Paint First, Ask Questions Later

A little experiment to loosen up. I plopped down a few splashes of paint without thinking about it and then later went back with a brush pen and quickly doodled the first thing that came to mind.

Ruff

Japanese brush pen and watercolor sketch.

The Gunsel

The Coming Storm

Only three long months until my graphic novel The Storm in the Barn is released! About this time last year, I was finishing up the pencilled pages. They still needed inking and painting, but it seemed momentous enough to take a snapshot of the stack.

Some early reviews have started popping up on the web such as here and here. Previews magazine has just named it one of their June Staff Picks and Graphic Novel Reporter has called Storm in the Barn one of the Hottest Graphic Novels of the Summer. And last but certainly not least, Storm made a list of recommended new graphic novels at BEA last week.

A book trailer will be debuting sometime next month and I'll also be revamping my website, so keep checking back.

Winter Sketch

Back to the Drawing Board

Stitches

Just one more quick word about David Small. I just finished reading an advance copy of his new graphic memoir, Stitches. It is as good as graphic storytelling gets, told with breathtaking precision and, of course, masterful drawing. It comes out in September.

I Came, I Saw, I Bid Successfully...

...woohoo!!!!

Thanks to all the wonderful booksellers that I met at last night's ABC silent auction. You folks know how to throw a fine shindig.

ABC Auction!

I've donated this bookish little fella for the Association of Booksellers for Children's annual auction shindig. This year they've put all of the auction items online for your viewing pleasure. I'll be at the auction, so if you see me, be sure to say howdy.

Will Draw For...

I'll apologize once more for my lack of recent posts. I had two book deadlines one after another and I'm just now coming up for air. Unfortunately for the blog, that means that I did very little drawing over the last 2 months that was not for a book (can't show you that stuff quite yet).

I did however take a smidgen of time to draw this ukulele lady for a uke festival poster competition. The prize was a shiny new Ohana ukulele. Alas, I didn't win but here's my entry. I made the drawing with a port inktense pencil (seemed appropriate).


And then I gussied it up in Photoshop. She's supposed to be sitting on grapes since we're talking wine country here.

There are no sour grapes on the Planet Ham, so if you are in that neck of the Northern CA woods, check out the fest. I'm sure it'll be fun. And if you'd like to commission me in exchange for a nice ukulele, apparently I will consider it.

Spells!

I'm very excited to be involved with the Spells Writing Center in Philadelphia. It's based on (but not officially affiliated with) the 826 Valencia centers. I'll be posting more and more about this venture in the future. In the meantime, zip over to their site and check out the upcoming events (including the Zombie Fundraiser, of course).

p.s. The Indefatigable Brian Biggs did the lettering for the above postcard image. The Incombustible Adam Rex is also rumored to be lurking about Spells Headquarters.

Madame Collara

Apology/PSA

This baby eagle is here to tell you that despite appearances, I have not abandoned my blog. April was a deadline month, and I was feverishly at work finishing a new picture book (more on that later). But I promise to start posting regularly again ... with some big stuff coming up.

Until then, if you are anywhere within a reasonable distance of Philadelphia, you should get down to the Rosenbach Museum to catch the extraordinary Sendak exhibit that closes on Sunday! Go, go! It's rainy today so there really is no better time to go to a museum, right? Right-ho.

Top 100... I mean, Top 3 Picture Books

Fuse #8 has posted the first ten books in her list of the Top 100 Picture Books as voted on by readers. Although I didn't get around to submitting my picks, today's 10 inspired me to chime in because book #94 on the list, The Gardener by Sarah Stewart and David Small, would certainly be in my Top 3 books. It's perfect.

The other 2 would be The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats and Harvey Slumfenburger's Christmas Present by John Burningham which are also, in my opinion, perfect picture books.

Can't wait to see the rest of the list.

Luck O' the Pigeons

Korean Bear!

The other day I received a copy of the new Korean edition of Very Hairy Bear! Yay!

Beastie of the Month

Humpty was pushed.

Shifty Peacocks

These peacocks would like to remind you that I'll be signing Big George and other books tomorrow (aka Saturday) at 2pm at the lovely Head House Books. Hope to see you there. However, if you're closer to Old Greenwich, CT, stop by Just Books on Saturday morn to meet Big George author, Anne Rockwell.

Niles and Pete

Another Ape

This time with a hard charcoal pencil on Arches cover stock.