Holy COW! One Hundred Thousand?!?

Rich Chocolately Goodness

I’ve been VERY bad about blogging the last week or so.  It’s entirely because I’ve been VERY busy, drawing some covers, writing some scripts and working on some interior pages…the last two weeks, everything I owe publishers is late, and I’m working 15 hour days, which means, dear, dear readers I’ve had to slack off on this VERY fun, but VERY unpaid blog.  Don’t worry, that will all settle out in a few days, with luck.

But in the meantime, I’m beyond thrilled to announce that it seems the blog is working.  I started sporadically blogging after the start in Septeber, and with more regularity and intention in January, and started the Saturday Webcomic in March, and you guys seem to have shown up to read ’em.  Two days ago I discovered that this blog passed the one hundred thousand mark in readers, and that tickles the hell out of me.

Now, obviously, I’m aware it’s not 100,000 individual readers, I know the difference between a visit and a unique visitor.  Our UNIQUE numbers are down in the twenty thousand range, which means folks are coming back after they’ve been here once or twice.

So thanks for showing up.  Sorry it’s been a little sparse the last few days.  I’ll be back to regular blogging by the start of next week, and on Saturday, you ALWAYS  get the webcomic, even if I have to stay awake for 48 hours in a row.

And since I’m here, and since I’m the only one who has a copy of this cover with THIS logo, I’m showing off one of the many projects that are taking me away from this blog.

Hands up if you know who Johnny Canuck is...

It’s been announced on Moonstone Books at this point, but not around here, so I gets to announce.  The ALL-NEW Johnny Canuck comic book is coming out this November.   Moonstone is reviving the CANADIAN super-heroes from the Golden Age, and I’m writing and editing the project and another fellow Canadian (DAVID J. CUTLER) is drawing it.   David is a graduate of some of the comic book courses I teach, and WOW, are you going to be impressed with his work when you see it this fall!  He’s going to be BIG!  Big, I tell you!  (I’d like to pretend I taught him everything he knows, but he was already disturbingly skilled when I met him…)

For those who don’t live in Canada and aren’t in the know, we had our own comic industry in the forties, during the war paper shortages, featuring such characters as Johnny Canuck, Nelvana, Freelance and others.  The art and writing in the “Canadian Whites” (so named because there was no interior colours, just black and white) was fairly spectacular, and the characters created are uniformly entertaining, and as a proud Canadian, I’m delighted to be involved in bringing ’em back to a modern audience.

Moonstone’s Joe Gentile has been very supportive of the project, but was concerned that American audiences will have never heard of Johnny Canuck and his pals, and asked me to change the logo and name of the series to work for a buyer who never heard of the Canadian Whites.  I utterly see his point, but this patriotic Canadian is so in love with the Johnny Canuck character that I can’t help but show off THIS version of the cover (painted by the amazing Jason Edmiston) with the original logo.

I’ll show off the new logo and title tomorrow, along with a REALLY fun story of the gig I got last week that may well be the happiest job offer I have ever received….(how’s THAT for a teaser?!?)

Again, thanks for showing up and making the hit counter rock 100,000 hits in the last few months.  It’s very gratifying to know you like me as LEAST as much as Sally Field.  (Wow, is that a dated reference!)

Ty the Guy

UPDATE: in the Comments, Scott Dutton has been kind enough to direct us to his site where he’s giving some Canadian Whites away for FREE! FREE I tell you!