Free Comic Book Day!

This Saturday (May 1st) is the ninth annual Free Comic Book Day across North America, a day when participating comics shops give away select comic books for FREE in an effort to grow appreciation (and the audience) for this great art form. Though events vary widely from location to location, it's always a family-friendly affair, with many comics publishers putting forward their best all-ages material in the free titles. Many stores invite creators to come and do signings, creating a sort of mini-convention atmosphere for the day.

All of which is to preface the announcement that I'll be at The Dragon in Guelph, Ontario on Saturday, along with the my old pal (and former collaborator) J. Torres. I'll be signing books and doing free sketches for kids from 10am-2pm, and will also have plenty of original art for display (and for sale). I'll also have a limited number of advance copies of the free 9-page "Two Generals" preview that's been prepared for TCAF...so if you want one, get there early!

I believe it's The Dragon's first Free Comic Book Day event, so come out and say hello and let's make it a special one. I've been informed there may be cupcakes!

"Tower of Treasure" is a Junior Library Guild Selection

A nice bit of early buzz for the first Three Thieves book: Tower of Treasure has been named an official selection of the Junior Library Guild. This means that the book gets a spotlight (and a short interview with yours truly) in their Spring 2010 newsletter, which goes out to libraries all over North America. 

In addition,the Guild buys a large number of copies to send out to its subscribers. So even though the book's not out until August, I can already report that it's doing well! I'll be adding Amazon links for it to this blog's sidebar, so pre-order your copy today!

"Two Generals" at TCAF

It's official. The fine folks at McClelland & Stewart are going to be giving away a free 9-page sampler of Two Generals next month at The Toronto Comic Arts Festival, which runs May 8th and 9th at the Toronto Reference Library. I've written at length on this blog about how much I love TCAF, and I couldn't be happier that pages from the book are going to be seen there in print for the first time.

Here's a sneak peak at a page from the preview. Consider it a sample of the sampler:

See you at the show!