I seem to be drawing different iterations of this scene in Marry Me a Little over and over again.
Happy to report I completed 5 more pages of Marry Me a Little this month. I’m trying to make up for lost time! I know I’ve made a lot of unrealistic projections before (I mean, I started work on this project 2 whole years ago), but something has turned in me. I think attending Queers & Comics in May definitely did the trick! Now I’m thinking I can get this done sometime next year - albeit likely in the second half. No, this time I’m for real! I’m not sure how long it’s ultimately going to be but I’m guessing it’ll be novella-sized - somewhere between 50 and 70 pages. We shall see. I’ll try to post some new pages on the Marry Me page of this site soon.
Hi, I have a three-page comic called “My Queer Body (Issues)” in this cool new all-color comics anthology edited by three academics from Dalhousie University in Halifax and published by Ad Astra Comix. It’s a really important topic and I’m proud to be a part of it. By the way, it features contributions from non-cis queer men as well (as it should)! You can pre-order it here and now, so do it!
Cover art by James Neish.
Finally produced some more pages on Marry Me this past weekend. The narrative wants a little historical context and who am I to refuse it?
Hi there, just a heads-up that I will be at the 3rd iteration of the mighty Q&C conference, the brainchild of the mighty Jen Camper. It’ll be at the School of Visual Arts in NYC this time around. I’ll be appearing on two panels on Friday: first as a panelist on Any Resemblance is Necessary: The Whys of Queer First Person Autobiographical Comics, moderated by the excellent AK Summers, and next to other autobio creators KC Councilor, Jan Descartes, Breena Nunez, & Whitney Romberg. That’s at the very beginning of the day (9:30-10:45am)! Then at a later session from 4:15-5:30pm, I’ll be the moderator of the Long-Form Comics panel with Nicole Georges, Steve MacIsaac, Lee Marrs, Hazel Newlevant, and Eric Orner. I’m excited about both panels, as they are about subjects very near and dear to my heart!
I am also curating the digital Q&C art show for the second time. It’s lookin’ pretty sweet thus far.
I hope to see all y’all in NYC next month!
Oh hey again, have managed to Not Update for a while because Life (so much Life) - you know? But here’s a quick check-in. After a productive summer, I’ve ONCE AGAIN had to halt with Marry Me a Little, but this time it’s to draw other comics that I really wanted to do. Last time I talked about doing a story for the next “Power of Music” issue of Delaine Derry Green’s classic anthology Not My Small Diary (which I finished in September); now I’m rendering a 3-page piece that has been accepted for an important upcoming anthology by and for gay men called Queer Bodies in Confidence. I just couldn’t pass this one up as the subject matter is right inside my wheelhouse - and it’s edited by comics-loving academics, which to me is always a good thing.
The bottom line: Marry Me a Little isn’t going to be completed any time soon. But that’s ok in a way, because it has led me to start off-boarding from a lot of other activities that aren’t super-relevant to me right now. I’m basically semi-retired from tabling at comic cons (I won’t be tabling again until I have Marry Me to hawk), and cutting my book reviewing sub-career in half. I’m also stepping down from my position as Guest Editor at Illustrated PEN - my final selection is by November Garcia and you can read it here. It feels good to start streamlining and focusing on what to me is my most important job, above all else: being a cartoonist. I’m hoping to get back to Marry Me in February or so and then finish up in early-to-mid 2020…I should shut up though, because I don’t want to jinx it!
In the meantime, hope you all are having a good pre-holiday season. The blue wave in the elections earlier this month was a gift, I need to receive nothing more until January when the Dems officially take control of the House and start investigating and legislating on behalf of The People (let’s hear it!).
Until next time, take care folks!
Astute fans may recognize this revamped drawing from my in-progress story from a panel in 2014’s “Music for No Boyfriends” (from my anthology QU33R). If you didn’t recognize that fact, I just gave it away, you’re welcome.
Had to take this month off from Marry Me to work on a couple of things for other folks. First of all there’s a new queer-oriented website debuting next month and I was commissioned to do a single panel comic for it. The idea is that it will be a continuing series, which is exciting to me. I’ll keep you posted and will certainly trumpet the news when the site makes its big debut!
Currently, I’m wrapping up a 2-pager for the next edition of Delaine Derry Green’s classic zine series Not My Small Diary - this will be the Power of Music issue, so you won’t want to miss that one. My biggest quandary with this theme was picking the one thing to do a story about - I’ve got a million of ‘em, folks! But I finally figured it all out and got to work. It’s been fun but a challenge. Naturally Morrissey shows up in my story - what can I say, he was a big part of my twenties. Be back next month with more news. In the meantime, you can still follow me on Twitter and/or Instagram, ok? Unlike FB, I’m sticking with them. Bye!
I've drawn 6 more pages since July, so feeling pretty good. Seriously, for me 3 pages a month is a pretty good pace - I'm a workin boy (40 hrs a week, ugh), don't forget. I'm trying to produce a page every other week, which is how I did my "Curbside" strip (a bi-weekly feature, natch) for 17 years. One thing that has always been true for me is that with longer pieces I cannot work with a set, fully-fleshed out script. I have a roadmap pointed towards a destination, with many details on the itinerary, but I have no idea of how I'll ultimately get there. The last 3 pages came out very very differently than how I had originally envisioned them. This is part of the fun, but also the struggle. I'm pretty much done with chapter one now, and I already have a couple of short comics that will work as interstitials for the book, so now I will begin to work on the more straightforward autobio chapter about the wedding itself. At least I think it'll be straightforward. We shall see...
Panel from Chapter One, page 18
A year measured not in daylights, sunsets, or cups of coffee but in dog walks (& the various thoughts thought on those dog walks).
A pre-text drawing
Got some more panels done on Marry Me a Little yesterday (am getting near the end of part one). I'm finding I'm really wanting to pare down the visuals in key sequences, such as this one. Overall, this piece wants to be more minimal, and I'm going with it. As ever, stay tuned for more in the coming weeks!
Taking a brief break from Marry Me a Little (just finished another page on Thursday), so here's a sequel to 2013's "Movie Quote Day." How many of these films can you name?
Hey there, happy End-of-June (Pride month)! I've been quiet of late, which is mostly due to working harder as a cartoonist. As I focus more intently on my comics I tend to withdraw from the social scene (more than usual!). Drawing comics generally gets even more challenging in many ways as the years go by and I'm trying to keep distractions at a minimum. I need to concentrate!
If you've been wanting to read more of Marry Me a Little than what is currently up on this site, Illustrated PEN has just published the first nine pages of chapter one, so go take a look. Many thanks to my PEN co-editor, Meg Lemke, for choosing to feature Marry Me. Otherwise, that's about all from me. For now. I told you I'm withdrawing!
But it's all okay. Until next time, here's a random panel from page 13:
Hi all. Well, I haven’t blogged since November, and it’s not because I haven’t wanted to. My old site was completely outdated–so outdated that I actually couldn’t create any new content at all. But now that has changed. So um…..Behold! Here’s my new site! Ain’t it purty? (I think so.) Sorry it took so long: between several trips and work and drawing and writing and general life stuff, it took forever for this to happen. Many many many thanks to John Capecci for all of his help in getting things up again.
FYI, please know that the site isn’t done yet: there’s still all kinds of links to add in, kinks to work out, more comics to add and fix (for one thing, the rez on the pages from "THEM" aren't of very good quality), and I have to get my store back up and running. It’s all going to happen in due time, bit by bit. In the meantime, please note on the About page I’ve added a few links to recent podcasts I’ve done, and on the Writing page I’ll have some new updates up shortly. And the Marry Me a Little page will get (fairly) regular updates as well as I slooowly make progress on it - I have more done than what's up now but thought I would tease it out a little, maybe add a new page per month or something.
In short: I hope you please bear with me and stick around. Happy Spring!
Rob K