I am both a fan and creator of comics. I believe people have come to know me as a thoughtful guy. I hope you enjoy the views expressed here at Comics Grinder.
It is ingrained in our DNA to thirst for bloody horror. Oh, wait, I think I just used that opening line recently. Well, it’s a good one and it certainly applies to The Walking Dead. I firmly believe that, when you strike the right balance of evenly spaced blood splatters and evenly paced plotting, it will resonate with an audience. It’s the next phase a horror creator wants to get to and fast just like Robert Kirkman has succeeded in doing. In tribute to horror done right, behold “The Walking Dead: The Pop-Up Book,” published by Insight Editions.
Lots of details and hidden goodies!
This is no mere pop-up book! Look it over form every angle, there is plenty to look at and marvel over. This masterful work is created by paper engineers David Hawcock (Journal of Inventions: Leonardo Da Vinci) and Becca Zerkin, with text by Stephani Danelle Perry, and illustrated by Sally Elizabeth Jackson.
Zombie Surprise!
Based on AMC’s hit television series, “The Walking Dead,” this has got to be the ultimate gift idea for many a friend and loved one into zombies, horror movies, or pop culture in general. It’s big but also compact enough to fit comfortably on your coffee table or wherever you like to keep groovy ghoulies.
THE WALKING DEAD: THE POP-UP BOOK is a hardcover featuring five glorious page spreads and over 20 pop-ups. For more details, visit our friends at Insight Editions right here.
When writing a book about your life, it’s easy to fall into having the last laugh. With her book, “Wildflower,” Drew Barrymore has chosen to write a book full of laughter, joy, and wise observations. If a book like this seems too idealistic, all one needs to do is dive in and read it and find an authentic voice.
Ever since spending many hours basking in the glow of the last days of a bookstore that focused on cinema, I gained a fuller appreciation of the celebrity autobiography. After you’ve taken the time to study a number of these titles, you just can’t make generalizations. Often, these works are remarkably insightful. You can only take them one at a time. In the case of Drew Barrymore, she consistently writes honestly and vividly. You can hear her unique voice on every page and it’s a story you’ll find refreshingly modest.
There are a number of fascinating moments that come to mind: Drew’s experience in Africa and how she connected that to learning how to heal her relationship with childhood and children.; her frankness about her relationship with her parents and how she learned to create boundaries; and her recollections of growing up in West Hollywood and how she cherished the little touches of nature, especially the bougainvilleas, amid urban life.
With a great sense of irreverence, coupled with a natural spirituality, this is one book by a celebrity, one very unconventional celebrity, that will win you over.
“Wildflower” is a 288-page hardcover published by Dutton, an imprint of Penguin Random House.
This is a really fun interview. I feel that I do a very good job of keeping things in play but it ultimately comes down to my subject. Well, Chris Hunt is an excellent subject. With a wonderfully self-effacing sense of humor, Hunt provides a behind-the-scenes look at a young man making it in New York City. He’s tried his hand at acting. He’s gotten to learn at the side of master cartoonist Paul Pope. He’s living the dream. That NYC energy has made its way into his new crime noir adventure, the comic book series, CARVER: A PARIS STORY. Check out my review right here.
So, the main character is Carver, a guy who looks like he just stepped out of a Ernest Hemingway novel. And Carver is up to his eyeballs in trouble and adventure in the same spirit as the comics of masters like Milton Caniff, Hugo Pratt, and Paul Pope. Now, check this out, our cartoonist friend here, Chris Hunt, looks like he just stepped out of a Ernest Hemingway novel too!
Just click below for my interview with Chris Hunt:
“Carver: A Paris Story #1” is published by Z2 Comics and available as of November 11, 2015. For more details, visit our friends at Z2 Comics right here.
It is ingrained in our DNA to thirst for bloody horror. But we generally know when we’re close to crossing the line. I think the comic, PUNCH TO KILL, does an interesting job of going back and forth with teetering towards a bit too much. If you love blood and guts, then no problem. That said, I give a lot of credit to cartoonist Marc Palm for carrying out his dance with death.
There is much said on the subject of horror, particularly movie horror. I don’t claim to really care more than I do. I like what I like. If it has wings, I’ll most likely applaud its flight. If it’s merely sick and disgusting, what can I tell you? This comic really tries my patience but it’s supposed to. In the end, I applaud its quirky humor. It is visually arresting. It’s a solid piece of work.
This is a collaboration between writers Kevin Clarke, Will Long, and writer/artist Marc Palm. I can see that they’re having a lot of fun with various horror and action movie tropes. There’s the tough guy being held prisoner in some dank office. Then, suddenly, he’s had enough, and he goes on a bloody rampage. Now, he’s like an armored tank plowing through one henchman after another. You think you fooled me, the tough dude thinks. Well, think again, sucker! Insert blood splatters on the wall, the floor, wherever you like.
What’s good about this comic is that, despite all the blood and guts, it’s got a good head on its shoulders–all the way up to when it gets blown clean off. Seriously folks, this is what you can file under “highly spirited good fun.”
PUNCH TO KILL #1 is published by Pizza Party Comix. You can find these bloody fiends right here.
From the first page of Kara Queen’s new comic, “A Wind From Nowhere,” I felt as if I had been invited into a quiet space where secrets were revealed through whispers. There is 11-year-old Madelyn sitting on the rooftop of her apartment building talking to Ichabod, a one-legged crow. Then, one day at school, her world is rocked by a boy named, Harper.
Kara Queen has a solid way of evoking the vulnerability of youth. She takes her two main characters, inevitably lacking in self-awareness, and places them on a treacherous journey that both are unlikely to survive. This is a study of a crisis that just keeps getting further out of control. Perhaps Madelyn and Harper should never have met but, despite the cloud that hangs over them, they seem to be meant for each other.
A WIND FROM NOWHERE by Kara Queen
The ill-fated relationship has everything to do with their instability. Neither one has much of a foothold on reality. At least Madelyn’s offbeat perspective leans to the whimsical. Harper’s view of the world veers towards homicidal.
Madelyn, Harper, and the crows
There’s a lot of heart to this comic. You really believe in the characters and their struggles. Queen has an energetic and compassionate drawing style. As you might have suspected, there isn’t much in the way of healthy parental support for these kids. But Queen is careful not to paint them as monsters. Instead, she manages to evoke that murky world of dysfunction where things just aren’t working the way they should be.
“A Wind from Nowhere” is a 50-page full-color comic, priced at $12, and available right here. And be sure to visit Kara Queen right here.
Do you like to write lists of goals you’ve set for yourself or give yourself little private pep talks? Of course, you do! We have plenty of bad energy out there to navigate through. A lot of us out there have already picked up on the benefits of self-help, particularly meditation. Yumi Sakugawa has a new book, “There is No Right Way to Meditate and Other Lessons,” published by Adams Media. Here, she provides a highly accessible, and quite invigorating, look at a peaceful world full of peaceful people.
It all began with an epiphany that Yumi had when she was 23-years-old and feeling very blue. She came to the realization that she was NOT her thoughts. She certainly wasn’t her negative thoughts. It is a simple enough concept and yet it is also a very powerful concept. This is a book that gently, and soothingly, offers observations on how to avoid negativity and gain a better sense of balance.
Yumi maintains a lighthearted tone throughout with her prose and whimsical artwork. For instance, she suggests that you get lost in the woods so your bad mood doesn’t know where to find you. It’s not too lighthearted. It’s just right. These are mind over mind exercises. So, the humor needs to ring true. The inner world won’t respond to a mere joke.
There’s such a genuine expression of joy and reassurance here that you’ll find it irresistible. No right nor wrong. No irony. Just a goal of self-love. Perchance to dream. Ah, dreams are a serious business. The mind demands convincing. Yumi will do this by presenting the reader with a rock. The rock is heavy. Anxiety is heavy. However, once you start to feel the rock’s ridges, it begins to feel less heavy. Yumi invites you to desire a better life without thinking too hard about it. Enjoy the now. That is exactly where you need to be.
“There is No Right Way to Meditate and Other Lessons” is a 160-page hardcover and is published by Adams Media. You can also find it at Amazon right here.
We think a lot about garbage here in Seattle. We’ve been ahead of the curve for many years. We separate our garbage from common garbage (non-food), compost (food), and recycling (very specific categories). I know that some Seattleites find utter joy in thoroughly washing their recyclables. And, lately, the City of Seattle has demanded more by showing no mercy and fining homeowners who dare to mix food in with their common everyday garbage!
To read TRASHED, the new graphic novel by Derf Backderf, this whole business of garbage is not so complicated. The real solution would be to use less! But I get ahead of myself. In this book, you see the very human element to garbage from the viewpoint of a bunch of young guys just starting out in life…as garbage collectors.
Derf Backderf has a style and tone to his storytelling that brings you right in. You might not necessarily want to be brought in to some of the content he’s involved with but, all the same, there you are. From his comic strip that examined Cleveland urban life to his previous recollections of Jeffrey Dahmer, Backderf presents the grim, the gritty, and the unvarnished truth. For his new graphic novel, he does something that may inspire other cartoonists to follow suit in their own way.
He revisits some experiences from his youth and brings these old characters up to present day with contemporary commentary. Backderf created comics based upon his year (1979-80) as a sanitation worker. In 2010, he took those old characters and, like ageless Archie comics characters, placed them in a present day setting for a webcomic. That project evolved into this current graphic novel.
Backderf gently nudges along the idea that we’re all such disgusting slobs. Maybe not all of the time but no one gets completely away. And there are plenty of oddball characters that Backderf observes on his rounds who shouldn’t get away with anything like the unscrupulous dog catcher that terrorizes all the neighborhood pets. And then there’s all the people leaving out inappropriate items like a stove and a car engine block. Seriously? Yes, people have no shame.
Knee-deep, and sometimes up to his eyeballs, in garbage, our main character prevails. He survives his year as a garbage collector. And, now, all these years later, we get the complete story in this funny, insightful, and beautifully rendered book.
TRASHED is a 256-page hardcover, published by Abrams ComicArts, available as of November 3, 2015. You can find it at Amazon right here.
The Short Run comics haul compiled by Henry Chamberlain and Jennifer Daydreamer
I am going to do a quick recap for you of the Short Run Comix & Arts Festival that took place this Halloween at Seattle Center. We had such a great time. Jen and I are so happy. This year I was an exhibitor and got to debut a couple of comics. One was the printed result to my annual 24-Hour Comics Day marathon, entitled, “Hello Hello Hotel Hotel,” and the other is the first part of what will be full-length graphic novel and this one is entitled, “George’s Run.” I want folks to know me as the “George’s Run” guy. Yes, this one is significant. And for many reasons. As I was saying in my review of Bill Griffith’s “Invisible Ink,” the past has a way of slipping away and that’s mostly because few people are working to gain it back. I’m working here to gain back a lot of stuff and celebrate it, explore it, and just be inspired from it.
Here I am debuting George’s Run at Short Run!
Anyway, back to the show. There is nothing quite like Short Run in Seattle. It is truly a treasure to be grateful for. Here you have gathered in one place such a wide and varied assembling of great talent in comics and zines coupled with the zesty and substantial accompanying events that Short Run puts together in October, and throughout the year. I’m just honored to be part of it. And I don’t take it lightly at all. Every participant at Short Run is vital and I know that each and every contributor takes the role quite seriously. We’re all sharing in some awesome mutual respect and love.
Short Run at Fisher Pavilion in Seattle Center, 31 October 2015
We all want to see underground comics make it more above ground and Short Run is leading the way. I found Short Run to have more of a broad audience as opposed to a niche audience that you would see at the Small Press Expo. This is just a general observation but I base it upon what I was observing and conversations I had at my table. I had folks who had never heard of “Logan’s Run,” or never seen an episode of “The Twilight Zone,” or never heard of “Adventure Time,” or never heard of 24-Hour Comics. That just tells me that we were seeing a pretty good amount of the general audience mixed in with the core audience–and that’s great.
A ghost from a Peanuts Halloween special checks out Short Run
You go to the Short Run main event at Seattle Center to make new discoveries. For someone like myself, it’s something of a reunion party as I get to catch up with a lot of old and new friends in the comics community. There is always something new, something just around the corner. I began with my tablemates for the day representing Section 8 magazine to the right of me and a compilation of the classic zine, Desperate Times, to the left of me. Here is a fun video just to give you a sense of the camaraderie that grows during an event like this. Here you will find Maire M. Masco, author of the zine compilation, “Desperate Times: The Summer of 1981,” and Tony Harris, owner/CEO, and Mike Peters, marketing/social media manager of Section 8 magazine:
Well, I have my haul of comics to go through. I see over twenty options for reviews. I will get to all of them one by one in the days, and weeks, ahead. There is much to cover as we make our way to end of the year. So, I will be reviewing a ton of stuff and keep coming back to titles that I picked up from Short Run.
Short Run pumpkins welcome visitors
Again, I cannot say enough how inspiring and joyful Short Run is for us creators and, surely, for everyone who stepped out and took in this jewel in the comics community. Visit our friends at Short Run right here.
Tom Van Deusen is a cartoonist based in Seattle who, along with several other cartoonists, started up the quarterly comics newspaper, Intruder. His work includes the comics, “Eat Eat Eat,” and “A Matter of Life and Death.” He was instrumental in bringing back the comics anthology work associated with writer Dennis Eichhorn and “Real Stuff.” Tom’s Poochie Press brought out two issues of “Real Good Stuff.” Subsequently, Last Gasp published, “Extra Good Stuff.” This was an opportunity to revisit previous collaborations as well as new ones between Mr. Eichborn and cartoonists.
Real Good Stuff #2
Dennis P. Eichhorn died October 8, 2015. He was one of the autobio genre’s best-known luminaries. Once nominated for three Eisner Awards for his work in Real Stuff comix, Eichhorn also authored the Real Smut comix series, and self-published The Amazing Adventures of Ace International, Real Schmuck, and Northwest Cartoon Cookery in collaboration with Starhead Comix. A former senior editor of Seattle’s now-defunct Rocket Magazine, Eichhorn distingished himself as the creator of one of America’s most notable art tabloids, the Northwest EXTRA!, by editing and publishing 16 issues in the late 1980s.
Tom Van Deusen’s art on the cover of Seattle Weekly
Tom Van Deusen loves to create art: words, pictures, and words & pictures. He dose it quite well and seemingly effortlessly. That is part of the appeal, for me, as I see him as someone who simply loves what he does.
Tom Van Deusen’s “Space Duck”
The image above is a good example. I was looking through items he’s posted and thought I’d ask him about the duck on the moon. Tom laughed and, almost apologetically but not quite, said that it goes back to his just drawing for the sake of drawing.
Tom has taken the comics bull by the horns and accomplished a lot in these last four years that he’s focused on comics. Although, truth be told, he’s been creating art for longer than that. Most notable for him has been his work with writer Dennis Eichborn. We talk about Eichhorn, the world of comics, and the world of an indie cartoonist. Aspiring cartoonists will often ask cartoonist vets about how to break into comics, if there’s some secret handshake involved, and Tom is a shining example of what’s really involved: a simple love for the work.
Henry Chamberlain: Tell us about your connection with Dennis Eichborn.
Tom Van Deusen: I met Dennis Eichhorn through Pat Moriarity, who is a great cartoonist and worked with Eichhorn on the original run of Real Stuff. I’m a big fan of his work as is my friend and fellow cartoonist, Max Clotfelter, and a whole lot of other cartoonists. Max had been keeping up with a sort of football blog that Dennis was doing. Actually, it was more of a newsletter that he’d email to friends. It was mostly about college football but it also included a fair amount of autobio work. And Max contacted Denny about maybe working together on creating comics. At that point, Eichhorn hadn’t formally published anything in about twenty years.
He had these great new stories and, from that, we asked him he’d be interested in working with a new generation of cartoonists. And Kaz knew him and wanted to work with him again as well. And he agreed. I had these ideas at the time of doing some small scale publishing work. I had self-published for a few years my own comics. So, we decided to do a Kickstarter. We drove over to Bremerton and met with Dennis. I think I only met with him four or five times. We had a very successful Kickstarter, almost doubled our goal.
We got to put out a 64-page double issue and worked with a lot of great cartoonists. Noah Van Sciver wanted to do one. We got cartoonist from the original Real Stuff, like John Hurley and Mary Fleener.
And from there, Dennis had all these other stories he hadn’t published and that led to a second collection that was picked up by Last Gasp. Distribution is really tough. And, for me with a full-time job and trying to create my own comics, getting this book published has been the hardest thing I’ve done so far. It was really lucky to get Last Gasp on board to publish the second volume.
HC: I loved that I got to pick up my copy of that second book at the Seattle ferry terminal, of all places.
TVD: Ha, what was it doing there?
HC: There’s a great story behind that. Dennis Eichhorn’s wife, Jane, let me know that she arranged to have it available at the newsstand there since that was her regular spot to pick up the Sunday New York Times for Dennis on her way back to Bremerton.
TVD: Oh, that’s great!
HC: I wanted to ask your take on underground comix.
TVD: Well, from the ’60s or ’70s, or more recent?
HC: Yes, it is era-based. Take your pick. How would you define it, overall, for people totally unfamiliar with this?
TVD: Anything that’s not mainstream. And mainstream usually means genre work. That’s work that’s never really interested me. Even growing up, I never read superhero comics. I was more into “Ren & Stimpy” and a bunch of other crazy cartoons coming out when I was a kid. When I finally started getting into alternative comics in college, I picked up Crumb and Chris Ware. I think that goes hand in hand. It’s work that isn’t genre…which is sort of a sad description since most things aren’t genre. Most things aren’t “superhero” and “action” outside of comics. But, for some reason, comics are so dominated by things that are more suitable for children. Underground comix are more suited for adults, although they don’t necessarily have to be.
Alternative comics can be anything. And, once I found that work, I was really excited that I’d found my calling. It took a long time. They’re kind of hard to find. Distribution is crumby. Unless you know about it, it’s kind of hard for people to stumble across. It deserves a wider audience. It shouldn’t have to be “underground.” In France, this is major media. It’s not something just for enthusiasts. In Japan, everyone reads comics.
HC: It’s good to hear you use the term “alternative comics,” which I find very useful. It’s “alternative” to market-driven mainstream comics.
TVD: Right.
HC: How would you describe the scene today? I mean, from your vantage point. You’ve got The Intruder.
TVD: Yeah, there’s a lot of stuff coming out. It’s amazing. It seems that I meet a new cartoonist every day. With the internet, cartoonists are coming out of the woodwork quicker than ever. And there’s all these festivals. That’s what brought about The Intruder. We’d been reading Smoke Signal, which came out of Brooklyn’s Desert Island Comics. We want to create something for Seattle. There’s a great comics community in Seattle and always has been. I met Max Clotfelter, Marc Palm, Ian Fitzgerald, and other cartoonists. We hung out a lot. We all drew comics. From there, we did a lot of jam comics. We did a lot of silly, usually scatalogical, comics. We started out with a free newspaper and people seemed to like it.
The only problem is that there’s no money in doing any of this. The problem is distribution. There’s only one distributor, Diamond. They are pretty much closed doors for the sort of comics I enjoy. It’s a bottleneck for small publishers. They exist because of Marvel and DC Comics.
HC: Well, we won’t put too fine point on it. They do have a small press section in their catalog.
TVD: They do have that.
HC: You had mentioned a graphic novel that you really enjoyed in another interview you gave. That was last year’s sleeper hit, “Arsene Schrauwen,” by Olivier Schrauwen, published by Fantagraphics Books. I can see you doing something like that down the road.
TVD: For now, I am focusing on short works. “EAT EAT EAT,” is my longest work at 25 pages and that took four years.
HC: And you enjoy doing comedy.
TVD: That’s how I got into comics, from doing these PowerPoint presentations.
HC: There was a group that did a lot of that some years back called, Slide Rule.
TVD: Oh, really, are they local?
HC: Yes, it was a group of cartoonists in Seattle. I was part of that scene. David Lasky was part of that scene. He could tell you about it.
TVD: I gravitate to that. I enjoy writing up skits. There’s a great comedy scene where I’m from, Buffalo, New York. Great friends of mine there: Matt Thompson, Pat Kewley, and Sarah Jane Barry.
HC: Well, I am impressed with all the things you’re doing. You may end up focusing on writing in the future. Who Knows. I wish you well. Thanks so much for your time.
TVD: Thank you, Henry
You can listen to the podcast below:
Be sure to visit Tom Van Deusen right here. And you can find Poochie Press Publications right here.
If you happen to be reading this on the same day it was posted, Halloween, and you’re in Seattle, go see Tom at Short Run.
Alright, talk about follow-through, I completed my 24-Hour Comics Day marathon at the start of the month and here I am presenting the printed result, HELLO HELLO HOTEL HOTEL, at none other than the Short Run Comix & Arts Festival at the end of the month, yeah, and it’s even Halloween!
The Fremont Troll is one of the most celebrated of stone people. If you listen closely, you can learn from stone people. In this comic, we explore what transpires when the Troll takes on human form.
