Rilke and Zeno: Two Talks

Above and below are talks given during my recent graphic novelist's residency at Thurber House in Columbus, Ohio. Tammy Birk (Professor of English, Otterbein University) discusses themes in "Mother, Come Home" while Ryan Jordan (Department of Philosophy, The Ohio State University) examines the nature of paradoxes in general, using Zeno's paradoxes in "The Three Paradoxes" as a launching point.

I wasn't present at the talks but wanted to thank Tammy and Ryan for their time and thoughtful analysis. And of course thanks to Jeff Sims and the people of Columbus Museum of Art for hosting the talks and making the videos.

Prints From The Flat Files

In reorganizing my flat file drawers, I came across heaps of various prints, some of which I thought had long ago sold out. So for a while (until they really (no, really) sell out), these three prints will be available for purchase here on the blog.

A brief explanation of the prints:The Project Superior poster (designed by Chris Pitzer of AdHouse Books and printed by Jay Ryan of The Bird Machine) was pulled from the cover art I did for the book. The Holy Consumption poster is a sort of "exquisite corpse" drawing from all four artists of The Holy Consumption, promoting an event at Quimby's years ago. The Mother, Come Home print (also printed by Jay Ryan, and representing the first time we ever worked together) is advertising an entirely fictitious reading by "author" Thomas Tennant. The yellow text is a bit hard to read in the photo, but it says "Oct. 27 6:00pm." Bonus points if you can figure out the significance of those figures.


Project Superior Poster, 2 Colors.

15x25" on French Speckletone paper. $30.

The Holy Consumption at Quimby's Poster, 3 Colors.

Approximately 15x30" on mixed stock (white and off white). $30.

"Mother, Come Home" Print, 4 Colors.

14x23" on French Kraft paper. $30.

Mother, Come Home's Soundtrack

Today Largehearted Boy posted my Book Notes: the soundtrack for Mother, Come Home, with thoughts about the story's creation and inspiration, cars in the rain, and hypothetical movie trailers.

Irish Men Mangling Names

If you want to hear two hilarious, just-exited-the-pub-with-exuberance Irish blokes talk about the recent re-release of Mother, Come Home (as well as a great dissection of comics based on The Muppet Show and The Twilight Zone), then make your way over to The Comic Cast podcast. You can download the podcast or listen online.

Frankly, these two could talk about the ingredients of asphalt and make it an enjoyable show.

Emerald City, Final Night

Today I'll spend the day with the various spandex and light saber adorned crowds of Emerald City Comicon, and will then retreat to the world of the Fantagraphics Bookstore, to sign books alongside the inimitable Stan Sakai and Jaime Hernandez. If you're in the Seattle area, I'll hope to see you at one event or another for the final night in this sprint of a northwest excursion.

Fred's Head

I posted some time ago about Derya Golpinar's embroidery floss rendering of Thomas from Mother, Come Home, (below) and I'd feel remiss if I didn't post about one of her latest, which I love. I'm not sure who Fred is, but he's a well stitched fellow. Be sure to visit Fred and Derya's other notes and oddities on her blog.

The Miniature Northwest Tour

The good people of Fantagraphics put together this poster for the small Pacific Northwestern tour I'll be embarking on soon. Each event will be significantly different from the other: a gallery opening in Portland, a slideshow and reading in Vancouver, a convention during the day in Seattle, and an afterparty at the Fantagraphics bookstore that night. It should be quite the comics event sampler platter for my girlfriend who is, despite her better judgment, joining me on the tour.

If you're in Portland, Vancouver, Seattle, or some truck stop in between, stop by and say hello. I'll be looking forward to seeing you, making an awkward joke, and then realizing that one of your close relatives is affected by whatever I just made fun of.

Mother, Come Home Back in Print

Available for ordering on the Fantagraphics site: the new hardcover edition of Mother, Come Home, back in print after a two year absence.

Once More, With Lion Masks

Fantagraphics has posted a slide show/Flickr set for the imminent re-release of Mother, Come Home. The book – out of print in North America for almost two years and now issued in a (in my opinion) massively improved hardbound format – will be in hand soon, and in stores around mid-March. I'll be doing a few signings of the book on the west coast around the time of its release: I'll post more information about that in the near future.

Visit the the book's product page to download wallpaper for your desktop or phone, read a fourteen page excerpt of the book, and, should the mood strike, pre-order the book.

For the Affluent Bibliophile, Confused Enthusiast

It occurred to me that I should make at least some note of the books (that I've been working on, in some portion or another) coming out in the next couple of months, if for no other reason than to abate my constant forgetfulness that these are seeing the light of day (it's an easy enough thing to forget, given the lags and turnaround times in the strange world of publishing).

Two of these books are available now, at least according to what I could find on various web sites. The first is Demons in the Spring, by Joe Meno, a collection of short stories benefiting the 826 writing center here in Chicago. It's a great cause and the book's crammed with Joe's words and amazing illustrations, all far better than mine. The other book in stores now is the twelfth installment of Fantagraphics' Mome anthology. In this issue I contributed what was, for me, a real odd ball: an illustrated short prose story. The story, "The Spoils of The Fair," was originally written for The Dollar Store reading series, and then read at a couple stops on "The Three Paradoxes" book tour last summer. The illustrations are equally abnormal, as they were all done directly in a sketchbook, with a brush pen and colored pencils, a decent departure from my usual painfully sterile techniques. (Thanks to the Fantagraphics folks for the video from which I stole this (below) still.)


Two more books, both scheduled to be out October 8th, are The Best American Nonrequired Reading 2008 (which will house a 32-page full-color excerpt of "The Three Paradoxes"), and the hardcover collection of Omega the Unknown (the dust jacket for which is in a recent post below).

Somewhere in all that mess, the second printing of The Three Paradoxes is making its way out into the world, and though I don't think I've even made an explicit mention of this edition anywhere, the Fantagraphics-published hardbound edition of "Mother, Come Home" is now available for pre-order, due out in February of next year.

I've probably missed something somewhere... I'll remember it at three in the morning, in a cold sweat, then promptly forget it and return to my dream of sentient doorbells and melting game shows.

Another Way to Spell That Thing

For those that tire of attempting to piece together the many (some would argue superfluous) letters of my last name, this cover I've just finalized for the Korean edition of "Mother, Come Home" (complete with a wood pattern wrap-around band at the bottom) should offer an elegant solution. Or anyway, I think that's my name on there somewhere. For all I know, it says, "Horrible book! Avoid like the plague."

(Above, the book (back cover, spine, and front cover) with band; below, the book by itself)

Ruh Roh, Romics?

I find it somehow appropriate that the first award I've won for comics is not only from a festival I'm not attending and have never heard of, but that sounds as if it were announced by an exasperated Scooby Doo. Yes, "Mother, Come Home" was awarded a Romic.

Beyond that, what can I say? Not much, all the information is in some sort of foreign language. Huh. Apparently there's a whole country speaking this stuff.

Embroidery Floss Thomas

When Derya Golpinar sent me this (first via e-mail, then through physical mail), I was astonished by how good it was, as this is the sort of thing that would have taken me weeks and would have ended up looking less like Thomas wearing a lion mask than Thomas wearing a lion mask after being subjected to a mutating heat ray. It's too good to not share. Thanks, Derya.

(Derya works for the Lower East Side Tenement Museum, which has some really engaging web comics on New York immigrants.)