Tag: newsletter

Hello everyone!

Thanks everyone who stopped by my table at San Diego Comic Con and signed up for my newsletter. If you are new here, here’s a run down of what I’m working on/what you might be looking for. 

• 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. 
• Cautionary Fables and Fairytales is a kid-friendly folklore anthology series I edit and organize for Iron Circus Comics. 
• Wolf and Bones Comic Club is a streaming show I do with my friend Bones Leopard. We are currently reading Berserk. It is live on my twitch Thursday, then I post the episodes 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.

Now that I’m back from San Diego, I’m getting a short break before I head to Worldcon in Seattle. I’ll mostly be doing panels. Above I posted a schedule but here’s some more details. 

• Table Talk 47 – Wednesday 7:30pm-8:30pm – Room 427: Six people can sign up to have a chat with me. You have to sign up in advance (The Worldcon site doesn’t have that up yet), so keep an eye out if you are interested. I’m willing to look at portfolios if one of the sign ups is interested. 
• SF/F in Comics! – Thursday 1:30pm-2:30pm – Room 420-422: How have speculative fiction and fantasy been represented in comics? From Jack Kirby’s super-science, to Jeff Lemire’s android families in Descender, to fae crimes of Black Cloak by Kelly Thompson and Meredith McClaren, let’s explore the comics that tried to put the science first, or brought the fantastical to the forefront, and talk about how that drew us into those stories!
• The Indie Comics Panel: The Big 25% – Friday 9am-10am – Room 431-432: The “Big Two” comic book publishers control 75% of the market and get plenty of attention. If you’re curious about who makes up the independent comics market and where you fit in as a fan, this might be the panel for you!
• Kickstarter for Authors – Saturday 10:30am-11:30am – Room 443-444: Kickstarter is becoming a powerful platform for connecting indie authors with readers. Join our Kickstarter experts to learn what projects work best, how Kickstarter backers are different from readers on other marketplaces, and how to set your project up for success.
• Writing Comics and Graphic Novels – Saturday 1:30pm-2:30pm – Room 343-344: Comics are bigger than ever, and the publishing industry is wild for graphic novels and manga, but writing a comics story is its own skill—different from prose or a screenplay. Gain valuable insight about the medium of comics: pitching, script formatting, collaborating with artists, and common pitfalls many new comic writers make as they get their start.
• The Comic Book Sommelier – Sunday 3pm-4pm – Room 423-424: Comic books today: Even with sales numbers dropping and the distribution channel scattered and shredded, there’s never been a better time to be a comics fan. Why Marvel and DC are doing some of the best work they’ve done in years, probably under pressure from the strong stories of “second-rank” companies and the surge of independent comics publishers. This panel will cover some of the “inside baseball” of how things are going, then move to being an audience-led “comic book sommelier,” where we match an individual with a perfect comic title or two.

So it is a pretty packed week. I hope some of you can make it! I really enjoyed Worldcon last year, so I’m very curious to check out the programing at the show this year. I haven’t had a chance to go through the whole program but there are a couple I’m already interested in like Blueprint for Hope.  

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!Bones is traveling so Wolf & Bones Comic Club is gonna be sporadic. They also think they have hit their limit with the violence in Berserk so we are lined up some different titles to move on to. We are gonna talk about the Dark Phoenix Saga, Bone, and then Rose of Versailles. 

Prep for San Diego Comic Con took up most of my time this month. I posted some of the con photos online. The thing I took the most pictures of was the lego version of the convention center. It was really impressed with all the details. I ended up taking a video as I walked around it. I also took photos of cosplayers, but kept it to deeper cuts/rarer costumes. All my photos are up on my google drive. 

I got decently ahead with Glass Diamonds, so this month I’m focus on writing Blue Moon. I’ve been stuck at the half way point for awhile. Meredith has been swamped with her Image series Black Cloak and her new book Meateaters (both of which are very good and you should check out), so it hasn’t been a big problem. I don’t want to hold her up though. 

Since San Diego prep took up a lot of time last month, I didn’t get to check out too many new books this month. One the drive down to San Diego I listened to the audiobook of Fan Fiction: A Mem-Noir by Brent Spiner. It’s mystery about him dealing with an obsessive trekkie while filming The Next Generation. While not the best book, it was funny and he got the whole cast of TNG to read their dialogue in the audiobook. I’d mostly recommend it to people who are Star Trek fans and are looking of an audiobook specifically. 

I also finally got a chance to read The Summer Hikaru Died by Mokumokuren. I watched the first few episodes of the anime. But it’s only available with subtitles and with I’d rather take in the visuals completely than try to read while watching. So I switched over to the manga. If you don’t know what this manga is about, it’s a romantic horror story. The titular Hikaru died in the mountains and has been replaced by a creator that not only copied his body, but also his memories. It is now experiencing being human for first time. The art really sells the uneasy intimacy between the main character and this fake Hikaru. I ended up reading 3 volumes and will get catch up later this month. 

Lastly, I listened to the audiobook of The Tomb of Dragons by Katherine Addison. This is the fourth book set in the world of The Goblin Emperor. It picks up right where the pervious book left off. Thara Celehar ends up looking into why a cemetery has fallen into disuse and get it functioning again. It digs into who the elf kingdom views as a “person” and how to right old injustices. The end was a little abrupt. I assume it was because Katherine Addison is getting stuff into place for the next book, but still felt off. I did like how Celehar slowly learns to move beyond his self loathing, or at least starts too. 

That’s it for this month! Thanks for your support and take care. 

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.