Dear Supporter,

Good news.

The Comic Torah is at the printer!

In fact, the printer has printed out a set of proofs which are simply delicious.

You can watch artist Sharon Rosenzweig ooh and ah over them in this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch...

We’re going to take a couple of days to review the proofs for possible mistakes. If all looks well with these proofs, and if the printing goes according to schedule -- one month for printing, one month for shipping -- you should have have the books in hand by mid September.

Come Simchat Torah, you'll be dancing with the Comic Torah. We hope.

We never thought it would take this long, either!

We really appreciate your patience.

But we’re confident that we’ll be delivering you book that are worth the wait.

I’m excited to share with you the title pages of the book, depicting Sharon and Aaron diving into the Torah.

Again, thank you for your support and for your patience.

Larry Yudelson
Ben Yehuda Press

"Where's the copy of The Comic Torah I paid for? It's been six weeks
since you got your funding. What's up? When will my book arrive
arrive?

Don't make me come down there." - YHWH

Here's the skinny:

Sharon and Aaron have been hard at work PERFECTING the book for publication, fixing small details, polishing jokes, adding headlines, and, most fun of all, preparing the pages that acknowledge you, our supporter, for your amazing work!
You can find the draft thank you pages below. And if we got your name wrong.... please, let us know!
We've also been looking at samples from printers. We're on the verge of making our choice. We hope to get our files to our chosen printer by the end of January.
After that, we'll be waiting with baited breath for our books to arrive.... which will take up to three months.
Sigh.
Such are the time frames of publishing. And as our supporter, you're a partner -- which makes you part of the publishing business as well.

With flaming mountains of grattude we wish you a wonderful 2010.

Did we mention, TODAH RABAH!!

We need your blurbs! Send your Comic Torah description or endorsement, with your photo, and to sbrzweig@gmail.com. You can be like these folks!

We've had a great response lately, with a bunch of new backers and we want to thank all of you for your amazing support.

The blogosphere has taken notice. We had a wonderful review in the Jewish Daily Forward (it's not in Yiddish anymore!): http://blogs.forward.com/the-sisterhood/113192/

Also, the Velveteen Rabbi: http://velveteenrabbi.blogs.com/blog/2009/09/coming-soon-to-a-bookstore-near-you.html

AND, Ageless North Shore: http://ageless-northshore.com/comic-torah-project/

You may find yourselves fraternizing with more folks than usual over the next 10 days, and we'd really appreciate it if you could tell your Torah-loving friends about our project. If we each get one pal to pledge, we'll be rocking and rolling.

Best wishes for a sweet and joyous new year!

Sharon, Aaron and the Yudelsons

By now, you've probably heard garbled rumors about the secret origin of The Comic Torah. Was it true that Aaron had been bitten by a radioactive rabbi, or that Sharon had been granted magical artistic powers by an aged wizard in an abandoned subway station? Seeking to set the record straight, I asked them how The Comic Torah came about.

This is what they had to say, writing jointly in the third person:

The Comic Torah began as a weekly comic called 52 Parshas. It was created by Aaron using a program called Comic Life which allowed him to combine speech balloons, text panels, his own photos and images from the internet to make funny midrash on the Torah portion each week. The comics included an ad for his stand-up act in the last frame.
You can see examples of his work here:

http://52sabbaths.blogspot.com/2006_05_01_archive.html

Sharon never liked these. She found the images illegible under the Photoshop filters, and was disturbed by the reverential attitude. "Sucking up to the Rabbis, eh?"

Aaron wouldn't stop making them.

"Maybe I could help," she said. "I could draw some panels for you."

Then came a few months of hybrid comics:

http://52sabbaths.blogspot.com/2006_07_01_archive.html

There was a steep learning curve. Trained as a painter/printmaker, a dedicated Luddite with only a few months of cartooning experience, there were some rough patches. But the production of a weekly comic took on a rhythm of its own, and before long the comics became a full partnership:

http://52sabbaths.blogspot.com/2006_08_01_archive.html

Our life revolved around the comic. On Saturdays, we would gather up our favorite translations of the Torah. Sharon likes Everett Fox, Aaron likes Gunther Plautt. We also had a parallel translation, Rabbi Hertz, the Ryrie Study Bible Hebrew English dictionary, all the various Art Scroll versions and of course, once Shabbos was over, Chabad.org. Jews around the world read the same section of Torah each week, such that they read the whole thing in a year. We would read the portion one week ahead so our comic would be ready for distribution in sync with all the other Jews.

One of us would read aloud while the other followed along, interrupting when the translations varied or when something particularly outrageous inspired us to look at the footnote commentary from the rabbis. Eventually we would get through the whole thing and then start discussing what part our story would focus on. This conversation would continue through Sunday, and on Monday morning Aaron would write a script, usually with notes on what the images would be. Then we would fight and draw and write some more and re-draw, and emerge bloody but happy on Tuesday with a pencil draft of the comic. These were scanned into Photoshop, inked and colored on Wednesday and Thursday and sent out to our global mailing list in time for Shabbat.

If you're receiving this as an email, that means you've already signed up to support The Comic Torah through Amazon Payments. But some would-be supporters haven't been successful in their efforts. And you might find as you spread the word, that some of your friends are having problems too.

I can't solve the problems of Amazon Payments. I can't even debug them. But what I can do is give an alternative way to pledge support for The Comic Torah.

You can mail checks, post-dated November 18, to
Ben Yehuda Press
430 Kensington Rd.
Teaneck, NJ
07666

I'll make a matching pledge using the Ben Yehuda Press credit card. (That's why I'm listed as a project backer.) I'll acknowledge the supporter on the Project Update page. And of course, anyone who pledges by check will get the same reward as those who pay by Amazon Payments.

Special thanks to those backers who paid by check

• 
  
• Holly Taya Shere
• 
  
• Rabbi Jill Hammer PhD
• 
  
• Shoshana Jedwab
• 
  

Thank you for your support!

Thank you so much for supporting The Comic Torah. Your pledges mean a great deal to Aaron and Sharon.

As of today, we've reached 9% of our goal. Looking ahead, we need 500 more people to pre-order The Comic Torah by pledging at $22. You can help, by spreading the word about The Comic Torah to your friends.

Over the next few weeks, through Simchat Torah and beyond, I'll be posting links to some of my favorite portions of The Comic Torah, as well as an interview with Aaron and Sharon. For now, I'm including Sharon's wonderful artwork for the book's cover.

Again, thank you for your support and for spreading the good word.

--Larry Yudelson