Tag: newsletter

I’ll be at San Diego Comic Con from July 23 – 27. As usual, I’m tabling with Alina Pete, Kory Bing, and Sam Logan at booth 1229. I’ll have all my books as well as the new tot bags I premiered at Emerald City. 

As mentioned, I’ll be at San Diego. Stop by and say hi!

So for most of June Bones and I had our stream show Wolf & Bones Comic Club was on hold because Bones was traveling and then I had construction done on my apartment, so it was too loud to record. But we are back now. So tune in next Thursday on my twitch.   

I’ll still do my usual stream though. 

• Tuesday at 8pm – 10pm PST – Art times
• Wednesday at 7pm – 9pm PST – Art times
• Thursday at 3pm – 4pm PST – Wolf & Bones Comic Club
• Sunday at 8pm – 10pm PST – Baldur’s Gate 3

All these streams will be on my twitch, so stop by!

After the birthday sale was over, I added my new tot bags to my store. The design comes in teal and gold. If you won’t be at San Diego Comic Con, go ahead and grab one!

This month is partly getting ready for San Diego while still focusing on getting ahead on Glass Diamonds. I’m also doing a bunch of panels at Worldcon in Seattle this year. I’m moderating one, so I need to prep some questions for people. 

This month I read The River has Roots by Amal El-Mohter. I really liked it. One of the main focuses is music and song, so the poetic prose fits it very well. To sisters care for the entrance to fae lands in their village and their relationship/connection is the main focus. The whole thing felt like an old fairy tale. The whole thing was beautiful. 

Another book I read Careless People by Sarah Wymm-Williams. This is non-fiction written by a woman who went from working at the UN to working at Facebook. It was fascinating and horrifying at the same time.  So if you like reading about terrible people, it is a fascinating read and Mark Zuckerberg should be in jail. 

This month I checked out Kpop Demonhunters on Netflix. It is a lot of fun and the animation is fun. I do with it was a show rather than a movie. The main girl gets a full character arc but the other two girls get a cliff notes version of an arc. So I feel like if it was a monster of the week show, the other girls could have gotten room to shine. I follow one of the animators on tumblr and they posted that to let the girls have cartoonier faces their mouths have different rigs than the rest of the head. They have also put up a bunch of concept art. If you are a fan of Sailor Moon or Kpop, I think it is worth checking out. 

I also saw The Phoenician Scheme, the new Wes Anderson movie. It is well put together and stylish. I like the dry humor and slightly surreal style. But it was a pretty standard Wes Anderson movie, so while everyone in it does a great job and the movie looks great, I would only recommend it to people who really like Wes Anderson movies. 

I’ve also been continuing to do movie afternoons in my Discord. They happen Saturdays at 11 am PST if you wanna join. This month we watched Weird: The Al Yankovic Story. It was a great parody of musician biopics. Everything was suitably over the top. I especially like the police breaking up a polka party. 

And last week we watched, They Live. I hadn’t seen it before. It started slower than I expected, which I did like. But once he could see the aliens, it was pretty much what I went in expecting. So while I liked it, I don’t have much to say about it. 

Anyway, next week we are watching Johnny Mnemonic, for the folks interested.   

That’s all for this month! Thanks for your support!

Sorcery 101 turned 20 on May 12th. And if you don’t follow me on Blusky you might have missed that everything in my store is currently 20% off with the code Happy Birthday. It is running until my birthday June 10th.   

I’m not doing a whole lot publicly this month. I’m having eye surgery on June 20th, I’m prepping for that. 

I’ll still do my usual stream though. 

• Tuesday at 8pm – 10pm PST – Art times
• Wednesday at 6pm – 8pm PST – Art times
• Thursday at 3pm – 4pm PST – Wolf & Bones Comic Club
• Thursday at 4pm – 6pm PST – Art times
• Sunday at 8pm – 10pm PST – Baldur’s Gate 3

All these streams will be on my twitch, so stop by!

Last month was pretty busy! 

The big thing was the Sorcery 101 livestream. I recorded the whole thing (4 hours!) and it is on my youtube. 

I also hosted to panels for the Nib and Ink fest. One is Having Fun With Backgrounds and the other is Alternative Careers in Comics. Both are on the Nib and Ink Fest youtube with the rest of the digital conventions panels. A lot of them are really good and you should check them out.  
 

Like I mentioned above, I’m having surgery at the end of the month. So this month I’m mostly getting ahead on The City Between and my Seven Seas editing work. 

Speaking of my Seven Seas work, later this month (June 24th) one of my favorite titles that I’ve edited while working there is coming out. Wolf’s Daughter: A Werewolf Tale is a quiet and subtle story of a teen girl who learns she is a werewolf. It explores how this discovery of her true identity helps her realize why she has felt disconnected from the future her mom is planning and pushing to her. I highly recommend you check it out. 

So this month I started having movie afternoons where I make a point to watch movies I own but haven’t seen yet. Click here if you wanna join, it’s always Saturdays at noon PST. The first of which was Aliens. I had first Alien and all the sequels and prequels but had never seen Aliens. I enjoyed it but had have absorbed through cultural osmosis. The one thing that did surprise me was Hicks and Ripley’s relationship. I like that it was built on a mutual respect and class solidarity. I like when Ripley overrules Burke by pointing out Hicks has command now and it took Hicks a little bit surprised. I also thought Lance Henriksen was a good pick for Bishop. If I didn’t already know he was a good guy and had only seen the first Alien, I definitely would have assumed he’d turn on everyone. He is kinda creepy looking in a way to play into assuming he is a bad guy. 

I also watched American Fiction. I grabbed it after it got an Oscar nomination but never found time to watch it until now. It wasn’t what I expected. The trailer for it made me think it would be funnier. But the trailer leaves out the more emotional plot line about his family dealing with grief. That gives it a sad edge that elevates the whole movie. At least in my mind it does. My favorite books, movies, and shows are ones that are both sad and funny at the same time. And American Fiction walks that line extremely well. 

A movie that was what I expected was Death Becomes Her. It was campy and fun which I knew going in. I especially like the look of Isabella Rossellini’s character and her chippendale’s looking servants. The effects on Meryl Streep and Goldie Hawn’s fight were also on top of it. 

I rotate my streaming services to save money and have had my Apple TV off since Severance Season 1 ended. But I recently turned it back on for Murderbot. I have been hearing good things about the books for awhile and the trailer sold me on needing to check it out. It exceeded my expectations. Alexander Skarsgård knocks it our of the park as the socially awkward Murderbot. I liked the first two episodes so much I ended up grabbing the audiobooks for the first two novellas because I NEEDED to know what happened next. The scientists that Murderbot protects are very charming. I like how they are understandably naive from Murderbot’s pov but are also clearly competent in their chosen field. I also like the attention to detail put into the show within a show. It looks ridiculous but in a way that makes Murderbot’s hyper-fixation on it believable. And the fake opening is on Youtube as well.    

While I wait for new Murderbot episodes I caught up on Ted Lasso since I never saw its third season. Ted Lasso still leaned into that a show doesn’t have to be cruel to get a laugh. But it was kinda uneven in its last season. I did felt like it successfully wrapped up most of the character arcs. I think my favorite plot line was either the friendship budding between Roy and Jamie or Keeley winning over her very serious CFO.  

I’ve watched a few youtube essays talking about the visuals of Blade Runner 2049. It is certainly breathtaking visually. But I kinda wish I didn’t know Denis Villeneuve was the director while watching it. I kept thinking about Broey Deschanel’s video about how he hates dialogue. Like for as beautiful as the movie is, it doesn’t have any icon lines like the original’s tears in the rain speech. I might have been more forgiving if I wasn’t thinking about Villeneuve’s dislike of dialogue. The movie mostly works because most of the cast are robots. Like the most interesting bit of dialogue is when the ad for Joi says some lines similar to K’s Joi. But like the words don’t matter, what matters is they are repeating. It is kinda a shame that the movie is ignoring on of the tools in it’s creative tool kit. I might have also been harder on it because the next movie I’m gonna mention uses everything it can to make a masterpiece. 

I saved the best movie for last. Sinners blew me away. I went and preordered it as soon as I got home from the movie theater. During the Sorcery 101 anniversary stream, Jay Edidin and I talked about how I am frequently drawn to things that can only be the medium they are in. Sinners would fall into that. There is so much it is saying about music and how they connect communities. It is so tightly written and shot, that expanding it beyond a movie’s length would have diminishing. I’m probably being unfair to Bladerunner 2049 to judge it against Sinners just because I saw them so close together. But it is the perfect example of how the dialogue and the visuals work together along with every other piece of a movie. Disregarding any piece weakens the whole. Sinners is truly excellent and if you haven’t seen it yet, you should. As soon as my preorder arrives, I’m gonna rewatch it and listening to any director commentary on the bluray. 

That’s it for this month! Thanks for your support. Fingers-crossed that my surgery goes smoothly.  

I’ve got several online events going on. So I’ll jump right into it! 

Firstly, Sorcery 101 posted it’s first page on May 12, 2005. Meaning it will be 20 years old on this coming May 12th. To celebrate, I’ll be doing a live stream where I chat with friends about when it started and will answer reader questions. 



The stream will be on my twitch and if you have any questions for during the stream ask them here. 

The next thing on the docket for May is I’m a panelist during the Cartoonist Co-op’s Nib and Ink Fest. If you don’t know, the Cartoonist Co-op is a co-op for freelance cartoonists to work together to help creators know their rights and improve their treatment across the industry. 

All through my they are running a digital convention called Nib and Ink Fest. I’ll be on two panels that you can join via Zoom or youtube. 



The first is Having Fun with Backgrounds. Myself and Blue Delliquanti are giving advice to artists on how to make drawing background more enjoyable rather than a necessary chore. I put it together because I love drawing backgrounds and I love it when people draw detailed backgrounds. It will be May 11 at 1pm PST.



Next is Alternative Careers in Comics. My pal Nero put together a panel were we talk about doing the support jobs in comics. So I’ll be talking about editing while Hye talks production and Kevin talks web design. This one will be May 18 at 1pm PST. 

Busy month huh? On top of all this, I’ll still do my usual stream. 

• Tuesday at 8pm – 10pm PST – Art times
• Wednesday at 4pm – 6pm PST – Art times
• Thursday at 3pm – 4pm PST – Wolf & Bones Comic Club
• Thursday at 4pm – 6pm PST – Art times
• Sunday at 8pm – 10pm PST – Baldur’s Gate 3

All these streams will be on my twitch, so stop by!

Last month I mostly focused on work but I was a guest on Serious Slack. The interview is on youtube and you can watch it here. 
 

I’ve been prepping for all these events this month. I think I’m mostly caught up on things. I finally finished writing Glass Diamonds. So next on the writing to do list is Blue Moon the book I’m working on with Meredith McClaren. So I had some more time to watch and read more stuff. 



A youtuber I like made a video about Black Butler‘s new anime and mentioned there are werewolves in it. So I joked online that I guess I need to read Black Butler now. It was a series I had always been vaguely aware of but never checked out until now. The first volume kinda reminded me Tokyo Babylon because it is very cutesy, then something something horrifically violent happens, then it is back to being cutesy. The storytelling is kinda clumsy which makes sense because the creator only did a one shot before jumping into Black Butler. It isn’t 100% my thing, but I can see why certain parts of the internet went feral for it. I’m gonna keep reading until I get to the werewolves though. 



A local theater was doing a David Lynch memorial event and showed off all his movies. It made me realize I haven’t seen most of this films. So some friends of mine and I went and see Mulholland Dr for the first time. I don’t know why but before seeing the movie I thought it was a murder mystery. So it was definitely a wild ride. I liked it a lot but I’m still mentally chewing on it. 


I saw the new Wolfman movie. It was not only bad, but also boring. I posted about it on my bluesky. I went in expecting it to be bad and it still disappointed me. So save yourself 2 hours and skip it. 

So that’s my month. Thanks everyone for your support! Have a good one. 

Hi there folks! Spring is here. Thanks to everyone who stopped by my table at Emerald City Comic Con and signed up for my newsletter. If you are new here, here’s a run down of what I’m working on and do. 

• The City Between is my webcomic about werewolves in the future. It updates Wednesdays. The current story is titled Glass Diamonds. It is free to read on my website, or you can follow my patreon to get it emailed to you. 
• Blue Moon is a werewolf romance graphic novel I’m writing and Meredith McClaren is going to draw.
• Wolf and Bones Comic Club is a streaming show I do with my pal Bones Leopard where we are reading classic comics we’ve been meaning to read. We are currently reading Berserk. It is live on twitch Thursdays, then I post the episode on my youtube. 
• You are the Chosen One is a fantasy comic that is exclusive to my patreon but is currently on hold until I’ve gotten a few other things off my plate. 

I have two day jobs. One is as an editor for Seven Seas, so I’ll occasionally share manga I’m editing for them. I’m also the managing editor at Iron Circus Comics. I like folklore, fantasy, and especially like werewolves!

So in the past I was hosting werewolf movies on the full moon in my discord, but I forgot/something came up the past few months. I think it was because it wasn’t the same time day/time each month. I’m gonna try to think of a new thing just for the discord. I might just do movies on Friday afternoons. But I’ll announce it next month. I will be doing my usual streaming though. 

And I’ll still be streaming on Twitch:

• Tuesday at 8pm – 10pm PST – Art times
• Wednesday at 4pm – 6pm PST – Art times
• Thursday at 3pm – 4pm PST – Wolf & Bones Comic Club
• Thursday at 4pm – 6pm PST – Art times
• Sunday at 8pm – 10pm PST – Baldur’s Gate 3

All these streams will be on my twitch, so stop by!

The photo up top was what I grabbed at Emerald City. For the curious this is the run down:

• Death to the Wizard Kings by Marie Enger
• Self by Christopher Sebela and Cara McGree
• Black Clock by Kelly Thompson and Meredith McClaren
• Stonebreaker by Peter Wartman
• Carmilla by Amy Chu and Soo Lee
• The Substitutes by Myisha Haynes (who also did the BG3 stickers)
• Billionaire Blood mug by Keveh Taherian

Also after Emerald City there was a discussion on Blusky about convention sales. Basically, it got started because some folks in artist alley though sales were down overall. Meanwhile, at the same time Reedpop (who runs Emerald City) told Forbes they were gonna move Emerald City away from cons and more toward general pop culture because they want to compete with Spring Break and Coachella. I replied with how I set up my table and then at the request of another comic artist, I made it a blog post. If you wanna read the whole discussion, it starts here. 

This month I’m mostly gonna try to rebuild a buffer for The City Between. I got sick after Emerald City and it threw off a lot plans last month. There seems to be a nasty bug going around. 

While sick I watched all of Common Side Effects. It is probably one of the best animated shows I’ve seen in awhile. If you are unfamiliar, the main character Marshal finds a mushroom that can cure any illness. So now big pharma wants him dead. It is made by the folks behind Scavengers Reign and Mike Judge. I highly recommend it and you can watch the first episode for free on youtube. 

After recovering, I did get a chance to see Mickey 17. I thought it was pretty funny but there was some character stuff that I wish got followed up on. While I enjoyed the female lead, it took awhile to get to why she and Mickey were together. And like there was a love triangle for maybe 10 minutes before it gets dropped. There are a few bits like that which seem like they could go some where interesting but weren’t followed through. It was very fun though. Robert Patterson does a good job being a big weirdo. 

That’s all for this month. Have a good one everyone. 

Hi folks, I’ll be tabling at Emerald City this weekend. Myself, Kory Bing, and Meredith McClaren will all be at table 20201. We will have a wide variety of monster and fantasy books! And I’ll have some new totebags. 

I mentioned I will have new totebags at Emerald City. After the show I’ll have them up in my store. I just need White Squirrel who handles my store fulfillment to take pictures of them. So it might be in April that they go up. Here’s the design. Like my other totebag, I worked with the great folks at Unicorn Empire. It’s a quote from Rebecca in Fame & Misfortune. So I asked Unicorn Empire to looks at art deco patterns, so it would match The City Between’s general look.

For the monthly full moon movie chat, I’ve rented the new Wolf Man movie. I don’t have high expectation for the movie, but maybe it will be fun to watch as a group. It will be March 14th at 3pm PST. Click here if you wanna join!

And I’ll still be streaming on Twitch:

• Tuesday at 8pm – 10pm PST – Art times
• Wednesday at 4pm – 6pm PST – Art times
• Thursday at 3pm – 4pm PST – Wolf & Bones Comic Club
• Thursday at 4pm – 6pm PST – Art times
• Sunday at 8pm – 10pm PST – Baldur’s Gate 3

All these streams will be on my twitch, so stop by!

Last month, as mentioned on my friend Bones Leopard and I started a twitch show/podcast where we read Berserk. We’ve done two episodes live. I’ve been posting them on my youtube. So you can catch up here. I’ll make a public/free post on my patreon the morning before we go live. So you’ll know when we are coming!

Also, to promote Bones and I’s new show and Glass Diamonds I was a guest on War Rocket Ajax. 

Also, I answered all the questions in this silly meme on Blusky. 

Last month was about prepping for Emerald City and recovering from the crunch time I had at Seven Seas. So once Emerald City is out of the way I’m gonna give Glass Diamonds most of attention. I just have the final scene to write. I might end up writing it in the Emerald City hotel room. 

While working, I was catching up on various TV shows. One of which is the 5th season of Fargo. One thing I really appreciate about Fargo is it always has one element that is vaguely supernatural in each season. And that supernatural element always reenforces one of the major themes of the season. Like in this season, the characters are constantly talking about debt and what people owe one another. So when one of the criminals is 500 year old sin-eater who talks in cryptic lines, they are about how he returns what he is given (whether kindness to an old woman he stays with or violence directed at him by a corrupt deputy) and how he is burdened by the sins of the rich he was forced to take on. And it adds a good texture the story, especially when the main character pushes back against his older views on debt and payment. I think without that spice of the supernatural, the story might be easy to dismiss as something more straight forward. 

When I think of a lot of my favorite stories, they are ones that use the magical or sci-fi elements to reinforce their metaphor rather than there for the plot or world building. 

That’s it for this month. Everyone, take care of yourselves.