I think a few harsh formating choices will make me a better writer. Thanks to Manga.About.Com Guide Deb Aoki for the opportunity.

As for Manga Milestones… #9 is International Manga, probably as typified by Yen Plus #1/Night School by Svetlana Chmakova. I can’t decide how much I want to write about this. I could literally write 2 or 3 thousand words ripping Tokyopop and ADV new assholes, but I’m not entirely sure there’s enough of a point to it. I’ve been going back and forth in my head for a few weeks, and I’ve been fortunate enough to be too busy to write it, but manga influenced comics from Korea and North America were utterly shit-on, 2000-2008. I wonder if dredging up every single way that happened is worthwhile, when the future is so much brighter for all involved now? Still working on it in my head.

#10 is still a secret though.

- Chris @ The Beguiling

You’re both wrong, I’m the new Batman.

Props to Kevin P. for the tip.

- Chris

Torontonian artist and illustrator Gary Taxali has unveiled a near-complete preview of his art show at Narwhal Gallery this Thursday January 28th, entitled “The Taxali 300″. A collection of prints on found objects and ephemera, it’s a wonderful example of his style, influenced by pre-war cartoons and illustrations. A lovely way to spend an hour.

Taxali is notable for having given Google the finger, literally and figuratively, when they approached him and other illustrators to produce illustrations for their various pieces of software, with no intent on paying them. In this instance, it probably would have been a very good ‘portfolio piece’, but Taxali decided that his work was worth being paid for, particularly when a (very) large company making lots (and lots) of money was the one who came calling, asking for freebies. Good on him.

- Christopher

8. The Push Man, and Other Stories, by Yoshihiro Tatsumi. Published by Drawn and Quarterly, September 2005.

Alternative Comics: The purveyors and creators of that material generally don’t prefer the work to be called “Alternative Comics.” It’s a term that necessarily sets the work in a context outside of mainstream acceptance–an alternative to what? Which means that, if you’re it’s an ”alternative” comic, you can’t discuss it without discussing what it’s also an alternative to, which at least in the context of North American comics, means “Superheroes”. “Indy” generally doesn’t fly either, except for the very young. “Indy Comics” automatically conjures up notions of, again, working outside mainstream notions of form, or too-often, quality. Not-ready-for-prime-time. It also necessarily excludes “indy” work that comes from major financial backing. Is Dash Shaw or David Heatley “indy” when they’re self-published? When they’re pub’d by Fantagraphics? How about when those self-published comics are the collected by a division of mega-publisher Random House, are they “indy” then? It’s a weird label.

Most creators prefer, simply, to say that they make “comics”. No adjective necessary. But when pressed, the phrase that tends to cause the least bristling, to have found the most adherents amongst discerning comics connoisseurs, is “Art Comics.” Comics that are, and/or aspire to be, art, rather than merely existing as illustration, or commercial product. Comics are a mass-produced medium (for the most part), there’s always a tricky and prickly balance between art and commerce in every single book. Few authors have the luxury of their work appearing in print exactly the way they’d intended. Ware, Seth, Clowes, Spiegelman… Probably a dozen others working in the medium, in total. I hadn’t really heard the phrase “Art Comics” before I started working at The Beguiling, much like before I met my husband I hadn’t heard the phrase “Art Music” to refer to music that was not “pop” or, in the common vernacular, popular. Music as art, rather than music for an audience. Sometimes both. But I’ve grown to like the idea of it, all of us as readers forced to consider the intentions of the artist in the creation of work; the mere naming of the type of book a cause for critical examination. Art Comics. Ask for them by name.

So then in 2005, after successfully releasing 15 years of art comics, Drawn & Quarterly released their first, and possibly the first, Art-Manga. Yoshihiro Tatsumi’s The Push Man and Other Stories is a collection of short works about everyday life in postwar Japan, and the heartbreaking and often horrifying mundaneness of living. It is “Gekiga,” a close-cousin to manga that came from the same place that the phrase Art Comics must: What if there’s a better way to tell better stories with words and pictures? What if instead of ‘irresponsible pictures’, as is one of the translations of the word manga, what if they made dramatic pictures (gekiga)? What if they strove for realism, maturity, experimentation, seriousness, and to touch the human soul? What if all of this ended up in direct contrast to the popular work of the time, but wasn’t a reaction to the work so much as simply being dissatisfied with artificial borders of the medium? What if manga could also be art?

Yoshihiro Tatsumi had been beaten to America’s shores twice before the arrival of The Push Man, and both times, by himself. Drawn & Quarterly had published one of Tatsumi’s shorts from The Push Man period, called “Kept” in 2003, in their fifth (and final) Drawn & Quarterly Anthology volume. Going back even further, an unauthorized English-language translation of a Spanish edition of Tatsumi short stories was published in 1988 by Catlan Communications. It was entitled Good-Bye and Other Stories, and until his first visit to North America, Tatsumi himself did not know it had been published.

The Push Man came to North America because of Optic Nerve creator Adrian Tomine. He’d owned some of the material, and ‘read’ some of the material, despite his inability to read Japanese. The storytelling in the work is marvelous, with layouts and framing designed to move you effortlessly through the story, except when it’s designed to give you pause. Tomine admitted to learning a lot from the work, declared that the books had reignited his interest in comics when he lost interest in superheroes, and that Tatsumi’s comics informed his own. Tomine pushed for years for material to be translated and brought to a wider English-language audience. That immediately set the context of the work for the readers who were going to encounter it for the first time; one of the most lauded art-comics creators in North America thinks that this guy, and this work, is the best in all of Japan. That’s a hell of a context to have the work released into, not just as a reader, but as a critic, as a bookstore buyer, as a bookseller. As a fan of Adrian’s.

Context is important, too. Labels like “Art-Comics” give a context to work, as I mentioned, but format gives a context too. If you’ve read a lot of manga, then you tend to think of manga not just as a collection of storytelling tics, or as work from a country of origin, or big eyes and small mouths, but also as a format. Tokyopop revolutionized format–book size and price point–and made the industry follow along. If you’re manga, then you’re 5.5″ x 7.5″, 200 pages, and $10, give-or-take. The book chains had further solidified that format, where covers needed to feature characters (no more than 2), and the characters needed to be looking right at the reader, and the logos had to be big and bold and easy-to-read from across the store. In 2005, manga was as much a product, a commodity, as it was a medium. But if you’re a Japanese comic and you come out in a 6″ x 9″ Hardcover, with a taped binding, monochrome covers, at $20? What are you then? Are you manga? Or something else? Are you gekiga? Art-manga? Or is just being “other” good enough for a first shot across the bow?

It’s important to note that the idea of art-manga had been tried before, and had even found measured success. Fantagraphics had released the excellent and inventive Anywhere But Here by Tori Miki earlier in 2005, and the alt-manga anthology Sake Jock in the 80s. Small publishers like BLAST! books had tried “alternative” manga in their anthologies like Comics Underground Japan. Viz had probably the most sustained success with their Pulp magazine and line of manga in the mid 90s and early 2000s, with a great selection of seinen (men-in-their-late-teens-and-early-20s manga) titles, and the occasional truly “mature” work like the early Jiro Taniguchi noir thriller Benkei in New York, or their groundbreaking release of Tezuka’s late-period masterwork Phoenix. 2005 had already seen Vertical’s Buddha from Tezuka, and the Nouvelle Manga movement that Fanfare was slowly rolling out on our shores, all around the same time, more or less. It should be said that the time was ripe for one big work to come out, to catch really pull the idea of Manga For Adults out of the ether and make it whole. Tomine put his reputation on the line to say that that book would be Tatsumi’s, and convinced D&Q to do the same.

I was incredibly excited at the prospect of its release, and in between the announcement of The Push Man and it arriving in stores, I even managed to track down a copy of the illicit Good Bye and other stories from Catlan. Reading those stories, I pretty much knew Push Man would be a hit.

Now I’d like to share a photograph with you. I took it while I was at the Osamu Tezuka Museum in the summer of 2009. They have a little English-language hand-out guide that explains and translates each of the permanent exhibits. Here’s the section on Tezuka moving to Men’s Manga Magazines.

Cover image of the Tezuka Museum Guide I pulled this image from.

So let me parse that out for you. Gekiga, or gekiga-style comics, were the mature style of comics that the single-most-popular creator of manga adapted his style to, in order to tell his most mature and important works (including, as mentioned, Ode to Kirihito, which was serialized in Japan from 1970-1971). Tezuka started adapting Gekiga into his work in 1968, more than 10 years after Yoshihiro Tatsumi had worked with a couple of other authors to develop it. While the stories collected in The Push Man are all from 1969, Tatsumi had started telling these short, sharp, pictures of everyday Japanese life years earlier, and their success and innovation caused Tezuka to reinvent himself and create some of his finest works, including Ode to Kirihito, MW, and the later Phoenix stories. Tatsumi really was Capital-I important, with an enormous pedigree. All of this was either intimated or stated outright in the build-up to the release of The Push Man, but if the work hadn’t been any good, it wouldn’t really have mattered.

The September 2005 publication of Yoshihiro Tatsumi’s The Push Man and Other Stories was when Art-Manga arrived in North America. It elicited a strong critical reaction, but more importantly a sustained one, with reviews of the work coming all through 2005 and into 2006, when a second volume of Tatsumi shorts was released. The book was a sales success too; it’s currently in its third printing in hardcover. It found an audience.

The work was not fantastical in any way, in fact the stories seemed to be entirely without genre trappings or manga shorthand or idioms at all. Tatsumi’s 8-page shorts seemed to consciously reject what we would normally associate with manga in any way it could, Tatsumi telling his stories inspired by police reports or the daily news delivered with a brutal realism, an unflinching eye into the stark realities of urban living. Violent tableaux. But the craft! The craft of these stories is so, so high. They’re not just affecting but effective, with art that’s been developed and then paired down again to the most essential lines, shadows, and ideas. It’s manga that reads like It’s A Good Life If You Don’t Weaken or Louis Riel or Sleepwalking. It’s Drawn & Quarterly manga. It’s Gekiga. It’s Art-Manga.

Manga Milestone #5, the release of Tezuka’s Buddha, showed the world that manga could be for Grown-ups, and that it could tackle mature ideas. But it was still, at best, a hybrid book, created not just to engage an adult audience but also to stay friendly to a young one. It didn’t wholly succeed as a work for grown-ups because of its humourous asides and stretch-and-squash cartoon-influenced art. It used a fantastical storytelling style to tell a fantastical, epic story. What was so important about The Push Man is that it showed that manga did tell stories for adults, using realistic art, and straightforward storytelling. It showed that in addition to whatever we thought about manga, it was also about every day life, and it could be bleak and mean and gritty and funny just like life is. It showed that, beyond just being for grown-ups, manga could be literature too. But maybe most importantly, and this was right on the spine, it showed that some artists in Japan were treating comics like a mature, sophisticated venue for telling important stories, in 1969. Context.

To date Drawn & Quarterly have released 3 short-story collections by Yoshihiro Tatsumi, including The Push Man and Other Stories, Abandon The Old In Tokyo, and Good-Bye. Their most recent release is Tatsumi’s 845-page autobiography in comics A Drifting Life, which chronicles the birth of the manga industry, the creation of Gekiga, and Tatsumi’s development as a person and creator. Drawn & Quarterly plans to release one of Tatsumi’s earliest genre graphic novels, Black Blizzard, in spring 2010. There have been numerous other wonderful art-manga releases since The Push Man, that I am personally convinced have found a wider and more ready audience because of its release and its success.

-o+O+o-

- Christopher

–

A month or two back, reader Mike Kitchen wrote to get my thoughts on the following announcement by Print-on-demand outfit ComiXpress:

It is with great pride that I make this post. As a lifetime fan and reader of indie comics, Dave Sim’s Cerebus always had a special place for me. The depth of the story, the wry wit and social commentary, the brilliant art of the book … this was the reason I read comics. As an aspiring cartoonist, I admired Dave’s championing of Creator’s Rights and his groundbreaking work in Self-Publishing. This guy’s day didn’t end when he put down his pencil after knocking out a page; he effortlessly changed hats from creator to businessman, showing a generation of cartoonists how it could be done if you had the brains and the guts, and in many ways made the independent comic book explosion of the 80s possible.

That inspiration is a big part of what drove me to create a company in 2004 that changed the way indie comics were made. And I couldn’t be more excited that Dave Sim has brought his work to ComiXpress.

Starting today, with the premier of Cerebus Archive #4, you will always be able to order every back issue of Cerebus Archive, Dave’s black & white walk down memory lane (completely devoid of rose-colored-glasses). No back issues ever go out of stock at ComiXpress, and Comic Shop Retailers are a welcome addition to this new Direct Market with a book from one of the most respected names in comics who has proven time and again how seriously he treats deadlines and release dates.

So please, join me in welcoming Dave Sim, Aardvark-Vanaheim, and of course Cerebus himself to ComiXpress. And lets all look forward to a brighter future for indie comics together.

Logan DeAngelis

Reader Mike mentioned, correctly, that I’d been pretty critical of print on demand services like ComiXpress and Lulu in the past, as a vehicle for solicitation of commercial projects. I still hold that point of view, quite honestly, but my thinking on it has broadened a little.

First off, I’d like to note that for terminology’s sake, I use “print on demand”, “pod”, and “digital printing” pretty interchangeably. I’m generally referring to digital printing like high-end laserjets or inkjets, versus offset printing which generally involves physical contact between ‘plates’ (usually rubber) and the paper, and offset is a much higher quality of printing. There are terms like ‘digital offset’ out there, but so far as I can tell it’s still inkjet printers, albeit with slightly higher quality.

As a sweeping statement, I will say that the quality and price of offset (‘professional’) printing has not yet been matched (let alone beaten) by any digital print or print on demand services I’ve seen so far. A couple of recent projects that I’ve been made aware of have been the closest I’ve seen to offset printing from this sort of set-up, but held side-by-side with offset work the difference is very noticeable, with P.O.D. suffering considerably in comparison.  When it comes to POD the resolution in the printing isn’t as high, leading to pixelation, the blacks often have a sheen that comes from laser printer ink, the greyscales look patchy, dark, and amateurish,  and the plain-white-bond paper stock doesn’t feel as nice in the hand or seem like a “real” book. As an artist who probably worked really hard on a story, I don’t understand the impulse to sabotage that hard work just to get it “in print”, regardless of how it looks when it gets there… I understand that it’s vital for works of limited or niche appeal, for books where the message or story is more important than the repro quality, but in terms of art it doesn’t make a lot of sense to me. So, yeah, strides have been made, but it isn’t there yet. I’m not convinced it ever will be.

Secondly, there’s the cost factor. I just finished working with a friend who moved their project from digital-printing to offset. POD offered them the ability to print books as needed, in small batches for smaller amounts of money. The-trade off was that their 64 page black and white book was costing them $5 a copy to print, and they’d printed over 300 copies that way. I priced out an offset print-run for them, and for the same book with better paper, a better cover, an actual spine (POD outfits hate printing on spines, it requires too much quality control), at 1000 copies the cost per book dropped to $1.50. At 2000 copies the cost per book dropped to $1.10. The difference is between $3 and $4 a book, but the money’s gotta be paid up front. But they’d already spent over $1200 printing 300 copies of their book! For $300 more they could’ve printed 3 times as many, AND made more on every book they sold. Selling a book for $10 that cost you $5 to make is ridiculous, but hey, it isn’t my money. But selling a book for $10 that cost you a buck  to print? I’d much rather be in that business.

Granted, not everyone has $2000 to spend. Not everyone is going to hand-sell their book. Not everyone wants to ship out copies of their work, which many online P.O.D. services will do (for an added fee). Not everyone wants to solicit through a distributor (like Diamond or whomever), which P.O.D. pricing either makes impossible or foolish. Some projects are deliberately short-run, copyright-skirting endeavours that need to stay under certain radars. Not everyone should print 2000 copies of their work. Or 1000. Hell, some projects shouldn’t be printed at all and advising someone to go-offset or go-home would just be mean. There are a bunch of other caveats there, but long-story-short, offset isn’t right for every project but if you intend to make a serious commitment to the continued commercial viability of your project, the choice, IMO, is clear. Sort of.

Back to the Cerebus Archive announcement.

A quick check of the ComiXpress website shows that they’ve subsequently added Dave Sim’s other recent offering Glamourpuss to their offerings. I actually found their original post/announcement incredibly confusing, as it strongly implies that ComiXpress will be printing/offering Sim’s work from now on. Their Glamourpuss announcement uses a very important phrase not present in the Archive announcement: back issues. ComiXpress is making back issues of Glamourpuss available, seemingly once they’ve gone out of print from their initial offset printing. A quick check at Diamond shows that Glamourpuss #1-7 are listed as out of print, but 8, 9, and 10 are still in stock. A quick check of ComiXpress shows that they’re offering #1-7 but not #8-10, so yeah, looks like once the first print is gone, it’ll be kept in print ‘forever’ in digital POD form… I’m pretty curious to see whether or not ComiXpress’s print job is up to the task of reprinting Glamourpuss, as, let’s face it, the book is an excuse for Dave Sim to draw fantastically detailed portraits of attractive women in varying ink styles, an incredibly art-focussed book.  I kinda want to order a copy just to do a side-by-side comparison and see how it holds up…!

Meanwhile, Cerebus Archive doesn’t match up quite the same (publication-wise), and with a very interesting difference. ComiXpress is distributing Cerebus Archive #4, a book that Diamond hasn’t distributed at all, and doesn’t seem to intend to… meaning Cerebus Archive #4 is exclusively available as a digital POD item, something that not-very-much fuss has been made about. It looks like that book has moved POD only, which strikes me as probably a smart move considering it’s a collection of ephemera and early, rougher early work by Sim. Issue #4’s contents describe it as reprinting a wedding invitation, so, you know. But it seems very likely indeed that Cerebus Archive #4 failed to meet Diamond’s order thresholds, wasn’t (offset) printed, and is digital-only. That’s a bit of a sea-change for a book from Sim. Cerebus Archive #4 has been available at Comixpress since early September, and no future issues have been added since, so I’d rightfully cast some doubt on the future of the project… Maybe someone who does this sort of thing regularly can ping the ComiXpress guys for info? Maybe they’ll show up in the comments, who knows.

But all of that aside, the important thing to take away from this is that POD is now being used for comics as a way to keep backlist available, without having to print thousands and thousands of comics at a time that may take years to sell through. That’s about the best use of POD I can think of, actually, following up a high-quality print run with digital copies for latecomers. Anyone particularly concerned with quality or ‘real book feel’ can track down one of the original prints, and anyone else can place a convenient order on a website… bypassing comics retailers entirely. Actually, that part doesn’t bother me either, because (at least in the case of Glamourpuss) we had our kick-at-the-can, ordered our copies, and sold them too. While a project from Dave Sim is something that we’d be likely to keep in stock indefinitely in whatever form it takes, that certainly isn’t true of every project and knowing that there are creators out there that can have that work available for the long haul? Not too shabby.

So… yeah. I’m still not sold on digital printing, and you’ve only gotta flip open a digitally printed book to a page with a toned/greyscale image on it to see why, but I’m glad the technology has started to be applied in really useful, important ways. Here’s hoping that the trend continues and someday we’ll be able to order individual reproduction issues of all KINDS of comics to fill out our collections.

- Christopher

One of my favourite things this year is when Chip Zdarsky drew a bunch of muppets for their anniversary. I know, right? There’s a whole interactive thingy at http://www.nationalpost.com/muppets/index.html. This is one of my favourite things from this year.

More Chip Zdarsky goodness at his Flickr photostream.

- Chris

Todays Christmas Comic comes to us from… Geoff Spear and Chip Kidd’s The Golden Age of DC Comics: 365 Days. Released a few years back, it was a meaty slab of beautifully photographed excerpts from Golden Age DCU Cover-art, with each of the images corresponding to a day of the year. This image is from the cover of Action Comics #105 (1947) and corresponded to Christmas Eve. I have to admit that I don’t know who drew the original… perhaps someone in the comments can add to this posting? According to CBDB, the issue features a 14 page Siegel/Shuster story called “The Man Who Hated Christmas”, which was reprinted in the 80s I think, possibly in one of the treasury books. Anyway, it’s not easy to find, that’s for sure (and it doesn’t look like Shuster drew the cover to my eyes…).

I believe this book (the Spear/Kidd) is technically out of print, but it’s certainly not too hard to find at all… Though it’s original price of $40 might have been a bit off-putting, it’s a great discount-bin find just for the fun finds like Superman’s unique way of helping Santa down the chimney.

As for Action Comics #105, the copy pictured would probably set you back a few grand. So maybe settle for the lovely cover-art here. :)

- Christopher

So I wrote a post a week back called “The Myth of All-Ages” and people seemed to really respond to it, for which I am always grateful. I’ve read all of the comments at my original post a couple of times, and the responses that have appeared on other blogs, and I’ve really only got a one bit of follow-up. It’s a little scattered, but I figure it’s worth posting so here goes.

Some comics retailers are just out of touch with contemporary kids comics: Look, I’m all for venerating the pioneers of the Direct Market and I do respect their experiences selling comics, but I don’t think most retailers complaining about this issue are really aware of what comics are actually available for young readers these days. This is typified by the main arguments of Buddy Saunders of the Lone Star Comics chain as posted to ICv2. They seem to be entirely about the nature of superhero comics being different than they were 20 years ago, and that’s ‘fine’ I guess, but that’s an irrelevant argument to comics for kids. I think Tom Spurgeon summed it up best: If Mr. Saunders wants to keep moving the goalposts until he scores, by all means, but that doesn’t really solve anything.

Mr. Saunders’ most recent post at ICv2 is castigating the comic book market for not being able to capitalize on the successes of Twilight or Harry Potter like the book market has. This is based on an argument provided by a bookseller of prose books & graphic novels, of all things. At best Mr. Saunders is comparing apples and oranges (graphic novels and novels are both printed matter, but are different media). At worst, he’s brutally out-of-touch with both the graphic novel market and the market for teen/YA fiction. Simply, the market for YA and teen prose fiction is massive, with more books published for those two demographics than there are total graphic novels published in English every year, maybe 6-10 times the amount. ICv2 estimated about about 5000 graphic novels a year are published, and that’s for every age group. This site estimates nearly 30,000 books were published for ‘juveniles’ alone last year, and that may not even include material for teens. Mr. Saunders and his quotee are comparing apples to industrial watermelon farms.

So, yes, it makes sense that when Harry Potter and Twilight do well, there are lots more books to sell those older kids and teenagers, because there are 2500+ books a month being published for kids and YA and teenagers anyway. So yes, book publishers had a breakout success, and started refining and promoting their existing lines and developing new ones to capitalize on it. That’s awesome! But unfortunately graphic novels for teens didn’t have that same breakout success, novels did, and the two don’t (necessarily) directly relate. Further, while there has been a consistent build in the number of comics and graphic novels for kids (and their quality!) published in the last few years, that number still pales in comparison to how many novels for that same audience are being published, and to be honest there are dozens of great comics and graphic novels for kids, teens, and everyone in-between, that completely fly under the radar anyway, not finding the marketing support or sales they deserve in comic stores or ‘regular’ book stores. The market is printing books for young readers as fast as they’re salable, perhaps even more so. Saying otherwise underlines a profound lack of experience in this market.

I’ve had the pleasure of a nice dinner with Chris Powell, Buddy’s right-hand-man at Lone Star Comics, and he’s a smart, passionate retailer who really believes in bringing in comics for every age group walking through the doors of a Lone Star Comics shop. I have no doubt that those are great stores with an amazing selection of kids comics, and with more and more coming in every day. I really look forward to visiting a Lone Star Comics at some point. But I don’t understand why Mr. Saunders is still arguing that these books don’t exist, unless it is still the fact that it’s really just about him getting the exact sort of comics he wants, which are superhero comics from the early-80s or older, which were targeted at older readers but could still be enjoyed by some younger ones, which I took great pains to point out ain’t gonna happen in that last post.

So, anyway.

I didn’t mention anywhere in the original post that in 2009 I published a comic book for kids. Like, I actually did that myself, with the help of some very talented creators. It’s called COMICS FESTIVAL! and we sold about 22,000 of them into the direct market. It’s a great book, if I do say so, with like 30 pages of comics for kids, leading to more than a dozen comics and graphic novels currently in-print for kids. If you can track one down, I recommend it!

I truly believe in comics for children, and middle-grades, and young adults, and teens, and I spend a lot of time with that material. I know it’s not really fair as an arguing tactic to ask people to just accept on faith that I know what I’m talking about and things are ACTUALLY really great right now when it comes to comics for kids, but they are, and I hope they will.

I don’t just write 4,000 word essays about stuff for nuthin’. Peace-out.

- Christopher

Once upon a time I lived with Bryan Lee O’Malley and this other guy, and we used one of the rooms in the house for our office. It housed all of our computers. I was kind of poor, so I had a pair of hand-me-down speakers for my computer and no headphones, wheras Mal and Other Guy both had pretty bitch’n headphones. So it made sense to me that I could just play the music I wanted because they couldn’t hear it anyway. About the time Christmas rolled around and I started listening to Christmas music 24 hours a day, I was informed that my music could in fact be heard, and was in fact intolerable.

That did not deter me. So Mal made me a comic strip.

I still consider it a tribute, rather than a threat.

- Christopher

The fine folks at SLG Publishing (known back-in-the-day as Slave Labor Graphics) are having a pretty solid sale right now—40% off their whole web store at http://slgcomic.com/—to help them through some rough economic times. Things aren’t DOOMy or anything, just a sort of a “hey look over here if you’ve got some money to spend”. I was considering telling you about 5 great books from the SLG catalogue that I own, and that you should buy them, but then I thought “My readers are givers, and what with the holidays right around the corner, I’m certain that they’d much rather have a list of recommendations for what to buy for Other People.” And since I have been enjoying and selling (and enjoying selling) SLG products for the better part of 15 years, I thought “Gift Guide!” and so here we are!

But this is no ordinary gift guide.

You see, SLG publishes a wide range of stuff, much of it difficult and strange and unique, and since everyone has a couple of people on their shopping list that are impossible to buy for, the comics and products manufactured by the fine folks at SLG would work wonderfully as gifts… for the difficult, strange, and unique people on your list. (Note: books are also appropriate for folks that do not match the stated criteria.) And with no further ado we present:

5 GREAT GIFTS FROM SLG PUBLISHING FOR DIFFICULT-TO-BUY-FOR-PEOPLE

For The Guy That Makes Inappropriate Jokes At Inappropriate Times…

FUN WITH MILK & CHEESE VOLUME 1
By Evan Dorkin.
Reg: $11.95. SALE: $7.17
[LINK]

I’ve been running Evan Dorkin’s awesome DORK comic strips here at Comics212 for the past few months and while I can’t speak for you guys, it’s been lovely waking up every morning (or so) to see a new Evan Dorkin strip on the site. So while I’ve been recommending DORK for the past few months, let me instead make a recommendation for MILK AND CHEESE, Dorkin’s most famous creations. Dairy Products Gone Bad, they are sociopathic, anthropomorphic bits of food, that Dorkin uses to both satirize society and to just draw vicious, unapologetic insanity. We’ve all met that person who says the most profoundly tasteless thing at exactly the wrong time, and an angry carton of milk and an angry wedge of cheese forcing an old woman into her coffin and beating a senior citizen with his own cane because they were forced to wait behind old people in a line one time? That is the comic for that person. Misanthropy!

–

For Your Friend’s Teenage Daughter Whom No One Understands And Is Possibly A Lesbian…

PARIS
By Andi Watson and Simon Gane.
Reg: $10.95. SALE: 6.57
[LINK]

PARIS is a wonderful book, a sensual, energetic, surprising work that reflects its titular setting. A restless young aristocrat and a talented young painter both find themselves in the city of lights, and after a chance encounter with a portrait painting session, they can’t stop thinking about one another. Did I mention that they’re both young women? A couple of major plot twists and Romeo & Juliet allusions conspire to keep the two young ladies apart, but thankfully (for a change) it’s not about the love that dare not speak its name, but instead about the class divide. Ooh la la! PARIS is beautifully drawn, with cute characters and an expressive line. It’s a bit “Classic British Farce”, a bit “Backpacking Across Europe”, a bit “Hollywood”, but really it’s just a wonderful little book, to make you feel good about falling in love.

–

For recent “Cool” young parents, to remind them not to move to the suburbs…

I FEEL SICK #1 & #2 and SPOOKY SQUEAK TOY
By Jhonen Vasquez, w/ Rikki Simmons
Reg: $17.85. SALE: $14.69
[LINK]

Jhonen Vasquez is the creator of cult-fav comics JOHNNY THE HOMICIDAL MANIAC and SQUEE, but he’s probably best-know around the world as the creative mastermind behind the incredibly popular Invader Zim television series for Nickelodeon. My favourite of his comics efforts is this two issue mini-series. It’s about the nature of creativity, and compromising artistic ideals for comfort and commercial success, and the struggle therein. It is surprisingly, hilariously good, and poignant, and could only have been written by someone who had a difficult birthing process with a creative property at a multinational corporation… like say Nickelodeon? Anyway, it’s edgy as all hell (even almost 10 years after its initial release), with great art and lovely colours by Rikki Simmons (the voice of Gir on Zim).

Bonus: Appearing in the comic itself is a little skull-faced squeak toy, called SPOOKY: THE THING WHAT SQUEAKS. It is pretty adorable, and it squeaks, and it’s pretty ‘cool’ as far as baby toys go. SLG’s store seems to be out of stock right now, but the toy has been ‘in print’ for years and many retailers should still have it in stock. We do at The Beguiling, for example… :)

–

For anyone you know that works in I.T., graphic design, or really any computer-related field…

NIL graphic novel
By James Turner
Reg: $12.95. SALE: $7.77
[LINK]

Drawn entirely in vector-based illustration tool Adobe Illustrator, NIL has a stark, complex, ‘designy’ look that is wholly unique in comics. The visuals of the world in this graphic novel are fully-realized, creating an engrossing place to get lost in. And? It’s a really good story too. NIL is a satire, an extension of nihilist chic taken to an absurd and therefore amusing degree. It’s about a man who’s job it is to quell outbreaks of hope or belief in a nihilist society, and anyone who’s ever heard “Can you make the logo bigger?” or uttered the phrase “Have you checked to make sure it’s plugged in?” will sure understand and appreciate the dark, dark humour. And it’s Canadian too, so double-excellent.

–

For someone you know likes Superhero comics but you have no other idea what they like or read, like none, and you want to get something that they almost-assuredly haven’t read AND is really good AND reflects your personality as the gift-giver…

STREET ANGEL
By Jim Rugg and Brian Maresca
Reg $14.95. NOW: $8.97!
[LINK]

So here’s the deal: The protagonist of this book is a homeless 12 year old girl who rides a skateboard and kicks ass. In the first chapter she fights like a hundred ninjas. In the second she fights Spanish Conquistadors and Ireland’s first man in space, “Cosmick”. In the third: Satan. It only gets bigger from there. Seriously, this is the work of a dude who’s taken in a LOT of pop culture over the years, and is letting it flow back out of his mind, through his pen, onto the page. It’s visually inventive, more sophisticated than you might imagine, and has all of the stuff in it that nerds like. The new edition even has shiny paper! One of my favourite comics of the past few years, and aside from being incredibly pink, any die-hard superhero fan who gets this one is going to love it.

–

Bonus: Free Comics for you to read…
SLG loves getting folks to read its comics, so it has all kinds of freebies that you can throw in whenever you place an order on their website. I personally recommend the beautifully-illustrated BOMBABY graphic novel by Antony Mazzotta, which is FREE, or the totally f’d up sci-fi graphic novel VAISTRON by Andrew Dabb and Boussourir. Grab one of everything from their FREEBIES SECTION, it’s all at least interesting and a bunch of it is really good!

–

So that’s 5 recommendations, but really, SLG has a pretty fantastic catalogue of books and products, and narrowing it down to just these five was kinda tough. So here’s 10 more suggestions:

1. Agnes Quill, by Dave Roman and friends – Spooky stories about a spunky girl detective.
2. Bill and Ted’s Most Excellent Adventures Volume 1 & 2, by Evan Dorkin – We’re almost ready for 90s nostalgia, get ahead of the curve with these surprisingly awesome comic books (they’re seriously great).
3. Farewell, Georgia, by Ben Towle – Tall tales and modern myth from down south.
4. H’eofigendlic Lodrung: A Collection of Stories by FSc – A fantastically talented Singaporean cartoonist working in a “goth” style, with wonderful results. Collects almost everything she’s ever drawn.
5. Milk & Cheese Vinyl Toys – based on the violent dairy products above. Only for hardcore fans, but for hardcore fans, they’re only $35.97, down from $69.95!
6. Rare Creature, by Kelley/Ken Seda – A pretty, quiet, short graphic novel about strange and quiet kids. Very ahead of its time.
7. Skaggy The Lost, by Igor Baranko – A very funny story about an incompetent, high-energy Viking who ‘discovers’ Incan gold. Hilarious, great euro-style art. Underappreciated gem.
8. The War At Ellsmere, by Faith Erin Hicks – A ‘Mean Girls’-esque boarding school drama about a school with secrets to hide.
9. Wonderland, by Tommy Kovac and Sonny Liew – Beautifully illustrated side-story to Carroll’s Alice In Wonderland. A lovely full colour hardcover book.
10. Zombies Calling, by Faith Erin Hicks – Zombies, fun art, a satire of the college experience.

Now this sale might not extend much past the next few hours (check your shopping cart to see the discounts), but these books are great year ’round. I recommend picking them up from the SLG store, or from your local comics retailer (when available), and you’re unlikely to be disappointed.

Best,

- Christopher
(Header photo by Chuck Rozanski/Mile High Comics. Stolen from here.)

The whole thing is peppered with quotes from Beguiling boss-man Peter Birkemoe, author and academic Jeet Heer, and even “The Chief”, Publisher Chris Oliveros himself. It also—being a business article—even has some hard sales numbers:

“D&Q’s fastest bestseller, Chester Brown’s Louis Riel, an improbable “comic strip biography” of the controversial 19th-century Métis leader, sold 10,000 copies in its first season, and to date has sold more than 36,000, more than most bestselling books in Canada. Publishers Weekly called it a “major achievement.” “ - Jason McBride, Canadian Business

Congrats on such a glowing profile to the fine folks at Drawn & Quarterly!

- Chris

From Atwood to Polkaroo: Highlights of Word on the Street events
The stars of CanLit mingle with comics geeks, dub poets, the TVO Kids gang and many other fans of the written word

I suppose all press is good press?

Still, it is a nice little nod in The Toronto Star about tomorrow’s Word On The Street fest. Second in line behind only the stars of CanLit…!

Hope we’ll see you out at the event tomorrow!

- Chris

Here’s a brief outline of this year’s programming, and I hope we see you out this weekend (oh and please feel free to repost):

11:00am-11:15am: All about Comics & Graphic Novels: A brief introduction.
Hosted by Christopher Butcher.

11:15am-12:00pm: Creating comics with Owlkids!
Featuring CTON (Clayton Hanmer) and Brian McLachlan.
Bonus: The first 200 kids 12 and under that attend this panel will receive a gift bag filled with great comics!

12:00-13:00: Creating Comics and Raising a Family: Finding Balance.
Featuring Jim Munroe (Sword of My Mouth), Tara Tallan (Galaxion), and Claudia Davilla (Luz: The Girl of Knowing).

13:00-14:00: No Rules, No Budget, All Fun! How and why you should make comics!
Featuring Georgia Webber (gangLion), Ruth Tait, and steflenk (The Haircut)

14:00-15:00: Graphic Memoirs – 3 New Works.
Featuring Tory Woolcott (Mirror Mind), Lesley Fairfield (Tyranny), and Adam Bourret (I’m Crazy)

15:00-16:00: Sequential Presents: Oh, Canada. Surveying The Landscape of Canadian Comics.
Featuring Bryan Munn, Salgood Sam, Brad Mackay, and Kevin Boyd.

16:00-17:00: Sequential Presents: Three New Comics set in Canada
Featuring readings by Willow Dawson (100 Mile House), Jeff Lemire (Essex County), and Evan Munday (Quarter-Life Crisis).

17:00-18:00: WEBCOMICS
Featuring Andy Belanger (Bottle of Awesome), Faith Erin Hicks (War At Ellsmere), Emily Horne (A Softer World), Ryan North (Dinosaur Comics), Kean Soo (Jellaby).

–

For full programming descriptions and stuff, check out The Word On The Street website at http://www.thewordonthestreet.ca/wots/toronto/whatson/comics.

Thanks,

- Christopher

Anyway, if you want to see what went down in 2008, the list is below. Thanks again to all of the great artists, writers, authors, and organizations we were fortunate enough to work with last year… and this year. 2009 is already off to a pretty solid start, if I do say so!

–

Author Events at The Beguiling, 2008

Cecil Castellucci (Janes In Love), The Beguiling, January 30th
Scott Hepburn (Star Wars: VECTOR), The Beguiling, January 30th

Kean Soo (Jellaby Volume 1), Keep Toronto Reading, February 5th
Kazu Kibuishi (Amulet Volume 1), Keep Toronto Reading, February 5th
In Association with Toronto Public Library 

Kean Soo (Jellaby Volume 1), The Beguiling, February 6th
Kazu Kibuishi (Amulet Volume 1), The Beguiling, February 6th

Michel Rabagilati (Paul Goes Fishing), Lillian H. Smith Library, March 15th

R.G. Taylor (Growing Up With Comics), Industry Night, March 26th
Ron Kasman (Growing Up With Comics), Industry Night, March 26th
Mark Innes (Comic Eye), Industry Night, March 26th

Jillian Tamaki Art Show, The Beguiling, April 14th-May 30th

Free Comic Book Day For Kids! @ Palmerston Library, May 3rd
Featuring: Michael Cho (Max Finder Mysteries), Steven Manale (You Crack Me Up!), Brian McLachlan (Owl Magazine), and Jeremy Tankard (Grumpy Bird).
Presented in association with Toronto Public Library, Scholastic Books, and Owlkids. Image shown below, featuring Jeremy Tankard.

Free Comic Book Day at The Beguiling, May 3rd
Featuring J. Korim (Penciler, Atomic Robo FCBD Edition), Jessie Lam (Colorist, Neozoic), Tyrone McCarthy (Creator, Corduroy High), Alana McCarthy (Illustrator), Tara Talan (Galaxion), Willow Dawson (Violet Miranda), Nick Mandaag (Artist and self-publisher), Chip Zdarsky (Monster Cops).

Stuart Immonen, The Beguiling, May 28th

Luminato Arts Festival, June 8th
Featuring Spain Rodriguez (Che: A Graphic Biography), Dan Goldman (Shooting War), and Bernice Eisenstein (I Was A Child Of Holocaust Survivors). 
Presented in association with Luminato. 

Blake Bell (Strange and Stranger: The World of Steve Ditko), Lillian H. Smith Library, June 18th

Jason (Low Moon, Pocket Full of Rain), The Beguiling, June 10th 

Ray Fawkes (Apocalipstix), Revival Bar, August 6th
Cameron Stewart (Apocalipstix), Revival Bar, August 6th

The Doug Wright Awards, August 10th
Official Bookseller

Russel Lissau (The Batman Strikes!), The Beguiling, August 29th

Matthew Forsythe (Ojingogo), The Beguiling, September 27th
Pat Shechuk (Pohadky), The Beguiling, September 27th
Marek Colek (Pohadky), The Beguiling, September 27th

The Word On The Street, Graphic Novel Tent Official Sponsor, September 28th
Featuring: D.J. Steinberg, Steve Manale, Brian McLachlan, Jim Zubkavich, Matt Moylan, Jeremy Tankard, Matt Hammill, Steve Murray, Mariko Tamaki, Ray Fawkes, Cameron Stewart, Jim Munroe, Ramon Perez, Ray Fenwick, Susan Hughes, Willow Dawson, Pat Shewchuck, Marek Colek, Matt Forsythe, Andy Bellanger, Joey Comeau, Emily Horne, Matt Forsythe, Ryan North, Kate Beaton, Ramon Perez.

Street Fighter Tribute Launch, The Beguiling, September 28th
Featuring nearly two-dozen different comics creators including Cameron Stewart, Bobby Chiu, Kei Acedera, Scott Hepburn, Alex Milne, Arthur Dela Cruz, Eric Kim, Alvin Lee, Omar Dogan, Joe Ng, Christine Choi, Eric Vedder, Joe Vriens, Matt Moylan, Jim Zubkavich, Saejin Oh, and many more.

Lynda Barry (What It Is!), IFOA/Writing The Unthinkable, October 23rd-26th
Chip Kidd (Bat-Manga), IFOA, October 25th-26th

Shaun Tan (The Arrival), The Beguiling, October 28th

Chris Onstad (Achewood, The Great Outdoor Fight), The Beguiling, November 4th

Igort (Baobab, Ignatz Line), The Beguiling, November 15th
David B. (Epileptic, Nocturnal Emissions), The Beguiling, November 15th

Maurice Vellekoop (Pin-Ups), Buddies in Bad Times Theatre, November 25th

Dave Lapp (Drop-In), The Beguiling, December 3rd

Kramers Ergot World Tour, The Beguiling, December 11th
Featuring Sammy Harkham, Seth, Shary Boyle, Souther Salazar, Kevin Huizenga, John Pham

Faith Erin Hicks (The War At Ellsmere), The Beguiling, December 17th

–

So, yeah. Come to Toronto. We are doing awesome things here, we’d love for you to be a part of it.

- Chris

You can find the interview at http://www.inkstuds.com, or http://inkstuds.com/?p=1812, or subscribe at iTunes. Thanks to Robin for the interview!

RELATED: Peggy Burns from Drawn & Quarterly let me know today that Radio Canada International (The CBC) just gave a glowing review to Seth’s new graphic novel George Sprott, and plugged TCAF and The Beguiling at the same time. Super awesome. Unfortunately the main host has a corny “Comics Aren’t Just For Kids!” thing going on, which is lame, but the reviewer and review are lovely… and will likely sell a LOT of books for us! And send people to TCAF!

You can listen to the clip online at http://www.rcinet.ca/rci/en/emissions/archives/archivesDetails_1952_15042009.shtml. Forward to about the 13:00 mark in the first part of the show.

Whoo!

Good day, productive. Need a nap though.

- Chris

The webcomic Unshelved is about life working in a library. It’s a huge hit online and in the library market, though relatively unknown in comic book stores. Well they’ve got this neat little feature called Unshelved Book Club (I believe it runs every Sunday), where they invite cartoonists to contribute guest comic strips in the form of book recommendations. Kind of like a book club!

The newest entry into the series? First Second Editor In Chief Mark Siegel recommends the hell out of Scott Pilgrim. 

I’m friends (or at least friendly) with all of the people involved in this strip, which makes the whole thing just that much more amazing… and from what I remember I think Gina told me that at least the first part of this strip Actually Happened. Hehe.

 Go check it out, it’s pretty darned neat. And browse the archives while you’re there.

- Chris

We’ve just put up most of the TCAF Events that will be happening in Toronto surrounding the Festival. We’re nailing down the dates on others, but yeah, it’s pretty outstanding, if I do say so myself. You can check it all out at http://www.torontocomics.com/tcaf, or if you’re more of an RSS person, all future updates are going to also be made via the blog on the front-page of http://www.torontocomics.com.

I am pretty proud of all of this I gotta say.

- Chris

KTR: Graphically Speaking. (L to R) Christopher Butcher, Kate Beaton, Willow Dawson, Emily Horne, Ryan North, and Brian McLachlan

Last night was our event Graphically Speaking: Webcomics, as part of Toronto’s Keep Toronto Reading month! We had a great turnout, well over 100 people (and I only knew like 10 of them!) including journalist Matthew Braga from Blog.T.O., who just put up a short article on the event:

“While the evening was a superb way to learn more about the burgeoning community of webcomics, both in Toronto and on the web, it won’t be the only chance for fans to interact with some of their favourite online authors and artists. Both the Toronto Public Library and The Beguiling will also be hosting the Toronto Comic Arts Festival (TCAF) this May, where most of Tuesday’s panelists should be in attendance.” –  BlogT.O.

A superb evening AND a TCAF plug. Hoo-ray!

- Christopher

At any rate, the Shusters tend to have a different focus than the recently-announced Doug Wright Awards, but I’ve been trying to figure out a way to delineate the differences between the two awards and their aims for the past 10 minutes, in a way that won’t offend one or both of the committees who put their respective awards together, and I can’t do it. I think the fact that none of the nominees on the Wright Awards list are on the Shuster List, or vice versa, except for Mariko Tamaki and Kate Beaton? That speaks for itself right there. Variety is the spice of life…

Anyway, congratulations to all of those nominated!

–

JOE SHUSTER AWARDS 2009 NOMINEES for Work Published in 2008

Artist/Dessinateur

* Marc Delafontaine – Les Nombrils, Tome 3 : Les liens de l’amitié (Dupuis)
* Dale Eaglesham – Justice Society of America #12, 14-15, 18-22 (DC Comics)
* David Finch – Ultimatum #1-2 (Marvel Comics)
* Karl Kerschl & Serge LaPointe – Teen Titans: Year One #1-6 (DC Comics)
* Jacques Lamontagne – Les Druides, Tome 4 : La Ronde des Géants (Soleil Productions)
* Steve McNiven – Amazing Spider-Man #546-548, Wolverine #66-70 (Marvel Comics)
* Steve Rolston – Emiko Superstar (DC/Minx), “Familiar” – House of Mystery #4 (DC/Vertigo), You Ain’t No Dancer #3 (New Reliable Press)
* Stephen Sadowski – Avengers/Invaders #1-7 (Marvel Comics/Dynamite Entertainment), Superpowers #0 (Dynamite Entertainment), Jack the Lantern: Ghosts #2 (Castle Rain Entertainment)

Cartoonist/Créateur

* Grégoire Bouchard – Vers les Mondes Lointains (Paquet)
* Darwyn Cooke – “Chapter X: The Greater Good” Justice League: The New Frontier Special #1, The Spirit #12 (DC Comics)
* Francis Descharnais – Burquette (Les 400 coups)
* Jean-Paul Eid – Des tondeuses et des hommes (La Pastèque)
* Michel Gagne – “The Saga of Rex” Chapter 4 – Flight Vol. 5 (Ballantyne Books)
* Faith Erin Hicks – The War at Ellsmere (Slave Labor Graphics)
* Jeff Lemire – Essex County Vol. 3: The Country Nurse (Top Shelf)
* Seth – “Thoreau MacDonald” Kramer’s Ergot 7 (Buenaventura Press)
* Dave Sim – Glamourpuss #1-4, Judenhaas (Aardvark-Vanaheim)

Colourist/Dessinateur Couleur

* Jean-Francois Beaulieu – G.I. Joe: America’s Elite 31-36, Voltron: A Legend Forged 1 (Devil’s Due), Marvel Zombies 3 #1-3, Wonderful Wizard of OZ #1, X-Men: Divided We Stand #1, X-Men Legacy #215 (Marvel Comics)
* Blond – Team 14 #1 (Digital Webbing), Freshman: Summer Vacation Special #1, Magdalena/Daredevil #1, True Blood: The Great Revelation NN, Witchblade: Takeru Manga #11-12 (image/Top Cow), Ultimate Fantastic Four #50-59 (Marvel Comics), Beyond Wonderland #4, Grimm Fairy Tales 2008 Annual (Zenoscope)
* Chris Chuckry – Brave and the Bold #17-18, Countdown to Mystery #4-8, Simon Dark #4-7, Two Face: Year One #1-2 (DC Comics), Air 1-5 (DC/Vertigo), G.I. Joe #0 (Devil’s Due), Comic Book Tattoo (image), Amazing Spider-Man #546, 565-567, newuniversal: Shockfront #1-2, The Twelve #1-8 (Marvel Comics)
* Maryse Dubuc – Les Nombrils, Tome 3 : Les liens de l’amitié (Dupuis)
* Nathan Fairbairn – Fear Agent 21 (Dark Horse), Pilot Season: The Core #1 (image/Top Cow), Civil War: House of M #3, Guardians of the Galaxy #1-3, Secret Invasion: Who Do You Trust? NN, Wolverine: Origins #31, X-Men: Divided We Stand #2, X-Men: Kingbreaker #1, X-Men Legacy #217, X-Men: Manifest Destiny #1, 3, Young Avengers Presents #1 (Marvel Comics), Stephen Colbert’s Tek Jansen #3 (Oni Press)
* Lovern Kindzierski – Sandman: The Dream Hunters #1-2 (DC Comics), The Worlds of Dungeons & Dragons #1-2Coraline (HarperCollins), Giant-Size Incredible Hulk #1 (Marvel Comics) (Devil’s Due),
* François Lapierre – “Gédéon et la bête du lac” Contes et légendes du Québec (Glénat Québec), Magasin général 4 (Casterman)
* Dave McCaig – Star Wars: Dark Times #11-12 (Dark Horse), Action Comics #861-863, Final Crisis: Rogue’s Revenge #1-3. Joker’s Asylum: The Penguin #1, JSA Classified #35-37 (DC Comics), Family Dynamic #1-2 House of Mystery #4, Northlanders #2-8, 11-2 (DC/Vertigo), Broken Trinity: Angelus #1, First Born: Aftermath #1, Pilot Season: The Core #1 (image/Top Cow), Fantastic Four Cosmic Size Special #1, Secret Invasion X-Men #1-4, Ultimate Iron Man II #3-5 (Marvel Comics), Stephen Colbert’s Tek Jansen #2 (Oni Press) (DC/Johnny DC),

Writer/Écrivain

* Ian Boothby – Bart Simpson’s Treehouse of Horror #14, Bongo Comics Free-For-All 2008, Futurama #35-39, Simpsons Comics #136, 141, 148, Simpsons Summer Shindig #1, Simpsons Super Spectacular #7 (Bongo Comics)
* Cecil Castellucci – Janes in Love (DC/Minx)
* Darwyn Cooke – “Dragster Riot starring Robin the Boy Wonder”, “Wonder Woman and Black Canary” Justice League: The New Frontier Special #1, Superman Confidential 11 (DC Comics)
* Maryse Dubuc – Les Nombrils, Tome 3 : Les liens de l’amitié (Dupuis)
* Ray Fawkes – The Apocalipstix (Oni Press)
* François Lapierre – “Gédéon et la bête du lac” Contes et légendes du Québec (Glénat Québec)
* Mariko Tamaki – Emiko Superstar (DC/Minx), Skim (Groundwood Books)
* J. Torres – The Family Dynamic #1-3, Legion of Super-Heroes in the 31st Century #11, 13, 17-19, Teen Titans Go! #51-55 (DC/Johnny DC), Wonder Girl #5-6 (DC Comics)

Cover/Couverture

* Adrian Alphona – Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane Season Two #1 Variant (Marvel Comics)
* Darwyn Cooke – The Spirit #12 (DC Comics)
* Marc Delafontaine – Les Nombrils, Tome 3 : Les liens de l’amitié (Dupuis)
* Dale Eaglesham – Justice Society of America #14 Variant (DC Comics)
* David Finch -Amazing Spider-Man #572 Variant (Marvel Comics)
* Philippe Girard – Les Ravins (Mécanique Générale)
* Niko Henrichon – Hostile Tome 1 (Dupuis)
* Steve McNiven – Kick-Ass #1 Variant (Marvel Comics)
* Dean Motter – Mister X: The Condemned #1 (Dark Horse)
* David Sim – Glamourpuss #4 Zombie Variant (Aardvark-Vanaheim)

Webcomics/Bandes Dessinées Web

* Kate Beaton – Hark! A Vagrant http://harkavagrant.com
* Michael Cho – Papercut http://www.transmission-x.com/_papercut
* Lar De Souza & Ryan Sohmer – Least I Could Do http://www.leasticoulddo.com / Looking for Grouphttp://www.lfgcomic.com/
* Kathryn & Stuart Immonen – Moving Pictures http://www.immonen.ca/comics
* Karl Kerschl – The Abominable Charles Christopher http://www.abominable.cc
* Gisele Lagace – Menage A 3 http://www.menagea3.net/
* Ramón K. Pérez– Kukuburi http://www.kukuburi.com / Butternut Squash (w/Robert Coughler) http://www.butternutsquash.net
* Cameron Stewart – Sin Titulo http://www.sintitulocomic.com/

Publisher/Éditeur

* Aardvark-Vanaheim
* Arcana Studio
* Conundrum Press
* Drawn & Quarterly
* La Pastèque
* Les 400 Coups/Mécanique Générale
* Red 5 Comics
* Udon Entertainment

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All of this information and much, much more available at http://joeshusterawards.com/.

- Christopher

From Canada: Dave Lapp (Drop-In), Brian McLachlan (Princess Planet), Michael Noonan, Joe Ollman (Chewing on Tinfoil), Steve Rolston (Emiko Superstar) and Jim Zubkavich (UDON).

From England, and attending TCAF for the first time, is Jamie McKelvie, author of Suburban Glamour and artist of Phonogram, amongst other works.

From the U.S.A.: John Campbell (Pictures For Sad Children), Scott Campbell (Hickee), Becky Cloonan (Demo, Pixu), Kevin Colden (Fishtown), Joshua Cotter (Skyscrapers of the Midwest), Justin Hall (True Travel Tales), Dustin Harbin (Heroes Aren’t Hard To Find), Cheese Hasselberger and Dave McKenna and Brian Musikoff from House of 12, Chris Hastings (Dr. McNinja), Jeph Jacques (Questionable Content), Matt Kindt (Three Sisters), Joe Lambert (CCS Grad), Miss Lasko-Gross (Escape From Special), David Malki (Wondermark), Sean McCarthy (Partyka), Erika Moen (Dar), Tom Neely (The Blot), Lark Pien (Long-Tail Kitty), Jonathan Rosenberg (Goats), Jeffrey Rowland (Wigu, Overcompensating), and Jason Shiga (Bookhunter)!

We’ve also confirmed exhibition space by publishers Adhouse Books, Anteism Books, Buenaventura Press, Fantagraphics Books, Le Dernier Cri,  plus The Doug Wright Awards, Broken Pencil Magazine, and Taddle Creek Magazine.

–

Cool beans!

We do have a number of potential guests who are still firming up their schedule so there’ll likely be more additions in the weekend to come, though another 30 creator update is unlikely. 

- Chris

The 2009 Finalists for Best Book are:

Burma Chronicles, by Guy Delisle (Drawn & Quarterly)
Drop-in, by Dave Lapp (Conundrum Press)
Paul Goes Fishing, by Michel Rabagliati (Drawn & Quarterly)
Skim, by Jillian & Mariko Tamaki (Groundwood Books)

The 2009 finalists for Best Emerging Talent are:

Kate Beaton (History Comics)
Caitlin Black (Maids in the Mist)
Jesse Jacobs (Blue Winter, Shapes in the Snow)
Jason Kieffer (Kieffer #2)
Nick Maandag (Jack & Mandy)

The finalists for non-traditional works (Pigskin Peters’ Award) are:

Hall of Best Knowledge Ray Fenwick (Fantagraphics)
Ojingogo Matthew Forsythe (Drawn & Quarterly)
All We Ever Do is Talk About Wood Tom Horacek (Drawn & Quarterly)
Small Victories Jesse Jacobs (self-published)

Further, this year the DWAs will induct cartoonist Jimmie Frise (d. 1948), creator of the popular strip ‘Birdseye Center’, into The Giants of the North, the Hall of Fame for Canadian cartooning.

The 2009 Doug Wright Awards will be handed out on Saturday, May 9th at 7pm, in a ceremony hosted by Canadian filmmaker Don McKellar and held at the recently renovated (and gorgeous) Art Gallery of Ontario. Just after the first day of TCAF, I might add, so another reason to come.

The DWAs are decided by a rotating jury, and this year the jury includes; Bob Rae (the Member of Parliament for Toronto Centre and 21st premier of Ontario), Andrew Coyne (national editor for Maclean’s and political panelist on CBC Television’s The National), Martin Levin (books editor for The Globe and Mail and contributor to What I Meant to Say), cartoonist Joe Ollmann (author of the 2007 DWA Best Book This Will All End in Tears) and cartoonist Diana Tamblyn, the Ignatz-nominated author of several mini-comics including The Rosie Stories and There You Were.

…I still think it’s strange that the nominating committee, who wasn’t named (and Christ do I hate that) didn’t opt to put Scott Pilgrim 4 on there, but it’s not like all four of those best books aren’t amazing, amazing work.

- Christopher

‘Stripmalling’ Book Launch Tonight

Launch party for ‘Stripmalling’
Presented by ECW Press and This Is Not A Reading Series
Monday, March 2nd, 7:30pm
The Gladstone Hotel Ballroom, 1214 Queen St. West
$5 Cover (Free with book purchase)
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=44003449363

Toronto author Jon Paul Fiorentino brought our good friend Evan Mundy on board to do extensive illustrations and comics sequences for his new novel, ‘Stripmalling!’ Then they made a short movie about how the book was made, “The Way of the Smock: The Making of Stripmalling”. Catch the trailer here:

This Monday, they’re launching the book, showing the film, doing a reading, an interview, and more. ‘Stripmalling’ looks great and Evan is a wonderful guy. See you at the Gladstone tonight!

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2. Seminar: Anime and Contemporary Japanese Society

Anime and Contemporary Japanese Society
Wednesday, March 4, 2009, 6pm-8:30pm (doors at 5:45) Ryerson University, 245 Church Street
George Vari Engineering & Computing Centre, ENG 103

Admission FREE – Reservation recommended for guaranteed seating RSVP at www.jftor.org/whatson/rsvp OR anime@jftor.org OR 416.966.1600 x600

Digital Value Lap Ryerson University, The Japan Foundation, and Consulate General of Japan in Toronto present two important lectures that will be of interest to Beguiling customers and friends, on Anime and Contemporary Japanese Society.

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POSTCRITICAL ANIME: OBSERVATIONS ON ITS ‘IDENTITY’ WITHIN CONTEMPORARY JAPAN
While anime is being watched on a global scale, there are significant differences in its contemporary reception. The gap between regular consumers and critical spectators, sometimes appearing in the form of Japanese audiences vs. foreign Japanologists, deserves special attention since it raises a number of questions, such as what sort of animated film is identified as ‘anime’; who relates anime to politics, history and society; what kind of meaning is at play in anime’s performative images, and to what extent one can read ‘Japanese society’, or even ‘culture’, out of anime. Comparing Kurosawa’s “Seven Samurai” (1954) and Gonzo’s “Samurai 7” (2004) as well as touching upon anime’s history, this lecture focuses on aesthetic and cultural identities ascribed to anime in modern Japan and their contemporary relevance.
Jaqueline Berndt is Associate Professor of Art and Media Studies, Yokohama National University. She specializes in aesthetics/art theory, anime, visual cultural and Japanese studies, aesthetics of comics, art in modern Japan and animation.

OTAKU CULTURE: PERSONALITY, SPACE & CITY OF ANIME FANS IN JAPAN
Optimism about an ever-progressing technological future ran out in the 1970’s. It was in the mid-1980’s that the term otaku was coined to signify a new personality that had emerged as a reaction to the loss of ’future’.The term evokes a stereotyped image of a geeky computer nerd, long past adolescence but still obsessed with games and anime. The presentation shall explore how this otaku personality became a geographical phenomenon in a district called Akihabara, together with its role in the development of Japanese anime.
Kaichiro Morikawa is Associate Professor of Contemporary Culture in the School of Global Japanese Studies at Meiji University. His research interests include design and architectural theory. Prof. Morikawa served as commissioner of the Japanese pavilion at the Venice Biennale 9th International Architecture Exhibition in 2004.

This sounds pretty amazing, and although this will be a VERY busy week, this will be one lecture series worth attending…!

–

3. MARCH 6-12: FEAR(S) OF THE DARK – Film featuring Charles Burns

FEAR(S) OF THE DARK
March 6th-12th
at the Royal Cinema, 608 College Street
Directors Blutch, Charles Burns, Marie Caillou, Pierre Di Sciullo, Lorenzo Mattotti, Richard McGuire; France, 2008

If you’ve been following The Comics Journal or Comic Art Magazine, you’re probably familiar with this striking new animated French film which features some of the most talented comics talents in the world. We’re really fortunate to get an extended screening of this in Toronto, and I hope everyone reading this gets a chance to check it out. Here’s the description:

“A wildly inventive and visually dazzling collection of fearful tales by six of the world’s most renowned comic and graphic artists – Blutch, Charles Burns, Marie Caillou, Pierre Di Sciullo, Lorenzo Mattotti, and Richard McGuire. From a besotted student whose girlfriend is weirdly ardent in her affections, to a Japanese schoolgirl menaced by a long-dead samurai, and a pack of hounds on a bloodthirsty rampage, FEAR(S) has a story strand to trouble every sleep – not to mention a stunning range of animation styles. Shot in shimmering black and white, the six intertwined tales create an unprecedented epic where phobias and nightmares come to life and reveal Fear at its most naked and intense.”

Trailer: http://movies.yahoo.com/movie/1809947440/trailer

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4. The (Edgar) Wright Stuff at the Bloor Cinema! Starts February 28th!

The lovely and talented Edgar Wright (SHAUN OF THE DEAD, HOT FUZZ) is in town to direct the big-screen adaptation of SCOTT PILGRIM, and we couldn’t be happier. Espescially because he’s going to be programming a full slate of his favourite films at The Bloor Cinema for the month of March! The first two screenings were this weekend, and they were great fun. The next few will no doubt be awesome as well… Check this out:

SUNDAY, MARCH 8
7:00 The Wanderers (Philip Kaufman, 1979)
9:30 The Warriors (Walter Hill, 1979)

SATURDAY, MARCH 14
9:45 Head (Bob Rafelson, 1968)

SUNDAY, MARCH 15
7:00 Dames (Ray Enright & Busby Berkeley, 1934)
9:00 Phantom of the Paradise (Brian De Palma, 1974)

SUNDAY, MARCH 22
5:00 Spaced Marathon (Edgar Wright, 1999-2001)

SUNDAY, APRIL 5
7:00 Kung Fu film TBA
9:30: Drunken Master 2 (Chia-Liang Liu, 1994)

SUNDAY, APRIL 12
7:00 The Brood (David Cronenberg, 1979)
9:00 Last Night (Don McKellar, 1998)

Single movie tickets are $8 for Bloor Cinema members and $11 for non-members. Double bills are $14 for members and $17 for non-members. (Non-member prices include a six-month Bloor membership.) A pass for all screenings is $90, or $75 if not including Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz. Complete Bloor Cinema info and schedule at its website: http://www.bloorcinema.com/

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- Chris @ The Beguiling

And so two of Canada’s most prominent graphic novelists have written an open letter to the administrators of the Governor General’s Literary Awards, in the hope of getting co-creator Jillian Tamaki her due in the acclaim for this fine book. Take it away, Seth and Chester Brown:

AN OPEN LETTER TO THE GOVERNOR GENERAL’S LITERARY AWARDS

November 12, 2008

As individuals involved in the art form of comics and graphic novels, we are glad to see that a graphic novel has made the short-list for this year’s Governor General’s Literary Awards.   SKIM (by Mariko and Jillian Tamaki)  is a wonderful book and deserves the attention.  But we’re troubled by the fact that only one of its co-creators is receiving credit for the creation of the book’s text.  We understand that an award-category exists for illustration, but to have nominated Jillian in that category would not have rectified the problem.  Indeed, that would have highlighted how our medium is misunderstood.

We’re guessing that the jury who read SKIM saw it as an illustrated novel.  It’s not;  it’s a graphic novel.  In illustrated novels, the words carry the burden of telling the story, and the illustrations serve as a form of visual reinforcement. But in graphic novels, the words and pictures BOTH tell the story, and there are often sequences (sometimes whole graphic novels) where the images alone convey the narrative.  The text of a graphic novel cannot be separated from its illustrations because the words and the pictures together ARE the text.  Try to imagine evaluating SKIM if you couldn’t see the drawings.  Jillian’s contribution to the book goes beyond mere illustration:  she was as responsible for telling the story as Mariko was.

In an October 21st article for the CBC website, one of your jurors, Teresa Toten, was interviewed:  ”Toten praised SKIM for using the graphic novel format to tell a sophisticated story about what life is like for teenaged girls.  The work is remarkable in part because of how the words and pictures both contribute to the literary quality, she said.”  And that is the point of this letter.  ”[T]he words and pictures both contribute to [SKIM's] literary quality”.

A new category does not need to be created to properly address the graphic novel.  In fact, it is best to see graphic novels appear in literary awards only when they deserve to compete equally against prose on their literary merit alone.

In writing this letter, we don’t mean to slight Mariko.   One of the reasons this collaboration works so well is because she understood how to write for this medium.  But we feel that as things now stand, Jillian is being slighted. We want both of the enormously talented creators of this book to be honoured together for their achievement.

Yours,

Chester Brown (Author of Louis Riel)
Seth (Author of It’s a Good Life, If You Don’t Weaken)

NAMES IN SUPPORT OF THIS LETTER
Lynda Barry (Author of What It Is)
Peter Birkemoe (Owner of The Beguiling)
Dan Clowes (Author of Ghost World)
David Collier (Author of The Frank Ritza Papers)
Julie Doucet (Author of 365 Days)
Chris Oliveros (Publisher of Drawn and Quarterly)
Joe Ollmann (Author of This Will All End in Tears)
Bryan Lee O’Malley (author of Scott Pilgrim)
Michel Rabagliati (Author of Paul Moves Out)
Art Spiegelman (Pulitzer Prize winning author of Maus)
Adrian Tomine (Author of Shortcomings)
Chris Ware (Author of Jimmy Corrigan, Smartest Kid on Earth)

I imagine this will create something of a stir within staid Canadian literary circles.

- Christopher
Edit: I missed the ‘names in support’ somehow. Sorry!

THE APOCALIPSTIX: RAGNAROCK PARTY

The Official Launch for the new Graphic Novel

Wednesday, August 6^th, 8PM
REVIVAL BAR, 738 College St., Toronto
ALL AGES + NO COVER

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=25642968337

TORONTO, Ontario –THE APOCALIPSTIX is the new graphic novel by Toronto authors Ray Fawkes and Cameron Stewart, and fresh from their sold out pre-release at the San Diego Comic Convention these two top graphic novelists return to “play” their hometown with a book launch party featuring bands, prizes, and more, Wednesday, August 6th, at Revival Bar, 783 College St.

“It’s like Josie and the Pussycats meets Mad Max!” enthused Christopher Butcher, manager of The Beguiling, Canada’s premier retailer of comics and graphic novels. “Ray Fawkes and Cameron Stewart are top comics talents and The Apocalipstix is their best work yet… We’re anticipating the folks who loved the indy graphic novel SCOTT PILGRIM really getting into this one. I mean, three girls in a band after the end of the world, what’s not to like?”

THE APOCALIPSTIX: RAGNAROCK PARTY will feature musical performances by Toronto surf-punk band Terror Lake and all girl teen punk band DAME, and there’ll be door prizes and giveaways! Creators Ray Fawkes and Cameron Stewart will be signing and sketching for all comers! The event is all ages and features no cover charge! Revival Bar is located at 783 College St. at Shaw. Doors for the event open at 8PM, with the bands going on starting at 9:30pm.

ABOUT

Book: THE APOCALIPSTIX is a brand new 200 page graphic novel published by Oni Press. You can find out more about the graphic novel online at http://apocalipstix.com. The Apocalipstix is currently in stock at The Beguiling (601 Markham Street, near Bathurst St. & Bloor St. W), and will be available at the event.

Authors: Ray Fawkes is the Shuster Award Nominated author of Mnemovore and numerous graphic novellas and short stories, and can be found online at http://rayfawkes.com. Cameron Stewart the award-winning artist of Seaguy and The Invisibles, and the author of the serialized graphic novel Sin Titulo, and can be found online at http://cameron-stewart.com and http://transmission-x.com/.

Bands: Terror Lake can be found online at http://www.terrorlake.ca/. DAME can be found online at http://www.myspace.com/dameband.

MEDIA QUERIES: Christopher Butcher, Manager of The Beguiling, 416-533-9168, or via e-mail at chris@beguiling.com.

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- Chris

Marvel and Diamond released the final cover for the “premier” edition of the upcoming hardcover collection of Jonathan Lethem and Farel Dalrymple’s Omega The Unknown. This is one creepy cover, but I love it. Props to artist Farel Dalrymple and color artist Paul Hornschemier for turning out a Marvel book that looks nothing like a Marvel book–in the best possible way. The hardcover collection of Omega will be out September 10th and should retail for thirty bucks.

With the next installment of the Batman film franchise set to open in theatres this weekend, newspapers everywhere are commissioning Batman pieces. Here in Toronto, The National Post is no different offering up an article by Jeet Heer answering the eternal question, Is Batman Really Gay or What? Of course, no article on gay Batman is complete without an fantastic illustration by Mr. Chip Zdarsky, who also offers the rebuttal that Batman Totally Isn’t Gay. For a bigger version of this art, visit Mr. Zdarsky’s blog.

What you see there is Jim Rugg’s KICK-ASS art for the new Street Fighter: Tribute book that my friends at Udon are putting together. A limited edition hardcover of the book is dropping next week at The San Diego Comicon (and will be available from their website), and the softcover edition will see release this September in finer stores everywhere. When I was looking at the work that would be in this book, this illustration just totally, totally blew me away, as it’s a completely different interpretation of the comics/video games than we normally see, but just perfect, too. The rest of the book is pretty outstanding as well with lots of different artists contributing lots of different illustrations in lots of different styles–320 pages worth. Check out the Street Fighter Tribute Edition page for more info.

- Christopher

My friend Chip Zdarsky has moved from comics creation for the direct market to comics creation for the masses, as he chronicles his unique experiences in sequential format for The National Post (it is a newspaper, in Canada). This time Mr. Zdarsky joins The Post’s star reporter Ben Kaplan and heads to a nudist resort. Yes, that’s right, it’s Chip Zdarsky’s Nudist Resort Funnies. Both the comic and accompanying article are well worth a read.

Nude Dudes: Comic Strip Version – Newspaper Article Version

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Meanwhile, Time Magazine is running an article on the guilty pleasures of famous authors. #1? Why it’s Pulitzer Prize winner Junot Diaz talking about his love of Naoki Urasawa’s MONSTER:

“Urasawa is a national treasure in Japan, and if you ain’t afraid of picture books, you’ll see why.” – Junot Diaz, Time.com

Maybe there’s some hope that adult manga fiction will cross over into the mainstream after all, eh?

- Christopher

ITEM:

ITEM: Perhaps better and more importantly, my friend Scott Robins (previously of Scholastic and the “All Ages Blog“, and now at KidsCan Press in Canada) will also be headed to San Diego, and he’s fabulous on panels. Drop a note in the comments here if you want to get a hold of him.

ITEM: I’m kind of happy that I don’t have any big events between now and San Diego… That said, we’re working on a ton of great stuff at the store including a big Toronto launch for the new graphic novel by my friends Ray Fawkes and Cameron Stewart: APOCALIPSTIX. It’s officially dropping at the San Diego Comic Con (theme!) but that launch probably won’t have live bands and crazy swag and shit. At any rate, details are coming soon, but in the meantime everyone should check out the massive 50 page preview that’s running at Comic Book Resources: http://comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=16776. It’s pretty coooooool.

- Christopher

Quite clearly patterned after Asterix & Obelix, this is a fun little series for younger readers that incorporates lots of First Nations history, culture, and tradition.

New strips are available every week or so at http://www.rabbitandbearpaws.com, and the book is available for sale from that website too (as well as from The Beguiling in Toronto). Feel free to read the full press-release on this series after the cut.

Congrats to Chad and Christopher on their second release.

- Chris

Adventures of Rabbit and Bear Paws Vol 2: The Voyageurs!
http://www.rabbitandbearpaws.com/gnovel.php

Our two mischievous heroes are up to their games again in this NEW comical adventure. Rabbit and Bear Paws join the Voyageurs to take the Furs from Lake of the Woods to Montreal and experience all the trials and tribulations of being a Voyageur. Our young heroes face the life of a voyageur with bravery, as they are confronted by thieves and dangers around every river bend.

Adventures of Rabbit and Bear Paws Vol 2: The Voyageurs is based on the Grandfather Bravery (Aakdehewin), One of the Seven Grandfathers of the Anishinabek Teachings.

Rabbit and Bear Paws is set in 18th Century colonized North America and follows the stories of two mischievous Ojibwa brothers as they play pranks and have amazing adventures using a traditional Ojibwa medicine (spirit powder) that transforms them into animals for a short time.

Adventures of Rabbit and Bear Paws Vol 2, is a compilation of all 60 comic strips of the story line “The Voyageurs”. Book Two contains 60 comic strips, jam packed onto 30 pages of comical adventures that will tickle the heart. 8 1/2″ x 11″ of giant belly laughs!

Rabbit and Bear paws is a First Nations syndicated comic strip, both in print and web based media. Little Spirit Bear, publisher of the Adventures of Rabbit and Bear Paws series is a First Nations (Anishinabek, Ojibwa) Multi-Media company.

For new comical adventures every week from North America’s favorite mischievous brothers, visit us at www.rabbitandbearpaws.com

+ Flight contributor and graphic novelist Neil Babra recently completed an adaptation of Shakespeare’s Hamlet for the “No Fear Shakespeare” line of graphic novels published by an arm of B&N. The “No Fear” line basically “translates” Shakespearian English into more direct or contemporary English, to make the stories more approachable for young readers. I have a complex array of feelings on the idea of changing the language of Shakespeare without a full modernization, particularly because I don’t think the plot of Shakespeare is as important as the actual language… But that said, I think there’s still value to this approach, both as a study guide and additional learning tool for readers who need a way “into” the works. Luckily Neil has lots of ideas on adaptation, translation, and Shakespeare’s language as well, and he addresses them all on the just completed information page on the No Fear: Shakespeare graphic novel adaptation of Hamlet. It’s really wonderful reading.

Also, I have included a more literal adaptation of my own to My reading of the classic; Neil draws Horatio hot all the way through the book.

+ Has anyone noticed that the new colours on the remastered hardcover edition of Batman: The Killing Joke are kind of boring? Check out this side-by-side comparison of the original colours and the new edition over at PopCultureShock. I think my problem with it is that while artist Brian Boland brings a high degree of craft to the new colouring, he’s drained all of the emotion and… art… out of the work. Little touches like the cast-shadows on the cuffs of the Joker’s sleeves, for example, added more personality and depth to the art than all of the soft airbrush modelling in the world could hope to accomplish. At work my opinion is in the minority, with the majority of customers loving the hell out of the new look. Enh.

+ I’m really glad that Johanna Draper-Carlson put the leg-work in to try and peel away some of the secrecy surrounding comics’ only national holiday (or outreach event…), Free Comic Book Day. I’ve never understood the lack of transparency or accountability that surrounds this event, and I find it incredibly frustrating every single time it rolls around. This time out? The organisation mandated that all books had to be all-ages appropriate, thus reflecting a vision of the industry that doesn’t actually exist. They disallowed the participation of a publisher and then apparently lied about the reasoning (see the comments section). Getting answers is like pulling teeth. They stopped answering. And then somewhat mysteriously retailer Joe Field, the founder of FCBD (before turning it over whole-hog to Diamond), a man who has made very specific mention in the past of his arm’s-length from FCBD, ends up responding to questions that were sent to Diamond.

I’m not one to critisize without putting the work in myself; I do lots of comics outreach. But I think you can do it without the secrecy and misdirection, and a damn site better than what’s gone on. And if Mr. Field wants to ask me for suggestions that generally aren’t followed up on, again, here’s one: Name the people and organizations on the FCBD comittee. Who’s making the decisions, specifically? I’d feel better about the organization and more inclined to support it if decisions weren’t being made behind closed doors, and without any more general consultation of the direct market.

+ My friend Mr. Bryan Lee O’Malley was interviewed on NPR’s “Fair Game” last week about Scott Pilgrim. It’s a fun little interview and it’s the last segment, so fast-forward until there’s about 10 minutes left in the program.

+ The New York Times’ “Papercuts” blog offers up The 7 Deadly Sins of Book Reviewing. In keeping with the form, the 7 sins are particular words that are overused by reviewers and critics to the point of uselessness… Are the standards in comics criticism high enough that something like over-use of word “poignant” is something we have to worry about? I mean, how often are we likely to see the word “lyrical” in the latest plot-recap of last week’s Avengers? Or am I just being a bitch? Or both?

+ At Gay Pop Culture Website AfterElton.com, prominent gay comics fan/writer Lyle Masaki has been covering comics and geek culture turning on the broader gay audience to all that’s gay in comics (though mostly the superhero and Buffy set). “Six Gay Geeks Who’ve Improved Popular Culture” is a recent piece from Lyle that tags comics mainstays like Phil Jimmenez and Andy Mangels for their comics-centric contributions to geek culture. It’s a solid read.

+ I found myself needing to write a short history of comics in North America recently, and found the website The History of Romance Comics to be a really useful compendium of knowledge on some of the most popular and bestselling comics North America has ever seen. Who knew that they also feature a great collection of romance comics reprints as well? Check out their fantastic collection of pre-code romance comics and history articles.

+ Thank you John Jakala for pointing out that Paul Levitz isn’t so hot at the math. Unfortunately, the platform for Mr. Levitz’ creative accounting is the blog & Newsarama, and the comments section there is such a fucking pit that any legitimate criticism of the facts presented in the column is likely to get drowned out by mouth-breathers still angry that every DC comic doesn’t come with bound-in $50 bills. Le Sigh.

+ Finally, though it isn’t specifically about comics I wanted to talk a little bit about bookstore culture… Here in Toronto the bookstore landscape is a-changing. Our neighbors at Ballenford Books on Architecture will be closing their doors in the next few months. They’re currently working to liquidate inventory which means some nice sales on some beautiful books… I really like this store and bookstores in general. It’s always sad when one decides to close their doors.

Meanwhile, one of my favourite indy bookshops is closing as well, but with a happier ending. “This Ain’t The Rosedale Library” will be closing their 22 year old spot in Toronto’s Gay Village, and moving to a smaller (and likely much cheaper) space in Kensington Market. They’re also having a pretty amazing sale right now, with 50% off of the already low prices on remaindered books. I’m going to try to get over there first thing tomorrow…

And that’s it for this post. Thanks for reading!

- Christopher

Comic Book Hero
http://www.nationalpost.com/todays_paper/story.html?id=361519

“Chris Butcher takes a break from rescuing literacy and gives Zenya Sirant the 411 on the superpowers of the graphic novel from his HQ at indie institution The Beguiling.”

Pilgrim’s progress for graphic novel fans as Cera touted to star
http://www.thestar.com/entertainment/article/349210

“We don’t let people leave the store without buying [Scott Pilgrim],” says Chris Butcher, manager at The Beguiling comic book store in the Annex. “Yeah, we’re totally excited about the movie news. You know, it’s still our best-selling graphic novel every week … People are always discovering it.”

My Night As A Lady: Steve Murray Goes Undercover
http://www.nationalpost.com/news/story.html?id=295844

It was a pretty fun evening.

Also: Funny story. I actually quit an interview two questions in, yesterday. A journalism student for an accredited university had called looking to do an interview for class on graphic novels, and somehow heard I was the guy to go to. Fair enough, I like to be helpful. The first question was “What’s a graphic novel?” and I was like “Seriously?” The second question was “Are they all superheroes?” and… I just balked. Like, maybe they didn’t know what they were doing, maybe they just thought that they needed me to reiterate all of their background information in my own voice for some reason, but I just was totally put off by the style and tone of the questions and balked. I just couldn’t do the interview anymore… I feel like a bit of a jerk too because I’m sure that now this person needs to find someone else for their project or whatever, but I realised that getting angrier and angrier at the questions and even answering these sorts of questions wasn’t going to do anyone any favours… Ah well.

Also Again: I feel like I’m getting back into the groove of blogging after a bumpy few winter months. Thanks to everyone for the comments and links on my last few weeks of articles. I’ve been trying a lot harder and I think it shows.

- Christopher

Toronto’s R.G. Taylor has a new graphic novel dropping in a few months called “Growing Up With Comics” from Desperado. It’s a collection of various comics luminaries talking about their defining comics moments, and it collects strips that ran in Negative Burn magazine. I came in and lettered what I think is the last story in the series, my boss Peter Birkemoe talking about old E.C. Comics. They’ve got a nice preview up online at http://www.desperadopublishing.com/TITLES/GrowComics.htm.

Pretty neat.

- Christopher

Just a quick note that Michel Rabagliati got a very nice interview in The National Post today, in advance of his appearance in Toronto this weekend:

It must be cathartic, however, for Rabagliati to tackle some of the issues he does: For instance, Paul Goes Fishing follows Paul and his partner, Lucie, as they try to start a family. The book deals with the multiple miscarriages they faced, but Rabagliati says his partner was OK with him discussing such matters in a public forum.

“It was tough,” he says. “When you start drawing it, and you start drawing the blood … it really puts you back in this particular context. It’s pretty sad sometimes. I must confess, sometimes I get a little bit depressed or I cry a bit when I [draw] that.

“I like drawing these stories about real life. [But] that’s the problem with it: I have to deal with that.”

I heard the event got a nice little mention in Xtra Magazine here in Toronto as well (Xtra.ca) but it’s not online, so you’ll have to go out and pick up a copy if you’re in the Toronto area. Thanks for putting up with my constant pimping of this event by the by, I’m quite excited about it and the books are among my favourites published by D&Q.
- Christopher

Art from Top: Paul in the Metro, French edition cover for Paul Goes Fishing, a musical panel from Paul Moves Out, and a moment of regret from Paul Moves Out. He looks so cute in his Y-Fronts. 

First up, Newsarama has an interview with Rabagliati, mostly just introducing the readership to the work of Rabagliati, although the discussion does bring to mind the recent publishing industry scandal about fake memoir in an interesting way:

NRAMA: When you started creating comics, what made you create a fictional alter-ego, Paul, through which to tell your stories rather than using real names?

MR: I did it to keep a certain distance. And Paul isn’t 100% autobiographical. The books are works of “auto-fiction” to various degrees. There’s plenty of fiction in them, but it’s fiction that draws on everyday life and isn’t necessarily visible to the reader. And so the reader thinks everything is true, when in fact what it is, is plausible.

Next up, The Toronto Star’s Raju Mudhar offers up an interview and profile of Rabagliati which touches on the artist’s move from illustration and graphic design to being a full-time graphic novelist.

“I kind of forgot about comics for about 25 years … I starting doing comics around when I turned 40 and stopped doing graphic design and illustration work. I’m that kind of guy and I do these kinds of moves in my life and they’re pretty hazardous sometimes. Now it’s paying off a little,” he says. “I’m 47 years old, I’m not supposed to do that. I’m supposed to have RRSPs at the bank, because I have a family and a house, it’s pretty perilous. It’s a career change you don’t usually do at that age.” - Michel Rabagliati

Edit: Thanks to Torontoist.com for their little primer on Michel and their plug for the event this weekend!  

Closer to home, we sent out the official press release for the event and I’ve included behind the cut below.

See you at the event this weekend!

- Chris

PLEASE INCLUDE IN YOUR EVENT LISTINGS

The Beguiling is proud to present…

IN CONVERSATION WITH MICHEL RABAGLIATI
Discussing the life and work of the author of Paul Goes Fishing

Saturday, March 15th, 5pm
The Lillian H. Smith Library, Basement Auditorium
239 College St., Toronto * FREE

TORONTO, Ontario – The Beguiling, Canada’s premier comic book retailer, is happy to announce that Michel Rabagliati, author of the Paul series of graphic novels including the newly-released ‘Paul Goes Fishing’, will be participating in a moderated Q&A and book-signing session on Saturday, March 15th at 5pm, at The Lillian H. Smith Library in Toronto.

Rabagliati will be interviewed on his life and art by The Beguiling’s Peter Birkemoe. The interview will include an extensive visual presentation of his work. Rabagliati is well-known in Quebec for his gentle, wistful series of French graphic novels detailing the coming of age his lead character “Paul” (really a thinly-disguised version of Rabagliati himself) in 1960s and 1970s-era Montreal. With ‘Paul Goes Fishing’, the author moves the titular character into his adult years as he and his partner suffer the joy and heartache of child-birth, city-living, and fishing in the country-side.

“Michel Rabagliati is one of Canada’s great literary graphic novelists,” said Birkemoe. “I think that recognition and appreciation of his excellent graphic novels is long overdue in English.”

“His art is rendered in the “clear line” style,” explains Beguiling manager Christopher Butcher, “and his previous career as a designer and illustrator imbues his art with a strong focus on design, particularly in his depictions of Montreal neighborhoods and their architecture. This really gives a lot of texture to his cartooning… it’s wholly unique in Canadian graphic novels but still accessible to those who love the graphic novels of cartoonists like Seth or Chester Brown.”

The free event will take place in the Lillian H. Smith Library auditorium on Saturday March 15th at 5pm. Doors will open at approximately 4:30pm, and a signing with the author will follow the presentation. The Lillian H.  Smith Library is located at 239 College St., just east of Spadina Ave., and houses The Merril Collection of Science Fiction and Fantasy, which includes the largest graphic novel collection in Canada.

The event is completely free and open to the public.

Books: Michel Rabagliati’s graphic novels ‘Paul Goes Fishing’, ‘Paul Moves Out’, ‘Paul Has A Summer Job’, and his comic book ‘Paul In The Country’ are currently in stock at The Beguiling (601 Markham Street, near Bathurst St. & Bloor St. W), and will all be available at the event.

The works of Michel Rabagliati are published in English by Montreal’s Drawn + Quarterly (http://www.drawnandquarterly.com) and are originally published in French by La Pasteque (http://www.lapasteque.com/).

About the Author: Like many kids in North America, Michel Rabagliati grew up reading comic books, but since he was born in 1961 in Montreal, instead of reading The Hulk or Superman, he was immersed in all the major comic albums being published in Belgium and France: Tintin, Spirou, Gaston, and of course Asterix, among others. A professional graphic designer and commercial illustrator and his work has appeared in a diverse array of publications including The Wall Street Journal, The Utne Reader, and Maclean’s. He has won a comics industry Harvey Award for Best New Talent for his first comic, ‘Paul in the Country’, and his previous graphic novel ‘Paul Moves Out’ was awarded a prestigious Doug Wright Award for best graphic novel. Michel Rabagliati lives in Montreal with his partner and daughter.

MEDIA QUERIES: For event queries, please contact Peter Birkemoe, owner of The Beguiling, 416-533-9168 or via email at: mail@beguiling.com.

For author queries, please contact Jamie Quail, Studio & Publicity Coordinator for Drawn + Quarterly, 514.279.0691 or via email at: jamie@drawnandquarterly.com.

This event is made possible with generous support of Drawn + Quarterly and The Toronto Public Library.

+ Doug Wright has been in the comics news as of late. First up, Drawn + Quarterly have been publishing previews (one, two) of their forthcoming biography of this Canadian cartoonist little known outside of Canada. Then, just this week a fellow named John Adcock found a number of his comics on microfilm, and decided to post them to his blog.

+ Sequential is a Canadian comics news and linkblog that, for whatever reason, I hadn’t yet added to my blogroll. I’ve rectified that now, go visit today.

Toronto Comics Events Coming Up:

March 15th: Michel Rabagliati in Toronto, http://www.beguiling.com/2008/03/reminder-michel-rabagliati-in-toronto.html

March 26th: Skim Book Launch, with Mariko Tamaki and Jillian Tamaki, http://pagesbooks.ca/events.php?type=event&id=165

April 3rd: Art Spiegelman in Toronto, http://www.uofttix.ca/view.php?id=326

Finally, here’s a little bit ‘a Stompin’ Tom Connors, courtesy of Kate Beaton’s Awesome Canadian History Comics.

- Christopher

Chris Lorway, Luminato’s Director of Programming, is enthusiastic about the festival’s literary component. “For Luminato 2008, we decided to make stronger connections between our literary program and the overall festival. I am so pleased that we were able to find someone like Devyani Saltzman to curate this program for us. She’s a great addition to our team.”

Devyani Saltzman is pleased to see her curatorial vision becoming a reality. “It’s a pleasure to bring both Canadian and international authors together around literary and political themes in addition to showcasing new works. I find the richest discussions occur because of unexpected collaborations.”

The 2008 line-up includes perspectives on South Asia, a focus on war and politics through illustration, a celebration of a renowned literary master, the launch of the third instalment of a city-centric anthology, as well as a festival of short stories.

The Political Graphic Novel
Sunday, June 8, 7:00 p.m.
The Al Green Theatre (at the Miles Nadal JCC)
750 Spadina Avenue (Spadina at Bloor)

From the war in Iraq to the life of revolutionary icon Ché Guevera, the medium of graphic novels becomes political in this stimulating evening of literature, illustration and discussion.

With award-winning Canadian author and illustrator Bernice Eisenstein (I Was a Child of Holocaust Survivors), Spain Rodriguez (Che: A Graphic Biography) and the Canadian premiere of Anthony Lappé and Dan Goldman’s Shooting War, which explores the war in Iraq and the influence of alternative news media. The Village Voice describes Shooting War as a “light-handed but searing political satire Shooting War…taking the Sunday comic strip places it could never have gone before.”

The evening will be moderated by Peter Birkemoe, owner of Toronto’s top graphic novel and comics bookstore, The Beguiling.

For more information on the various Luminato Events, please visit http://www.luminato.com/index.php.

Note: Unfortunately Miriam Katin will not be attending this event. My apologies for any confusion, it looks like I was using an earlier version of the press release.

- Christopher

Hey! It’s Kazu Kibuishi and Kean Soo! Last week’s events as part of Keep Toronto Reading and at The Beguiling went quite well, with a solid turnout for the library event and some hardcore fans braving a blizzard to drop by the store the next day. I’d like to thank Kazu and Kean for participating, and Scholastic and The Toronto Public Library for all of their help.

The fellas were in town to celebrate the launches of their new all ages graphic novel. Kazu Kibuishi’s Amulet Volume 1, published by Scholastic, and Kean Soo’s Jellaby Volume 1, published by Hyperion Books, sold exceptionally well at the event and made lots of kids (and adults) very happy.

On Tuesday March 6th, Kazu and Kean participated in Graphically Speaking, the graphic novel program that’s part of Toronto’s month-long literacy initiative. Both creators gave short presentations of their work (despite some technical errors that had our digital projections looking considerably pinker than normal… However both pros rose to the challenge. Following the presentation I did a bit of a moderated Q&A with the guys on stage as they talked about their work.

Kazu lays it all out for the audience. Everything from working methods to schedules to inspiration! It’s hard to judge how well something is going when you’re on stage, but I was told by several audience members that it was a great, in-depth discussion. Hurrah!

Following the interview, Kazu and Kean signed and sketched for the assembled masses.

Look! They’re shy! Thanks to Naseem Hrab for all of the great photos from this event. :D

The next day the city got about 12 inches of constantly falling and blowing snow, so while attendance was a little lighter than I would have personally liked, it was great seeing the youngsters of all ages drop by the store to get books signed. In this picture, we can see The Beguiling’s Peter Birkemoe, Naseem Hrab, Kean Soo, and Kazu Kibuishi.

A young fan came just for the Jellaby.

Kean draws the Jellaby!

Kazu sketches for a fan. Daisy Kutter!

We actually still had FLIGHT 2 posters in stock from Kazu’s last trip to Toronto in 2005, so why not break them out too? :D

Thanks again to Kazu and Kean for a fantastic time!

- Christopher

The Beguiling is happy to announce that Michel Rabagliati, author of the Paul series of graphic novels including the newly-released Paul Goes Fishing will be participating in a moderated Q&A and book signing session on Saturday, March 5th at 5pm, at The Lillian H. Smith Library in Toronto.

Rabagliati will be interviewed on stage by The Beguiling’s Peter Birkemoe, on his life and art as well as his new graphic novel. Admission to the event is completely free. Sponsored by The Beguiling, Canada’s premier retailer of comics and graphic novels, and Drawn & Quarterly Books.

- Chris

In a confluence of fortuitous circumstances, Mal is doing the cover to the March issue of Shojo Beat, which is dropping in (I think) a few weeks. Lovely little cover. Head over to Bryan Lee O’Malley’s livejournal to find out just what other surprises await you in The Art Issue.

In other my-friends-are-cool news, our event with Kean and Kazu got picked up at BlogTO and even made it onto the front cover of The Toronto Star, in an article on young readers graphic novels!

Good day.

- Chris

Kazu Kibuishi & Kean Soo Signing
Wednesday, February 6th, 5pm-7pm
The Beguiling, 601 Markham Street
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
416-533-9168 – http://www.beguiling.com
FREE

Just in case you can’t make it out to the wilds of North York and would like a chance to get your graphic novels signed by these fantastic creators, The Beguiling will be holding a signing with Kazu & Kean the day after the TPL event, from 5pm to 7pm at the store. Now, we sincerely suggest that if you want to see some great a/v presentationing and see the creators interviewed, then you really ought to go to the event at the North York Public Library. But we are happy to welcome both creators to the store as well, and hope it will be as warm (and well-attended) a welcome as our last in-store signing.

For more on the event at North York Library as part of Keep Toronto Reading, check out:

The Beguiling post on the event:
http://www.beguiling.com/2008/01/reminder-kazu-kibuishi-kean-soo-in.html
Join the Keep Toronto Reading group on Facebook!
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=19746872808
RSVP to the event on the Kazu & Kean Facebook Page!
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=8322672055

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Regular posting soon! Promise!

- Chris