Greetings from the Hallieverse ♥

                November 17, 2021

            Greetings from the Hallieverse ♥

From the archives: my ode to IKEA monkey, drawn in 2012. Always feels appropriate to revisit this for the holidays. 
Salutations, dear friends. 
I miss talking to you. So I’m just going to write this as if it hasn’t been months since I’ve sent a newsletter. As if writing newsletters is a thing I do, at all! Here goes. 

I’M IN LOVE! I’M IN LOVE AND I DON’T CARE WHO KNOWS IT!

Years ago, when I started Pen Parade, I was deeply in love with this pen. I always dreamed we'd grow old together, write graphic novels, travel... Then, tragically, it was discontinued by its manufacturer. I was heartbroken. I managed to find a similar pen, then THAT pen was discontinued! I thought I'd never fall in love again.

Then, this past summer, Kuretake ZIG (pictured above) came into my life, and my grieving, callused heart is healing with each drawing we make together. It comes in FINE and MEDIUM versions, and I adore both. You can push harder for a thick, decisive line, or lightly dance across the page for a wild, delicate one. It’s responsive. It’s reliable. It’s WATERPROOF. I love it so much, and I want everyone to buy it so it’ll never be discontinued and my heart will never be broken again!!! 
TIS THE SEASON TO BUY ART FROM HALLIE

Art that's good enough to steal is good enough to buy! 
I’m having my BIGGEST EVER sale in my shop. It runs through Sunday, November 21st. A bunch of art prints, including the one above, are marked way down, and you’ll get an additional 25% off everything with code HALLIEDAYS. 10% of proceeds from this sale will be donated to the Malaria Consortium. 

PLUS: Now through November 30th, take 30% off my latest book, Directions, with code CYBER2021. 

“HOW AM I?”
How dare you ask me this perplexing, unanswerable question?! But, okay, if I had to answer, I’d say: I’m feeling better than I was. I got breakthrough covid in July and it turned my life upside down for a long time. The most surprising impact it had was that it stopped me from making art for a few months. I simply had no energy to devote to anything but barely getting by. 

Now my fatigue has finally lifted, and I’m starting to make art again. I made my first comic in months recently. Drawing it filled me with a pure joy I hadn’t felt in so long. That joyful feeling of, oh yeah, this is who I am! This is why I’m alive! Art is how I communicate not just with the world, but with myself. So when I’m not making art, I sortof don’t know who I am or why I’m here. So... It feels good to be back. Also, fuck covid. Please get vaccinated.

♥

That’s all for now. I think this newsletter will always contain some art supply recommendations, a bit of news, and of course some art. Just so you know what to expect. 

Love,

HB 

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