Hi folks! Hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving. I know I did - I have much to be thankful for, not least of which is your incredible support. here's an overdue update for you as I begin dipping my feet into the murky waters of making a new book...

First, a little bit of "business" - everyone make sure you reply to those info requests I sent just after the funding ended (check your email spam folders if this doesn't sound familiar; some people have told me their Kickstarter emails sometimes wind up in spam accidentally). I'm still missing a bunch of addresses, so make sure you let me know where you live - the funds are still processing, but I hope to start sending out rewards soon. If your reward is a commission, be sure to let me know the details of what you'd like drawn (if you haven't already, of course). I've got a bunch of these to do, so they may take longer than I'd like, but I hope to finish as many as possible before the end of the year. If it's urgent that you receive your reward by a certain date (say, for a holiday gift), just let me know and I'll do my best to get it to you in time. As always, if you have any questions or comments at all, please feel free to send me a message via Kickstarter or email me directly at jamietanner@gmail.com.

A bit more business - since funding ended, a few people have contacted me saying they'd still like to pledge and get rewards, and I'm of course more than happy to oblige! Since I can't accept funds via the Kickstarter project anymore, I've set up a storefront on my website for any new backers to pledge - http://www.jamietanner.com/kickstarter.html - if you happen to know anyone interested in joining the project, please pass that link along...

Okay, on to the fun stuff. This beginning stage in making a new book is one of getting inspired and brainstorming. One of the main ways I get myself fired up to create is by reading, reading, and re-reading. So today I'll share my current reading (and re-reading) list, and give you a peek at some of the things rattling around inside my head...
David Boring, by Daniel Clowes - One of my all-time favorite comics, by one of my very favorite cartoonists. A near-perfect graphic novel. So deceptively simple on the surface - gorgeous, polished art and a great main character make this book so compulsively readable. But under the surface, there's some absolutely masterful cartooning and construction. I find new details every time I read this.
Dear Julia, by Brian Biggs - A criminally overlooked gem of a graphic novel from the late 90s. When I read this in college it resonated with me so much. Something about the whimsical yet dark tone of the story and the graceful art inspired me tremendously, and continues to do so.

"Jon", by George Saunders, from his short story collection In Persuasion Nation. A story told from the point of view of a boy raised by a corporation to be a product tester and consumer tastemaker. Dark, dark satire that is somehow funny, sad and moving all at once. I don't know how Saunders strikes that tone, but it gets me every time, especially in this story. Once in a while, when I draw a story that has something like a weird reality show or mysterious corporation in it, I feel I'm treading on Saunders territory (in a much lesser way, of course).
The World Doesn't End, prose poems by Charles Simic. I'm not much of a poetry reader, but there's something really special about this little book (hey, the Pulitzer people thought so too). These poems are like tiny short story fragments or puzzles with pieces missing, or pieces that don't even exist (which is how I sometimes describe The Aviary). Here's a short one:
We were so poor I had to take the place of the bait in the mousetrap. All alone in the cellar, I could hear them pacing upstairs, tossing and turning in their beds. "These are dark and evil days," the mouse told me as he nibbled my ear. Years passed. My mother wore a cat-fur collar which she stroked until its sparks lit up the cellar.
Currently reading: George Sprott, by Seth. Like the aforementioned Clowes book, Seth's elegant, deceptively simple drawings make this feel like a light, fun read. Meanwhile, the narrative and form of the story go off in all sorts of interesting directions and tangents. Makes me feel like so much is possible in comics (because it is!)...

So, how does all this reading apply directly to the book I'm starting? Hopefully the next example will demonstrate that a bit:
Danse Macabre, by Stephen King. Read this one about a year ago and one passage about certain archetypes of horror fiction stuck with me, so I went back and re-read it. King talks about three classic horror novels - and the monsters in them - as the foundations of the modern horror story. The three archetypes are the Vampire (as in Dracula), the Werewolf (as in Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde) and the Thing Without a Name (as in Frankenstein). He also mentions a sort of hidden fourth archetype, the Ghost (as in The Turn of the Screw).

Now, I'm not setting out to make a horror book, necessarily, but I do like the horror genre. I never set out to tell a story in a specific genre when I sit down to write, but more often than not my comics wind up being an awkward, uncomfortable hybrid of horror and comedy (well, sort of). So when I read that passage about archetypes, it immediately seemed like a great way to organize a graphic novel - in three "acts", if you like, or three chapters / stories, each one centering around one of these archetypal themes or monsters. And in between those three sections, a framing or connective ghost story. Do I have these specific stories in mind yet? No, I don't. But this seems like as good a place as any to start. Will I adhere to this exact structure? Probably not. But again, a good place to start. Chances are one of those sections will take on a life of its own and balloon in length to fill up the whole book. Or maybe it won't - that's part of the fun in making a new book (for me, anyway); seeing where the story takes me.

I'll leave you with one element I know will be in the book, a character "based" on a very generous backer of this project. I don't know exactly the role this character will play in the book yet, but I've started doing some sketches to figure out how I'll draw this gentleman, known for now only as the mysterious Blackwell...