The Bat: you ride it, then you do it again. Backwards.
My UTSC Visit
Yesterday, I visited Daniel Tysdal’s Graphic Novels course at the University of Toronto Scarborough Campus, and I had an amazing time. Seriously, it was one of the best experiences of my adult life, and I’ve been on The Bat at Canada’s Wonderland.
I talked about Quarter-Life Crisis and explained a bit about the process of making the comic and the influences that informed the book. I passed out some inappropriate Supervillain Valentine’s Day cards. And I signed more copies of the book than I’ve ever signed before. More than I thought I printed. I also got in good with some of the students by drawing Harper in a Wu-Tang T-shirt in the book. (Wu-Tang is for the children.)
A big thanks to all the students at UTSC for being such an attentive audience and for asking some outstanding and intelligent questions. I knew I’d get grilled about the conspicuous absence of Scarborough (and all of non-downtown Toronto) in the first book, but I promised the rest of the megacity would make an appearance in the following three books. More surprising were some of the other questions they had: If you could creative control over any existing comic book, which would it be? Or What’s your favourite and least favourite part of Toronto? How do you answer questions like that?
A big thanks, as well, to Daniel Tysdal. His Graphic Novels class sounds incredible and is something I wish my school had when I was in university. He’s got Joe Sacco coming in next week! Best of all, the next paper in the class is on the use of violence in graphic novels – with Quarter-Life Crisis as one of the texts they can write on! (I hope he sends me any papers the students write on my book. I wonder how the book holds up to academic scrutiny.)
Dead (Kids) on Arrival
In non-comic news, my juvenile novel, The Dead Kid Detective Agency is already off to the copy editor and I’m working on chapter title and additional illustrations for the book. This book is so dope, it’s going to make (The Hunger Games look like em>Mockingjay. (That’s right, I went there.) In all seriousness, I’m very excited to unleash this weird tribute to high school goths, Canadian history and Phoebe Cates upon the world. Stay tuned for more updates.
2 Comments
Hahaha, it’s good to hear you enjoyed the visit as much as we did! The Bat is a fearsome competitor.
Btw, will you be attending the TCAF this year? Before your visit I never heard of this festival before, but after some research I’m very interested now. Thanks for telling us about it!
Actually I won’t be at the TCAF Festival this year. I was there last year, and they’re trying to space out the Toronto creators. Maybe next time. Thanks!