Since I was taking a break from the city and its distractions I decided to treat this as a writing retreat. my goal was to get far along in my cartooning book. Did it work? Kind of. I did get  fair amount of writing done, though not as much as I’d hoped. Lauren and Tim’s comfy home can be distracting, they have a million great comics. I discovered Agonizing Love, the new collection of golden age romance comics from Harper. It’s pretty good, but kind of a hodge podge collection. Not a best of, there were plenty of stinkers and no Matt Baker or Simon and Kirby (except some covers). Oh well, I guess those guys have their own collections. I was happy to see a Ruth Atkinson comic in there.

And this one was good. Maybe it’s Ogden Whitney?

Oh and this dude, whoever he is. I think I’ve seen him before, he draws hair like it’s made out of copper wire. And his girls dress so sleazy! In case you were wondering, in this panel a mother is consoling he crying daughter. This one is pretty bad but fun and weird (and it has a progressive message, it’s ok to date someone outside your church!)

And who created this gem? Look at this splash page!

And what a kiss! This guy is good. This comic is about a maimed vet coming home after the wear. can she love a man with a claw? It’s a pretty good story.

You can probably tell, the author of the collection didn’t credit the artists. I know many (most?) of these artists are unknown, but a few aren’t (Ruth Atkinson signed her name).

I’m getting distracted. and that’s the point, I am too distracted out here to write as much as I’d like. And the suburbs are kind of scary…too quiet and dark and empty. I was getting freaked out on Dr. Buddy’s late night walks. I miss New York, where it’s never really dark or quiet. Heading home tonight!

The great folks at the Brooklyn Zine Fest did this little interview with me in their Meet Your Zine Maker feature. I’m really excited about this show, and honored that they invited me to be a part of it. Check it out!

The comics community has lost two sweet souls this fall. you can read my thoughts about it here and here.

I’m still grieving for Rosalie. It’s so hard to watch my dear friends navigate this nightmare. But they are two special people, with an uncanny amount of love and strength and will. I know they can survive. SAW will happen, and I’m gonna be watching when it does.

But there is good news too. I now can utter those five magic words every cartoonist yearns for: I have a book deal. I am currently working on an instructional cartooning for Quarry Books. It will be part of their Lab series, which is a series of beautiful, full-color art instruction books.

This is a collaborative project and I’m inviting some of my favorite teaching cartoonists to participate.

The deadline is very soon, so every waking hour not spent at my day job is now dedicated to this book. Which means Paper Pocket will be on hold till spring.

I will be posting updates about this project on this blog. Stay tuned!

Next time, on the Paper Rocket blog:

We’ll visit Bridge Club, the art studio I share with Karen Sneider and Joan Reilly.

One of my favorite subjects to lecture on as the summer workshops is book design for comic self publisher. Jon Chad and I have a few philosophies about book design, and we’re trying to turn our students into true believers. I blogged the following mini lesson at Lerner and CCS, I hope you won’t mind me recycling it again.

Design is Content

Most cartoonists consider their comic pages to be the content of their book, while book design is just the wrapping paper they slap on at the end. I believe design is content. Book design affects how a reader experiences the story. Before your reader ever sets eyes on a panel, they interact with the book as an object. If cartoonists make thoughtful and appropriate design choices, they can use book design as a narrative device.

My go-to example of appropriate book design is Leo Geo and His Miraculous Journey Through the Center of the Earth, a self published comic that was created by Jon Chad when he was a summer workshop intern. Our protagonist, Le Geo, burrows deep into the earth for educational adventures. Because the book is about digging down, Jon Chad made a clever design choice. His book reads vertically, top to bottom like a calendar, rather than left to right. It’s the perfect design for this book, and it significantly contributes to the reading experience.

These photos show the first printing of the comic, as a self-published booklet with a screen printed cover. Next March the book will emerge as a hard cover graphic novel from Roaring Brook Press, a “real” book! It’s a true self publishing success story. And a big part of that success is due to book design.

I find it helpful to break down book design into six categories. Consider each one, and make appropriate choices:

• Paper (Cover and Interior Stock)

What color, texture, or weight should your paper be?

• Book Size

Letter, legal, and tabloid are the standard paper sizes that can be photocopied. You can trim these to a non-standard size after printing.

• Book Shape

Why have a rectangular book? Die cut or hand trimmed for a custom shape.

• Printing

Most minicomics are photocopied or printed on a laser printer, usually in black and white. Consider using these other printing techniques: screen printing, Gocco, linoleum block, spray paint stencils, stickers, or stamps.

• Binding

Saddle stitch (a staple down the center of the spine) is standard. Consider using needle and thread, a sewing machine, or a rubber band.

• Packaging

Slip cases, bags, and belly band are popular finishing touches.

Keep these in mind the next time you publish, and remember: design is content!

As you know, Paper Rocket is a minicomics publishing house.  In addition to publishing new material, I plan to start a Classix line which would republish comic gems long out of print.  My main focus will be on the minicomics of the early to mid 90s, a period which I consider to be the golden age of zines.  There was a strong self-publishing movement, fostered and made visible by Fact Sheet 5.  A really remarkable community of self-publisher created, sold, and traded thousands of zines.

One of my favorite minicomics from this era is Deep Girl by Ariel Bordeaux.  Ariel’s stories are unflinchingly autobiographical and packed with energy and humor.  Deep Girl‘s approach to subjects like body image, self-esteem, and sex offered a form of feminism that I found genuine and relevant. Deep Girl was deep–Ariel wrote about her life, but she also wrote about her thoughts.  ”Why Do You Put Yourself Down So Much” read like an essays on how Ariel’s brain processes feelings of competitiveness and inadequacy.

When it came time to pick a debut title for the Classix line, Deep Girl was my first choice.  Luckily, Ariel has obliged.  We are planning a single volume of about 80 pages, which will collect most of the work she created from 1993-1995.  It will be a thick minicomic, not a graphic novel (Paper Rocket doesn’t do graphic novels).  The book will include an interview, photographs, ephemera, and an essay by yours truly.  It is my goal to create an archive piece that presents the work and its historical relevance.

Last weekend I spent several hours at the Atlergot/Bordeaux household, scanning Ariel’s original art.  Ariel also dug up some of here mail correspondence, which turned out to be a huge pile of handwritten letters, drawings, and postcards.  This only represented a small portion of the mail Ariel received (after 15 years, she’s only kept the good stuff).

I also got a peek at some old photos.

Last weekend was the first step toward publishing the Deep Girl collection.  I want to give a big thanks to Ariel, Rick Altergot, Travis Doggett, Kelli Nelson, Chuck Forsman and Melissa Mendes.  My buddies fed me and put me up while I was visiting lovely Providence.

Keep an eye on this blog for more news on the Deep Girl project!

While the end of the grant is hardly happy news, I didn’t respond to the news as some of my peers did.  I felt like the general response was negative with a measure of entitlement (“This is lame”, “how could this happen”,  ”we should try to change Peter Laird’s mind”, etc.).   My first thought on hearing the news was “the end of a great era – someone should make a big Thank You anthology.”  Peter Laird gave this medium a wonderful and substantial gift for nearly 20 years, and he certainly didn’t have to.  When TMNT made it big and he was showered with money, he did something people in his situation rarely do.  He remembered his roots.  He gave back to disenfranchised group that no one really cared about, who never were and never would be a group of special interest: comic self publishers.  He gave while no one, but this special tribe, was paying attention.

I think we should respect his wishes to call it quits.  I trust it’s something he considered carefully–how could he not?  The Xeric Grant must have meant a lot to him, for him to carry it on so long.  I trust it was not meant to last forever, and he felt this was a good time to end it.

There is still a need for something like the Xeirc Grant, and I hope against hopes something appears to fill its vacuum.  Even with the webcomics, even with Kickstarter, our medium can profit from grants for cartoonists.  The fact that The Xeric Grant was so singular says a lot about comics value in our society.

I thought I’d take a moment to reflect on  how the Xeric Grant effected me, personally.  I won a grant back in 2000 with one of my very first comics, a collection of short stories titled Theater of the Meek.  Please don’t ask to see a copy–I produced that work during my college years, and I’ve grown a lot since then.  I really don’t recognize myself in those pages.  To be perfectly honest, I don’t think the comic is very good.  But, when I was 21, it was the best work I could muster.

I took the award (I believe it was around $1,500) and produced a professional quality offset comic.  It was the first, and last, time I was able to afford offset printing on my own work.  It was also the first, and last, time one of my comics would be distributed by Diamond.  Even though I was an absolute nobody, Diamond considered me (solely, I’m sure) on the prestige the Xeric Grant offered.  The whole experience taught me a lot about production, distribution, and retail.

The most valuable thing the Xeric Grant gave me was a huge dose of esteem and prestige. Right after I got my award I took my new Xeric book to the San Diego Comic Con.   I had been to very few comic conventions in my life, and never as an exhibitor.  I traveled to the convention alone and I knew absolutely no one on arrival.  I was far from home, I was only 21, and was very shy.  It really should have been a disaster.  But instead it was a positive turning point in my life.  Perfect strangers looked at my comic, and some even bought it!  I met many of my cartooning heroes and I was able to give them a comic of my own.  I felt welcomed by the community, and I’m sure a big part of that was due to fact I had “Xeric Powered” printed on the cover of my comic.

The best part of that convention was meeting female cartoonists who shared my love of comics, and my taste in comics.  A favorite memory: sharing beers and a mutual love of Peep Show in my hostel room with three new friends: Ariel Schrag, Gareille Bell and Amanda Padia.  This was how I was introduced to the cartooning community.  If it hadn’t been such a welcoming experience, I’m honestly not sure if comics would be a major part of my life today.

The Xeric Grant started me down a path in life, and I’m pretty happy with where I ended up.   Thank you, Peter Laird!

There’s nothing wrong with exhibiting minicomics.  I was very pleased to see some Paper Rad minis in the Cartoon Polymaths show this spring.

What we need to understand is that when minicomics are in galleries, they’re usually there by some fluke–a fluke that will probably soon be corrected.  So we should lap up the attention while we can.

So I’m lapping up some attention.  This Isn’t Working is in a juried gallery show at Chicago’s Woman Made.

The show is called Seriously Funny, and it opens today.

Seriously Funny includes a wide range of comics, from commercial 1-panel gags

to (what looks to be) outsider art.

This Isn’t Working is the first comic I’ve published with an all-women cast, and it kind of happened by accident.  I didn’t set out to create a women only project.  But I did want to collect stories about a shared theme: women and their ex-boyfriends.  I’m thinking of doing two more volumes, This Isn’t Working: Comics About Ex-Girlfriends and maybe This Isn’t Working: The Queer Issue.  What do you think?

We have some exciting projects in store, so check back often!