Soaring Penguin Press

This November, we'll be publishing The Best of Meanwhile..., a collection of your favourite stories from the first 12 issues/volumes of Meanwhile... To make certain they're _your_ favourites, we invite everyone to vote for your favourite stories: s.surveyplanet.com/7rt71pe9

Master comic creation from start to finish! Take Andy Schmidt’s Editing & Project Management Course and learn how to build a successful comic book. Register today: bit.ly/4d39SS8 #ComicCreation #ProjectManagement #ComicsExperience

@comicartistchat I have a friend who is Ksing a comic. It's made its goal but every dollar helps: Passing in the Night: A Queer Romance Fantasy Graphic Novel, via @Kickstarter kickstarter.com/projects/shrim…

Time to share your awesome #comics and #webcomics! If you're crowdfunding a comic, share it with us! We want to support you. Got a favorite comic creator? Give them a shout-out! Please retweet to help spread the word!

Comic writing is problem-solving. Greg Pak shows you how he actually does it, 475+ scripts later. bit.ly/42kjea6

How do you break into comics as a writer? I get this question more than any other. I wrote a post a couple of months ago on how to pitch, and a lot of people then "pitched" me and asked me for advice. We publish a small boutique line, and we have broken a LOT of artists, but very few writers. The ones we have were primarily through the Talent Hunt. It is incredibly hard to even break even on publishing a new writer. Why is this? Think about your own reading habits. You need a reason to try a new book... and most of our reading dollars are already spoken for in advance. Lots of great books get published all the time that people don't read. Publishers want to work with writers who do good, timely work that we can make a little bit of money on. This is hard for established writers and creative teams, and new books come and go all the time. So how do you break in? Forgive me for repeating some of my prior post, but the two main ways (in my opinion) are: 1) Self-publish at a loss until you build a small audience that a publisher can then scale up. You can do this by publishing online for free via social media, LINE WEBTOON, or whatever... or by attending conventions/events and hand-selling or giving it away directly to readers. Some very successful creators, like Brian Pulido at Coffin Comics, built this model from zero to huge, ongoing, thriving businesses. Meaning, for some, you don't need publishers at all; you become the publisher. When you have an audience, publishers will come to you. As I mentioned in that last post, we pay attention to crowdfunding. If you run a successful Kickstarter for even a modest amount, it shows your commitment, professionalism, and your built-in audience. 2) Find an established writer to co-write with you and build awareness that way. This "mentoring" works, but is harder and harder to find. I have mentored a few writers over my career and would love to do more in the future, but at the moment, I don't have the time, sadly (so that's not an invitation). There are countless examples of how this has worked. You see a new book by established writer X and co-writer Y. Since you trust X, as a reader, you're more likely to give this book a chance. Eventually, Y starts writing their own books without X. And there are probably other methods, newer ones that I'm not even aware of, but these are the two I've seen work for decades. Please share your thoughts and ideas if you have them. I enjoy the discourse. I also don't assume I'm correct; these are merely my own experiential observations from my thirty-three (and counting!) year career.

The BBC just released a new adaptation of Lord of the Flies, the classic novel by William Golding. It's beautifully made, but it's still telling the wrong story. A few years ago, I went looking for the *real* Lord of the Flies. I wanted to know: has it ever actually happened? Have kids ever been shipwrecked on a deserted island? It took me a year of research, but I found it. In 1965, six boys from a boarding school in Tonga stole a boat, got caught in a storm, and drifted for eight days without food or water. They washed up on 'Ata, a remote, uninhabited island in the Pacific. They stayed there for 15 months, and what happened on that island was the exact opposite of William Golding's novel. These boys set up a small commune. They built a food garden, stored rainwater in hollowed-out tree trunks, created a gym with improvised weights, and built a badminton court. One of them, Stephen (who would later become an engineer) managed to start a fire using two sticks. They kept it burning the entire time. Of course they fought too. But then they argued, they had a rule: go to opposite ends of the island, cool down, then come back and apologize. As one of them told me: ‘That's how we stayed friends.’ Back home, everyone assumed that the boys – Luke, Stephen, Sione, David, Kolo and Mano — were dead. When they were finally discovered by an Australian captain named Peter Warner, he radioed their names to Tonga. After twenty minutes, a tearful response came back: ‘You found them! These boys have been given up for dead. Funerals have been held. If it's them, this is a miracle!’ Peter commissioned a new ship, hired all six boys as his crew, and named the boat the Ata, after the island where he found them. They remained friends for the rest of their lives – Peter and Mano even became soulmates. I tracked them down, and it became one of the central chapters of my book Humankind. Here's what struck me most: William Golding (the author of Lord of the Flies) was a troubled man, an alcoholic who once said ‘I have always understood the Nazis, because I am of that sort by nature.’ I think he was projecting his own darkness onto children. And we turned it into a lesson about human nature that we teach to millions of kids around the world. I think the real lesson is the opposite. When real children found themselves alone on a real island, they didn't descend into savagery. They cooperated, they took care of each other, they survived. I'm not saying that the Tongan castaways were representative of all kids everywhere. But I am saying that every kid who has to read or watch the fictional Lord of the Flies also deserves to know what actually happened when it played out in real life. Stories are never just stories. We become the stories that we tell ourselves.

Our official poster, courtesy of @bethanypardoeart. Isn't it gorgeous! New West Comic Fest 13 September from 11am to 5pm Sapperton Community Hall 318 Keary St, New Westminster, BC V3L 3L2 Admission: $5 – children under 13 get in free! newwestcomicfest.ca

Save the date! New West Comic Fest Autumn 2025 Over 70 creators, traders and publishers in one jam-packed day. New West Comic Fest 13 September from 11am to 5pm Sapperton Community Hall 318 Keary St, New Westminster, BC V3L 3L2 Admission: $5 – children under 13 get in free!

Who will you meet at New West Comic Fest? Matthew J. R. Nielsen (also known as @NuclearJackal ) is a comic artist currently working on ‘The Big Soup: Growing up Autistic’, an autobiography. He has illustrated Monstercat’s ‘8 Year Anniversary’ comic,

Save the date! New West Comic Fest Autumn 2025 Over 70 creators, traders and publishers in one jam-packed day. New West Comic Fest 13 September from 11am to 5pm Sapperton Community Hall 318 Keary St, New Westminster, BC V3L 3L2 Admission: $5 – children under 13 get in free!

Our official poster, courtesy of @bethanypardoeart. Isn't it gorgeous! New West Comic Fest 13 September from 11am to 5pm Sapperton Community Hall 318 Keary St, New Westminster, BC V3L 3L2 Admission: $5 – children under 13 get in free! newwestcomicfest.ca

Save the date! New West Comic Fest Autumn 2025 Over 70 creators, traders and publishers in one jam-packed day. New West Comic Fest 13 September from 11am to 5pm Sapperton Community Hall 318 Keary St, New Westminster, BC V3L 3L2 Admission: $5 – children under 13 get in free!

Who will you meet at New West Comic Fest? Rico Mortis of Rico's Wreck Room: "Tired of constantly looking at screens??? Video games turning your brain to mush??? Consider tabletop gaming! I sell a large assortment of board games and card games"

I'm now accepting applications for New West Comic Fest Autumn 2025. newwestcomicfest.ca

Tired of the same old superhero stories? Discover the boldest indie comics, zines, and graphic novels—all under one roof. New West Comic Fest! 13 September 2025 from 11am to 5pm Sapperton Community Hall 318 Keary St, New Westminster, BC V3L 3L2 newwestcomicfest.ca @mt_rs3

Who will you meet at New West Comic Fest? Konn Lavery is a Vancouver author whose dark fantasy and horror novels have been recognized by Edmonton’s top five bestseller charts and by Readers’ Favourite, and The Wishing Shelf Awards. newwestcomicfest.ca

Our official poster, courtesy of @bethanypardoeart. Isn't it gorgeous! New West Comic Fest 13 September from 11am to 5pm Sapperton Community Hall 318 Keary St, New Westminster, BC V3L 3L2 Admission: $5 – children under 13 get in free! newwestcomicfest.ca

Save the date! New West Comic Fest Autumn 2025 Over 70 creators, traders and publishers in one jam-packed day. New West Comic Fest 13 September from 11am to 5pm Sapperton Community Hall 318 Keary St, New Westminster, BC V3L 3L2 Admission: $5 – children under 13 get in free!

@punkcase I placed an order two months ago. No sign of it. I've tried emailing but I'm asked for an order number in a format that doesn't match what was provided by your service. How convenient for you: you get to keep my money and deny an order was ever placed.

This is the last day to put in your application for the inaugural Rain City Comic Con. Seventy-four tables at the Roundhouse for a brilliant day of independent comic creators. If you want to be part of it, head to raincitycomiccon.com and apply.

If you're not sure if you want to be part of Rain City Comic Con, we've posted our Statement of Purpose on the website. Have a read, then decide if you want to apply. Applications close 31 March 2024 raincitycomiccon.com