TCAF-inated

By munday | Published May 13, 2012

Just one of my many TCAF purchases.

Last weekend was the annual Toronto Comic Arts Festival, and what a weekend it was! For the uninitiated, TCAF is a free celebration of comics and graphic novels and their creators, which culminates in a two-day exhibition and vendor fair featuring hundreds of comics creators from around the world, held at Toronto Reference Library in Toronto, Canada. This year’s festival featured such luminaries as Jeff Smith, Kate Beaton, Konami Kanata, Bryan Lee O’Malley, Alison Bechdel and more. My fellow SketchKrieg! members and I were stationed on the second floor, selling books and meeting new people. If you’ve never been, you should really attend – it’s a wonderful festival!

The TCAF weekend was doubly exciting this year as two members of TCAF – Brian Hoang (Medicine) and Gillian Newland (A Chanukah Noel) – were married on the Saturday night! SketchKrieg! now features two married members. It’s only a matter of time before Jason Loo (Loo Harvest) and I announce our engagement.

TCAF was a truly amazing celebration of comics. Not only did I sell a surprising (to me) number of copies of Quarter-Life Crisis, The Dead Kid Detective Agency and the brand-new DOOM: Love Poems for Supervillains, I met a number of creators I really admire and discovered several new ones! Congratulations and major thanks to all the TCAF organizers and the army of volunteers. (TCAF is also one of the best run comic festivals ever – they’ve thought of everything!)

Books purchased at TCAF:

Sassy Mavericks by Brian Evinou
Hector Umbra by Uli Oesterle
Sparky O’Hare: Master Electrician by Mawil
Manta-Man by Chad Sell
Teen Boat by Dave Roman and John Green
Ultimate Kate or Die by Kate Leth

Posted in books, comics, conventions, Dead Kid Detective Agency, DOOM, fairs, Quarter-Life Crisis, SketchKrieg, TCAF | Leave a comment

By munday | Published May 13, 2012

Pecha Kucha Mississauga invitation

I’ll be taking part in the FIRST EVER Pecha Kucha Mississauga at the Mississauga Art Gallery, and you can, too!

What’s a Pecha Kucha? You can find out more here, but the basic concept (devised in Tokyo in 2003) is that several participants present 20 images timed at 20 seconds each. It’s like the most fun, entertaining series of Powerpoint presentations ever!

The special guest presenter is architect, designer and editor Ian Chodikoff (Canadian Architect). I’ll be one of the other artists and cultural producers trying to enlighten and delight. What will I present on? Book publicity? Forgotten comic books of the 1990s? Who knows!

Pecha Kucha Mississauga
Thursday, May 24
Mississauga Art Gallery, 300 City Centre Drive
Mississauga, ON
7 pm
Free! All are invited!

Want to be a part of this? Limited spots still available! Please contact Jaclyn Qua-Hiansen at (905) 896-5088 or jaclyn.qua-hiansen@mississauga.ca.

Join the Facebook event, too.

Posted in Events, reading | Leave a comment

Toronto Comic Arts Festival

By munday | Published May 5, 2012

TCAF poster by Gabriel Ba and Fabian Moon

The Toronto Comic Arts Festival is a week long celebration of comics and graphic novels and their creators, which culminates in a two-day exhibition and vendor fair featuring hundreds of comics creators from around the world at the Toronto Reference Library (789 Yonge Street). Seriously, it’s the best thing ever to happen in Toronto and I feel forever indebted to the people at The Beguiling who make it happen every year.

I’ll be part of a table at the weekend exhibition with my fellow SketchKrieg! illustrators, so please come by and say ‘hello.’ I’ll be selling The Dead Kid Detective Agency, the brand-new DOOM: Love Poems for Supervillains, the also-brand-new  SketchKrieg! Paper Trail collaborative comic book and more. I’ll also be sheepishly apologizing for not having the new Quarter-Life Crisis book done yet. (My new joke: ‘By the time I’m done, I’ll have to change the name to Mid-Life Crisis.’)

Even if you don’t say ‘hello,’ just go to this. It’s an incredible comics event. More information can be found at torontocomics.com.

Posted in books, comics, Dead Kid Detective Agency, DOOM, Events, fairs, Quarter-Life Crisis, SketchKrieg, TCAF | Tagged , | 2 Comments

Dead Kid # 2 in the can, DOOM off the presses!

By munday | Published April 30, 2012

Prospective illustration for the second book.

At times, it seemed it was impossible, but the second manuscript of The Dead Kid Detective Agency, tentatively titled Dial ‘M’ for Morna, is complete!

Well, not quite. I’ve handed in the manuscript to ECW Press. Most of the editorial process is still ahead, and while I think the book is in pretty good shape, I’m sure my talented editor Erin Creasey will have other thoughts. That said, the second book does have a chapter entitled ‘Sk8 or Die (or Do Both).’ So, you know it’s gotta’ be good.

DOOM: Love Poems for Supervillains, is hot off the presses at Coach House Printing. Author Natalie Zina Walschots swooped by (she traveled by boom tube, I think) to catch a couple copies of the book as it came off the gluer. If you’re in Toronto on May 15, you should attend the launch of DOOM at the Insomniac Press Party at the Dora Keogh. (You can find all the details here.) I’ll also have copies on me at TCAF this coming weekend. So come by and pick up a copy, or buy a copy of our SketchKrieg! collaborative book or berate me for not having Quarter-Life Crisis #2 done yet (I deserve it).

In other news, I just saw The Raid, which is the action movie to end all action movies. Seriously, this movie is bananas. I spent most of the viewing with my hand in front of my open mouth. Just look at this trailer.  (Don’t worry. There’s way more where that trailer came from.)

Posted in books, Coach House, comics, conventions, cover, Dead Kid Detective Agency, DOOM, movies, Quarter-Life Crisis, SketchKrieg, TCAF | Tagged , , , | 2 Comments