Summer Bottleship

Greetings, friends!

I am writing to you from the aft cabin on the Oliver Hazard Perry, a stunning Class A [Read: VERY BIG] sail training vessel currently teaching kids about life at sea off the coast of New Hampshire. I’m here for a week working with the crew and researching a new comic. It's a pretty exciting time.



These last few months have been BONKERS, to say the least, so think on this as a cumulative Summertime Bottleship to make up for the lack of more regular updates while I’ve been on the road. I’ll try to hit the highlights from everything that's been afoot:

• Kickstarter backers have been getting their copies of Baggywrinkles this week, which means it's time to celebrate! Join me in just a few short weeks at Floating World Comics in Portland, Oregon for the official book release party. We'll be having an art show/signing/general festive time on Thursday, September 1st from 6pm-10pm. RSVP and invite your friends right here.
• While it focuses on terrestrial winds rather than oceanic ones, I’m still entranced by this art project from Fernanda Viégas and Martin Wattenberg.

• I finished my longest consecutive drawing project to date! A Life in Objects collects all my illustrations for The 100 Day Project, a challenge where I illustrated and wrote about a different meaningful item in my life for 100 days straight. Preorders for the print collection are now live if you'd like one (they're going to be really cool).

• On a related note, I enjoyed Austin Kleon’s notions about doing Something Small Every Day.
• I've been working on this comic about the resurgence of sail-powered cargo vessels for the last couple months. Excited to finally share it on The Nib!

• In book-reading news: my mother gifted me with a copy of 84, Charing Cross Road for my birthday last month, and it’s one of the most delightful books I’ve read in a long, long while. The correspondence within contains such a concentration of sheer delight in books and the kindness they can provoke that it moved me to tears. Treat yourself to a copy at once.
• My pal Kate Milford has a new novel coming out on August 23rd called The Left-Handed Fate and it is an utter delight. I had the pleasure of reading an advance draft for nautical inconsistencies (there were very few) because it is a book about a tall ship-sailing girl named Lucy having magical nautical adventures and if that isn't the most tailor-made-for-Bellwoods book on Earth I don't know what is. She's also giving away gifts to people who preorder it through indie booksellers. <3
• If you're a cartoonist looking to fund your work through grants or fellowships, check out this very helpful list from Melanie Gillman about comics-friendly funding avenues.
• And, possibly most importantly, here are some truly majestic portraits of sheep and goats.