rockpants finds from the chicago comicon, part III

tucked away in the tiniest back corner of artists' alley - i'll be honest, we found it on our way to smoke behind the convention center - was a lady named Carla Speed McNeil. She's WICKED prolific; she had at least eight graphic novels on the table for sale. LONG graphic novels. All self-published, too. I couldn't afford to pick up more than one, so I picked this one:



It's essentially the story of a little girl and her quest for a book that was read to her when she was very young. The guy who "read" it to her made up most of it as he went along, leading her to believe that it was magic, like 1000 books in one. And leaving her pretty frustrated whenever anyone else tries to read it to her:



Talisman's beautiful. All of Ms. McNeil's work is filled with gorgeous linework, obsessive hatching and texturing, beautifully evocative expressions and poses. I could probably draw this well if I went to about a million more figure drawing sessions.



Near as I can tell, McNeil's created her own elaborate universe. The books border on science fiction and fantasy, in the sense that everything takes place in an alternate existence, people can jack into movies and television for enhanced experiences, there are clans and tribes and creatures and things. I'll be honest, I don't like sci fi/fantasty stuff that much, and what saves McNeil's work is that the stories aren't really ABOUT the different/future/robot/magic world. They're about very relatable HUMAN stories, and they just happen to be SET in the different/future/robot/magic world. I probably wouldn't have picked up Talisman if it were told with overt references to the alternate universe McNeil's created. Instead, it's about a love affair with a book, a topic pretty familiar to my own heart.

Looking at how much work McNeil's produced, I feel pretty bad that I hadn't heard of her before. If you've seen the Carla Speed McNeil and the Finder before, you're better informed than I am. If not, you should definitely check out this rare and exceedingly productive talent.

oops.

we've been having some glitchiness with our store site. Some of the orders have been going through cubecart, but not paypal. If this applies to you, OMG i'm sorry.

I've run some updates, and the glitch should be fixed now. If you wanted to cancel the order, you don't have to do anything, and your paypal account shouldn't have been charged. But if you stil want the book and don't mind going through the trouble of placing the order again, we'll totally send an extra present with your order as our way of saying sorry.

Thanks!!

you don't gotta be nekkid no more

Coz I finally got around to putting the tee shirts up in the store!!



Hide your shame with Jason's provocative Sucker Punch tee or charm that cute indie chick with the first official Shortpants Press shirt! Both shirts will escort you to levels of unrivaled awesomeness, the likes of which you have never seen. Or maybe they're just normal tee shirts. Either way, you don't gotta be nekkid no more.

rockpants finds from the chicago comicon, part II

Awesome find number two: Josh Johnson. He has his own letterpress, and I was magnetically drawn to his artwork.



He does these awesome haunting little letterpress prints, most of which are of a creepy family called the Spindletons. I bought (well, traded books with him for) three of them. Also, I want a letterpress now.




He also does some really gorgeous watercolors, collages, and he handmakes books with the letterpress prints, books based on the Spindleton family and their misadventures. they're really lovely.



Once again, I can't really tell you where to buy his work, other than contacting him online, or tracking him down at SPX. But Josh's stuff is really breathtaking, if you can find it, it's intimate and chilling and magnetic. Letterpresses can be as cheap as $300 on ebay. Maybe I should stick one in my Amazon wishlist...


ps: it occurs to me that I never did this for APE. We found a LOT of great stuff at APE. Maybe I'll post them up here too.

rockpants finds from the chicago comicon, part I

For the short amount of time at the Chicago con that I WASN'T sitting at the booth shilling books (or chatting with the nice guy from Spring Hollow and buying first edition Walt Kellys), I was trolling the rest of artists' alley, looking for awesome new artists, ones who aren't drawing trite superheroes and elfquest ripoffs. This year we only found a few, but they're pretty amazing.

The first one I'll write about is Cathy Hannah. She won the Xeric grant last year for this book:



Cathy doesn't have a website yet, and so far I think the book's only for sale at Quimby's, but it's a great book, if you can get it. Charming, minimalist but confident lines, sweet characters and some really clever use of white out. It's got a little of a Dylan Horrocks feel to it.



It's a true story: Cathy's falling for Mike, her best friend, and doesn't know how to tell him. So she writes a comic book. THIS comic book. There's even an epilogue at the end where she presents him with the book and you find out how he responds. I won't spoil that for you.



I will say that this book is darling, it's compelling, and I couldn't put it down. Not only that, it's only SIX MEASLEY BUCKS. That's amazingly cheap for the amount of awesome that you get.

(I'll post another find tomorrow!)

PS: SHIRTS WILL BE AVAILABLE IN THE SHOP SOON. I have to inventory them and see what sizes we have left now that the show is over.

you geekin' out? or nerdin' it up?

are you ready for chicago's wizard world? yeah, me either. but if you're brave enough to battle the crowd and the cosplayers to come visit our booth this year, you'll be treated to A BRAND NEW GRANT REYNOLDS BOOK:



it'll be up in the shortpants store after the convention is over. for a few days at least, the only place you can get it is the shortpants booth in artists' alley!

here is a map of where we will be:


and here is a map of the only things that i ever end up paying attention to: