Hey everyone - just wanted to check in, so you don't think I'd forgotten about you! There may not be a ton of stuff to show in this first month or two of work on the book, especially while it's still in the nebulous idea phase (and while I'm still spending much of my time signing books, drawing commissions, and packing envelopes), so I'll just try to pop in from time to time with little reports on what I've been reading or thinking about with regards to this little project...

A couple of ideas and images that have been cropping up in my mind lately that may work their way into this book:

-A man carrying his severed head under his arms. Walks into a bar, sits down, orders two drinks (one for his head, one for... him?). Just an odd image at this point, may fit into the "vampire" (or, perhaps more accurately, "undead") section.

-A disappearing woman. A frequently recurring theme in the books of one of my favorite writers, Haruki Murakami. The search for a missing woman could provide a thread to follow through the book, especially if I wind up adhering to the initial idea of three separate sections, each based on a different horror archetype. Plus I just like that phrase, "a disappearing woman". Hmm, maybe I can even take that literally - a woman who physically disappears (turns invisible? evaporates?)...

Keep an eye in the general direction of your mailboxes - I'm starting to send out rewards, slowly but surely! Those of you who ordered commissions, I've got a bunch of them to do and they're taking a little longer than I'd anticipated, but I think they're coming out nice, so please be patient! Here's a look at some of the commissioned art in progress on my drafting table...

More to come soon. As always, if you'd like more frequent updates from me (though not specific to this project), you can follow me on twitter. Until next time, here are a couple of great in-depth interviews / conversations about comics from the excellent 300th issue of The Comics Journal, which I just read and includes many such conversations between outstanding cartoonists of different generations. Here are the two I liked the most:
David Mazzucchelli in conversation with Dash Shaw- Mazzucchelli's Asterios Polyp is easily the book of the year, and Shaw's excellent Bodyworld can be read online right now.
Art Spiegelman in conversation with Kevin Huizenga- Huizenga is one of the smartest cartoonists out there (his book Curses and his comic series Ganges are must-reads, if I do say so myself (and I do)), and if you don't know who Art Spiegelman is, well, then just turn off your computer and go read Maus. Seriously, go. I'll wait...