What Am I Doing?

Not much really, waiting to have some good ideas....
I have finished Math-Ro-Mancer, it's three pages long and I'm happy with it. Nice ending. Also I started a new one page story called 'Rob Jackson's Rules of Life no. 6', not sure how that'll turn out. I went to the Manchester Comix Collective Drink and Draw 7 and we drew a four page jam comic which was cool. You can see it here-
ComiX Jam

Yoshihiro Tatsumi - Good-Bye

This is the third of a series of Tatsumi books from Drawn and Quarterly. This ones a good one, the first 'Abandon the Old in Tokyo' is awesome but the second was a bit disappointing to me. They all are very similar really in tone, and that tone is super depressing, sometimes so dark that its funny, though the drawing gets better as you go through them. I really like the way he draws women. D & Q aren't going to do another of these, instead they are going to print his vast autobiogrpahical book about being a manga-ka, so i've heard, which should be great. I'm not sure why you would need all three of these books anyhow, i think I have mainly got them all as they look so nice all together on my shelf. Just get the first and this one...

Tekkon Kinkreet - Taiyo Matsumoto

Tekkon Kinkreet is another massive book. I keep buying these giant tomes recently, they are very good value for money. The stories pretty good, about two orphans living and trying to survive in a city called 'Treasure Town' which is a bit like Tokyo or more like Osaka. They are fighting Yakuza but really fighting a giant corporation which is trying to take over the city and remake it into a kind of corporate disney-land. The great thing about it is the drawing which is awesome, all spindly wobbly line people. The city also looks amazing and is the main character of the story really. Matsumoto constantly uses close up panels of the characters great big heads with their small spindly bodies in perspective going away below which gives the book a special feeling of being right up in their faces. The drawings more european or indie comics looking than usual manga. Well worth gazing at and trying to work out how to make such a cool city.

Math-Ro-Mancer

Here's the main character from my new short story Math-Ro-Mancer. I've done 2 pages now but I'm going to do another page too, thats just pencilled so should finish it tomorrow.

So Very Tired

I am so tired. We are having to move offices at work so have been moving crates and boxes round for days and days and I had to work Saturday morning too, boo hoo (got double time for it though). I have started a new 2 page story 'Math-Ro-Mancer' which I think will be quite good. I'll stick some sketches and bits from it up here next week when i wake up...

First 2 Books from Secret Acres

Here are the first two books from Secret Acres, they look great! I highly recommend them. Go have a look at -
secret acres

Bottomless Belly Button by Dash Shaw

Wow, this is a massive thick book, you could kill a man with it. It is very decompressed story telling though so doesn't take that long to read. I really enjoyed it, the character design is awesome, I especially liked all the freckly people, you don't see that very often. Its basically the story of a family reunion of all an old couple's children on hearing the news that the old parents are going to divorce after forty years of marriage. All the children (all grown up now) react in very different ways. The older son trys to work out the mystery of why they are getting divorced, while the other children don't seem so bothered as to why. It's a really good read so I highly recommend it, same as most everyone else has. Just cos everyone recommends something doesn't mean its not great, sometimes it is...