we were in north carolina last week for heroes con. the con has been running for over 30 years and has a reputation for being maybe the best east coast convention, with a family atmosphere and emphasis on comics and comic creators–none of the pop culture nonsense that so many other cons have made the focus of their shows. it’s fair to say we were looking forward to this one.
josh and i left early thursday morning, hopping on a train, where we met up with our roomie for the weekend, ulises farinas. ulises is a fantastic artist and an easy guy to spend 13 hours on a train with. here’s the cover to his book coming out in july…
there’s not much to say about a 13 hour train ride. we traded comics biz stories (shame on some people out there, ha) and ate lousy train food and discussed the eternal subject, women. we got into charlotte around 9 pm and headed for the hotel. andrew had flown in earlier and scouted out the bbq options, which, by the time we unwound and ulises had donned his RATTICUS costume, were limited. who’s RATTICUS, you ask?
we wound up eating at QUEEN CITY Q, a middle of the road BBQ restaurant that had good ribs, terrible brisket, and weak drinks.
friday was set-up time, and we were in INDIE ISLAND, along with the pittsburgh boys (jim rugg, jasen lex, ed piskor, and tom scioli), chris pitzer of ADHOUSE BOOKS, rafer roberts, and some other folks i’m spacing on right now. we were tabled next to chad bowers, who was from the area and a real nice guy to be stuck next to for 3 days. chad did a bunch of ‘terrible sketches for $1’ over the course of the 3 days, and they were all worth a chuckle. the show got off to a slow start, sales-wise (more on that to come), so i decided to hit the floor, say hi to some folks, and try to get creators signed on to our LITTLE NEMO: DREAM ANOTHER DREAM project.
i saw neal adams with only 1 or 2 people around him and figured what the hell, i’d give it a shot. after listening to some hilarious off-color stories about roy thomas and stan lee from neal, i pitched him nemo. i was excited and a little abuzz when, without too much work, he said yes. this kicked off a pretty spectacular weekend of recruiting creators for the project. when i got back to the table to hear sales were slow but josh had talked to–and gotten a yes from–peter bagge, the tone and type of weekend it was going to be was set. before the end of the day, tom scioli, ed piskor, nick pitarra, shawn crystal, and ben marra had all joined in. we also got to meet drew moss, who illustrated one of the stories in ONCE UPON A TIME MACHINE and is doing stuff at IDW now. drew is a swell guy, great finally meeting in person. Continue reading →
the simon & kirby library – science fiction : a big book of jack kirby sci-fi, mostly from the ’50s and filled with fantastic little stories. al williamson inks kirby for most of the stories here, and he draws a couple, too. a trove of classic old-school sci-fi.
primates : this ogn looks at the lives of jane goodall, dian fossey, and birute galdikas, three women whose remarkable contributions and dedication to primatology offers a wonderful example of the human spirit. the art style is simple and charming, allowing easy entry into the lives of these women and the primates they study and love.
the manhattan projects #12 : this book has been on a roll. nick pitarra and jordie bellaire are looking good.
savage wolverine #6 : joe madureira jumps back into the game with gusto in this fun romp starring spidey, wolverine, elektra, and the kingpin. zeb wells came up with a great hook here (i won’t spoil it) and joe mad looks good. fun stuff.
guardians of the galaxy #3 : i love rocket raccoon. steve mcniven draws a badass groot. that’s enough for me.
the true lives of the fabulous killjoys #1 : gerard way wrote some fun, zippy comics in THE UMBRELLA ACADEMY books. becky cloonan brings a joy for the medium and considerable chops to every project she works on. let’s see what they do together!
wolverine & the x-men #31 : nick bradshaw returns for the first day of school at the hellfire club academy. one of the little treats in comics every month.
Locust Moon’s CHRIS STEVENS, JOSH O’NEILL, and ANDREW CARL are in Charlotte, North Carolina this weekend for the city’s beloved HEROESCON.
We’ll be selling books (ONCE UPON A TIME MACHINE!) and beautiful prints, signing anything and everything, giving away nice free stuff, and they’ll even have a few little teasers for upcoming books that you’ll only be able to see in person.
Come find TABLE 1028in Artist Alley’s “Indie Island” — though it’s a huge con, so you may just need a map (click to embiggen):
herobear and the kid special #1 : mike kunkel’s charming tale of a toy stuffed bear come to life as a cape-wearing hero who gets into mischief & adventure with his little boy best friend displays the ample cartooning chops at kunkel’s disposal; the easy wisp of a line that creates movement and voices characterization; the comedic timing and childlike imagination, where the every day becomes a playground for herobear & the kid.
fun stuff!
east of west #3 : issue #1 was the best 1st issue in a long time. issue #2 was a little bit all over the place. this issue should let us know where we’re at with jonathan hickman & nick dragotta’s enticing new series.
the hollows hardcover : the best looking sam kieth book in a long time. beautiful, sweeping vistas, strong settings that evoke an eastern feel, quirky, cute critters…welcome back, sam.
the end : devastating. sad. realistic. you could call anders nilsen’s new book dealing with the death of his girlfriend any of these things, and you’d be right. but it’s also a graceful meditation on loss, and living, and a fine testament to the enduring spirit of love and partnership that’s at the center of the common human experience.
this cover kills me…
lone wolf & cub new edition #1 : over 700 pages of this comic book masterpiece for 20 bucks? the folks at dark horse are bringing this samurai masterpiece to the masses in a big way. highly recommended.
solo-the deluxe edition : one of the best mainstream projects of the 2000’s is finally collected in a hearty, handsome hardcover collection. DC COMICS editor mark chiarello gathered up some of the best artists in comics and gave them 48 pages to play with. darwyn cooke, tim sale, teddy kristiansen, scott hampton, sergio aragones, mike allred, richard corben, and paul pope are among the creators here, and they all take full advantage of the creative free rein, whether it’s with stories set in or outside of the DC universe. paul pope’s issue is worth the price alone, with one knockout story after another, from greek myth in ‘the problem with knossos’ to childhood magic in ‘life sized monster ghost’ to pure nyc pope in ‘on this corner’ to the james jean colored, eisner award-winning robin & joker story, ‘teenage sidekick’. darwyn cooke’s issue weaves in and out and somehow sews up a perfect single issue out of several short stories. neil gaiman writes a DEADMAN story for teddy kristiansen. mike allred runs around the dc universe like only mike allred could. and there are treasures to be found in each artist’s outing. one of the finest collections in a long, long while.
40. Copra Compendium
It’s finally here, courtesy of Bergen St. Comics. With a voice all his own Fiffe swipes liberally from Miller & Kirby, then high-tails it for the border.
39. Electric Light Orchestra If there’s a better album to make comics to than ELO’s NEW WORLD RECORD, please tell me about it.
38. This Commencement Speech by Joss Whedon
Because YOU HAVE ALREADY BEGUN TO DIE.
37. Poutine
When this stuff finally breaks in the states, dozens of organic locally-sourced poutineries will start popping up all over Williamsburg & Silverlake.
36. Inky We got a new cat. He’s a little monster, but also a kitten so we are legally and morally obligated to love him.
elephantmen #48 : the stakes are rising in richard starkings’ masterful scifi-noir of man and beasts. the best-produced book on the stands. every issue looks fabulous, no matter who draws it.
b.p.r.d. vampire #3 : mignola. ba. moon. stewart.
the wake #1 : scott snyder & sean murphy form a new age dream team on this one, and the book looks creepy and smart and like it’s got a story to tell. let’s see where we’re going.
x-men #1 : this new all-girl x-book has our customers excited across the board, from guys to gals and new & old readers alike.
absolute top ten : one of my favorite series ever gets the whistles & bells treatment. the hard-to-find SMAX series in included, along with all the alan moore written issues of the titular series. this book is jam packed with comics love, from an at the top of his game moore to the incredibly detailed, and funny, world that zander cannon & gene ha bring to glorious visual life. i was lucky enough back in the day to sit with zander cannon and see what the process was like putting these pages together. i tip my hat to him now, many moons later, as he was really the unsung hero of this masterpiece.
The boys here at Locust Moon are all still recovering from a wild weekend of comic-book glory in Toronto. Editor-in-Chief Andrew Carl, Director of Special Operations David B. Tanh and I, your humble scribe, Megabussed it up across the border in the dead of night, packed alongside a lot of other cartoonists including Annie Mok, Pat Aulisio, Matt Wiegle and Ramsey Beyer. I can’t say I really recommend the 12-hour overnight Megabus experience, but like all things, it was made better by being around other comic book people. We arrived at 9am with a day to kill, and so despite a lot of miserable and rainy weather, we went on a little walking tour of the local comic shops, led by Stephanie Cooke – assistant to Bill Willingham, tour guide to the stars, and generally awesome human. It was our first time in Toronto, and the city struck me as clean, laid-back & friendly…and it also seems to be where all the book stores went. There seems to be a massive 5-story Barnes & Noble, or a tiny little beautifully curated rare book shop, or an outstanding comic book store on every block. We were blown away, of course, by the absolutely insane cornucopia of The Beguiling. Overstuffed with incredible books obsessively jammed in every open space according to some detailed organizational system only the staff can understand, the place is just a swooning wealth of material. We were very pleased to find that they stocked 8 copies of ONCE UPON A TIME MACHINE. And then there’s all the original artwork… Other great shops were the Silver Snail, a beautifully arranged & designed comic/coffee shop where they had a 12-foot topographical map of Middle Earth and fashioned some Adventure Time art in my latte, and The Comic Book Lounge, which seemed to be half comic shop and half event space, with a laid-back clubhouse vibe. Badly drenched after hours of exploring the city on foot, we feasted on poutine, a first for all three of us, and tried to analyze why something made of fries, gravy and cheese is not popular in America. (We decided the word “poutine” is suspiciously French, has “poo” in it, and “cheese curds” sound gross. Just a branding issue.) Later on there were drinks at The Pilot, where a lot of cartoonists were unwinding. We had good chats & drinks with hometown heroes Box Brown, Pat Aulisio, and Daryl Seitchik, as well as Charles Brownstein and Frank Santoro. Late night Paul Pope showed up with a BATTLING BOY galley in tow and we got to look through it. I’m trying to find words to express how great it looked, but I can’t, so you’ll just have to wait until October and find out for yourself. We tipsily stumbled back to our hotel room, high on Molson and comics.
Which brings us to Saturday, and the show. TCAF was a thing to behold. Taking over two floors of the Toronto Reference Library and transforming them into a glorious megalopolis of books and prints and original artwork. It’s free to the public, and the place was thronged by more than 20,000 people eager to see everything there was to see and buy everything there was to buy. Books seemed to be flying off every table. We were in a glass-walled room with the members of RAID (the Royal Academy of Illustration & Design), flanked by ‘Fearless’ Fred Kennedy & Adam Gorham, the righteous dudes from Big Sexy Comics, and local illustrator & printmaker Irma Kniivila, who was selling a whole bunch of gorgeous pieces with the help of her man Charlie. Andrew, reminded of his buddy back home, kept staring at this guy: Saturday was the best single day of sales we’ve ever had at a convention, getting almost 100 copies of Once Upon a Time Machine into the eager hands of readers. The action at our table was so intense that we barely had any time to explore the festival floor or check out any of the programming – but that’s an awfully good problem to have.
A celebratory dinner that night was spearheaded by my trusty companions, both world class Asian-foodies, so it was ramen, poutine du japon (yup, that’s a thing), and then drinks at an izakaya, which is a Japanese bar where they bang a drum when you enter and bring you delicious snacks every 10 minutes while you drink; as far as I can tell, this represents total mastery of the drinking experience. We closed out the night back at The Pilot, where a lot of very gifted cartoonists were busting out some gloriously ridiculous dance moves.
The next day, in true Sunday-at-the-con fashion, everybody seemed a little rough around the edges. It was sort of nice, though, that the energy level was lower, because it gave us more time to walk around and talk with people. I had nice conversations with Sam Hiti, Matt Kindt, Ross Campbell, Lilli Carré, Salgood Sam, Ed Piskor and many more, as well as old pals like Jim Rugg, Ben Marra, Brendan Leach & Paul Little. I picked up copies of Josh Tierney & co.’s gorgeous SPERA, Sam Hiti’s delightful children’s book WAGA’S BIG SCARE, and Frank & Becky’s TINY KITTEN TEETH, in which they drew this amazing Nemo sketch: Then dinner at this great tapas place in Kensington (Toronto has its own Kensington!), the TCAF afterparty at the legendary Lee’s Palace, and a soju-fueled karaoke blitz with Pope, Hiti, Becky Cloonan, Andy Belanger, Ivan Brandon, Frank Santoro, Steve Manale, Jimmy Aquino, and a few other awesome comics folks. Watching Dave & Paul duet on Let’s Dance was quite a way to end a pretty perfect comics weekend. One billion thanks to KILL SHAKESPEARE maestros Anthony Del Col & Conor McCreery for hooking us up with the great cartoonist Ramon Perez, who helped us get our table despite missing the application deadline. This was the best convention we’ve ever been to, and we owe you guys big time.
Goodbye, TCAF, you beautiful beast. We will see you next year.
batman incorporated #11 : a wacky interlude written by regular series artist chris burnham and featuring the batman & robin of japan. burnham has definitely learned at the side of grant morrison, whose inventive, playful spirit is all over this one. a nice break in the midst of the sturm & drang fallout from the death of damian wayne.
in the kitchen with alain passard : one of the world’s best chefs jumps into the comic book arena. subtitled A GRAPHIC NOVEL, WITH RECIPES , we will be cooking up some of these dishes in-store very soon.
saga #1 ($1 edition) : get in on the best ongoing book there is for a measly buck.
(only sharing pope’s ghost variant cover to #7 to make sure we all get to see it.)
godzilla the half century war tpb : 120 pages of james stokoe stomping through the gojira-verse. run for your lives.
the property : i haven’t read anything by rutu modan. this book will change that. the gorgeous cover and evocative cartooning are calling me in.
wally wood eerie tales of crime & horror : aliens and elephants. exotic villains and girls gone bad. monsters and men on the run. this book collects all the non-EC crime & horror work done by a young wallace wood. wood was the best artist comics has known–eisner was a better storyteller, kirby was a better creator, but no one could flat-out draw like wally wood. a treasure trove of comics power.
prophet #35 : brandon graham continues to build his own moebius cum conan world with the help of his beatiful conspirators simon roy, giannis milonogiannis, joseph bergin, and ed brisson. maybe the best revamp ever.
thor god of thunder #8 : jason aaron & esad ribic bring the myth and majesty to the best marvel book this side of hawkeye.
michael golden gi joe yearbook artist edition portfolio : the man who influenced arthur adams, and then arthur influenced everyone else.
copra compendium & copra #6 : michel fiffe’s exercise in monthly badassery gets collected and continues to roll on. take a look.
Locust Moon Comics 
