2008 update.
It's been a year. Where to start?

The 64-page Courtney Crumrin and the Fire-Thief's Tale came out last year. It was great to keep Courtney's story going and feature Aloysius more. I explore his character even further in the next Courtney book. I also really got a kick out of working with some of the Old World monsters, looking into the roots of those traditions and giving them my own interpretation. You can find a review of Fire-Thief here. Here are the cover and five pages:



Then I took six months to draw the first of three graphic novels with Holly Black, Good Neighbors: Kin. It's been earning some positive press,* and I'm excited about getting started on the next book, Kith. Holly is easy to work with, and it's fun to put faces on her characters. Here are the front and back covers and an assortment of five pages with no text.



I recently finished the companion volume to Fire-Thief. It's entitled Courtney Crumrin and the Prince of Nowhere, and it continues Courtney's travels with Aloysius in Eastern Europe. It may sound arrogant, but I consider it my best work, both in storytelling and art, so far in my career. It's more of the emotional rollercoaster you expect from Courtney: sad but funny, thoughtful but with some neat fight scenes. It's due to hit the shelves in November, and I can't wait to find out what fans think of it. Fire-Thief and Prince will eventually be bound into a trade paperback called Courtney Crumrin's Monstrous Holiday. Here's the cover and page.




For a more in-depth breakdown of my recent work, check out the interview at Sequential Tart and an upcoming interview at Newsarama. Beware some spoilers for the newest Courtney book in the Newsarama piece.

Apart from that I've enjoyed meeting fans at Wondercon, San Diego Comic Con, on a fabulous signing tour in France, and at my personal favorite event of the year, DragonCon. In the next few months, I plan to attend APE and New York Comicon.

My new favorite way to waste time when I should be drawing is playing guitar. I got an acoustic Fender on Craigslist and got started with some tutorials on YouTube. I've been adding to my repertoire of Nick Cave and Magnetic Fields songs, and my girlfriend evens chimes in on backup vocals.

My website is hopelessly out of date, and now a complete mess - my webmistress retired from the biz - and will hopefully be getting a complete overhaul soon. Sorry to let it get so stale. I hope the pages I'm including here will tide you over in the meantime.

For those of you curious about what's going on with Polly, I'm working with Oni Press to find another artist to take over, but I'll continue writing it myself.

Thanks for sticking with me and continuing to buy the books. I hope to have more and even better offerings in the future.



*Please let the record show that this article contains a few typos, and that I know the difference between aesthetic and ascetic.