Talking ’bout John Bellairs in The Post

One of John Bellairs's most-beloved books

The National Post runs a semi-regular column called ‘Old Book, New Author,’ in which a new author (in this case, I) talk about an older book that has influenced his or her work. On January 19, 2012, I wrote an installment about one of the greats of kids’ mystery novels (and frequent Edward Gorey collaborator) John Bellairs:

I’ve been dropping the name “John Bellairs” into casual conversation lately. To many, it means nothing. But to people of a certain age — men in particular — the name makes their eyes light up like I’ve just mentioned their favourite Thundercat. (Panthro, in most cases.)

Bellairs was a much-beloved author of mysteries for young readers, like an earlier, more sophisticated R.L. Stine. The House with a Clock in its Walls was the first in a string of rather chilling mysteries, which also include The Eyes of the Killer Robot and The Curse of the Blue Figurine. Like his frequent illustrator, the more widely recognized Edward Gorey, Bellairs was an American most believed was British, despite the Midwestern locales of most of his novels.

In The House with a Clock in its Walls, overweight orphan Lewis Barnavelt is sent to live with his uncle Jonathan, who just happens to be a wizard. What follows is by turns whimsical and menacing, beautiful in its blend of the fantastical and the everyday. His uncle can (and does) blot out the moon, but Lewis is more concerned with learning to play baseball and impressing the popular boys, an obsession that leads him to raise a witch from the dead. (No big deal; it’s like when you take up smoking to impress the cool kids.)

For the full column, visit the National Post website.

Posted in Dead Kid Detective Agency, books, reading | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Illustrations of DOOM, Part Deux

Illustration work continues on Natalie Zina Walschots’s excellent and hotly anticipated poetry collection, DOOM: Love Poems for Supervillains. (It can’t ALL be Playboy interviews.) Here are some sketches of section pages, followed by more polished illustrations along the same lines. As you can see, I bumped up the kink a bit.

First are the sketches for the section named ‘Bondage,’ dealing with places of imprisonment for supervillains (Arkham Asylum, The Vault, etc). My first thought were some kryptonite handcuffs:

A more elaborate drawing involved someone being sexily pushed up against a Phantom Zone mirror prison thing from Superman II, but it was hard to illustrate clearly:

Walschots astutely noted that there should be someone using the Kryptonite handcuffs, which influenced the next iteration. (And before you mention it, I realize Kryptonite would have no effect on Tw0-Face … not that it’s necessarily Two-Face in the illustration.)

Next, the section illustration for ‘Rogues Gallery 1: Domination.’ First thought was a globe with some super-undies tossed hastily across its surface. Then I threw in a knife for good measure. And menace:

Then, I went with a Red-Skull-esque villain, so I could emphasize the riding crop:

Still, it wasn’t sexy enough, so I added assless pants in the next iteration:

I think it’s tasteful. Maybe. More illustration work to come!

Posted in DOOM, books, comics, pencils, sketches | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Two new dead kid reviews!

On her book blog, Words That Fly, K. Quinlan very kindly reviewed The Dead Kid Detective Agency, alongside Marissa Meyer’s certified mega-hit Cinder, in one of her ‘Double Whammy’ reviews (and I’m very proud to say my book received the same star rating):

‘Sounds interesting right? I thought so too. October’s a really interesting character, full of spunk and determination. She’s the kind of girl I would have been glad to be friends with when I was thirteen. The mystery is also pretty interesting. I couldn’t figure out who did it until closer to the end, and so I totally felt October’s frustration every time her hunch proved wrong.’

Obviously, Quinlan has some valid criticisms, as well, but I’m delighted she liked the book. Read the full review at wordsthatfly.wordpress.com, and check out some of her other book reviews and posts.

Additionally, 410 Media gave The Dead Kid Detective Agency what I would consider a near-rave on the first day of 2012:

‘It seems what makes a juvenile fiction novel for kids is sometimes just that the protagonist is a kid even if the book is just as appealing to adults as it is to kids … Munday handles this unbelievable plot deftly as you root for October and her friends as they move through a plot that include fights, psychopath teachers and real estate agents. I really enjoyed the exploration of the lives of the dead kids. They became real characters in the book instead of the props that they might have been in a lesser writers hands.’

Read the full review (for which I am endlessly thankful) at 410media.com.

Posted in Dead Kid Detective Agency, books, reviews | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Interviewed by Playboy (no joke)

An example of why I was interviewed.

2012 is off to a great start, as it began with me being interviewed by Playboy – or, more accurately, Playboy’s safe-for-work site, The Smoking Jacket. Reporter Melissa Bull asked me a few questions about illustrating Natalie Zina Walschots’s DOOM: Love Poems for Supervillains and what it’s like to draw Galactus with no clothes on. Here’s a small sample:

The Smoking Jacket: Why are the dudes lounging around like this?

Me: Given that all the illustrations of male supervillains, I think it turns the whole male gaze of most comic books on its head (if that’s not too many mixed metaphors in one sentence). You go to comic conventions and there are all these pin-up drawings of female supervillains and female superheroes everywhere, and you just don’t see any male supervillain erotica. It’s wall to wall drawings of Catwoman and Harley Quinn in various states of undress, but nary a naked dude to be seen.

Comic readers are used to having their female characters overtly sexualized. Despite the spandex and bulging muscles, male characters just aren’t treated the same way by illustrators. At conventions, half the people who look at the calendars become really uncomfortable; the other half absolutely love them.

And yes, I do acknowledge that I am simultaneously drawing ‘naughty pictures’ of supervillains and writing kids’ books. It happens. I also acknowledge that most of the illustrations featured won’t appear in the finished book, but DOOM: Love Poems for Supervillains will still be over-the-top incredible.

Read the full interview at The Smoking Jacket.

Posted in DOOM, books, comics, interviews, sketches | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment