Black
River Chronicle 1 (1995) A5 (210mm X 148mm), 28pp.
US$4.00
SOLD
OUT!
A NZ comics fanzine put out by Lars
Cawley and me in 1995 (Lars edited it, really). The intention
was a bi-monthly ‘zine, but of course fate had other ideas.
Issue two was mine to organise and somehow I just never found the time...
Nevertheless, this first and only issue features an interview with Timothy
Kidd (in which poor old Tim hardly gets a word in, between me and Lars
interrupting him to rant about stuff - for an example, click here) and
news, reviews and gossip. And a couple of strips (one by me, 'Maungarei'
- reprinted in Top Shelf Under the Big Top - and one by Lars; and
a legendary one-pager by the mysterious Vernon Tasp). Eventually,
Black River metamorphosed into a mailing list - Black
River Digital.
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‘Cafe Underground chapter one’ (later reprinted in Pickle 1) - in a slightly earlier form (there are a couple of pages I redrew before it appeared in the proper comic book). This is the minicomic that I put out in my first efforts to shake off the comics-phobia that hit me in England (as described in 'The Last Fox Story'). The secret to the cure was that I didn't have to draw anything new to put out this minicomic: the story had all been drawn months before and all I did for the cover was enlarge an image from one of the panels within (deliberately letting the quality erode in the process). Even the title was typed, so I didn't have to do any new lettering. It worked.
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‘Incomplete Works’ (later reprinted in Pickle 1) and 'Little Death' (from Fox Comics and then reprinted in Reactor Girl. Another in this batch of 'overcoming the comics-phobia' minicomics.
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Collects the serial ‘Sex’ from Fox Comics (written and drawn 1987-1989). This has never been reprinted anywhere else - although I might do so one day... It was the most ambitious thing I'd done back then - excluding vast epics like the Crystal Wars (ahem) done when I was at school (each chapter of that one was done as birthday presents for my friends). Features my most obsessive use of letratone ever. ADULTS ONLY.
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‘Men That Perish’ (originally done in 1989 for Eddie Campbell's The Dead Muse and later reprinted in Pickle 2), 'Not Here' (done Nov.89 as Xmas presents for friends and family - each panel was drawn large and coloured as gifts; it's never been reprinted elsewhere, but I may redraw it some time for a collection or something); 'Unwritten Stories' (from Fox Comics 17 and later reprinted in Pickle 1) and 'An Empty, Cold Dark Fireplace, or Barney Gets Lonely' (from Razor 7, never reprinted elsewhere).
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This is the story (and minicomic) that saved my life - and I still feel this might be the best thing I've ever done. It was reprinted in its entirety in Pickle 3 (albeit in a different format - with two double page spreads from the original mini on each page of the comic book). It was the first comic I drew (apart from finishing a short thing for charity - which was dreadful and mercifully never published) after my comics-phobia episode (which it describes). To fool myself into drawing a comic, I avoided the comics format. At the time I was working in the children's section of Waterstone's Bookstore on Charing Cross Rd (London) and reading a lot of kids' books. So it was natural to write and draw in an illustrated text format - which would occasionally break into balloons etc. The last trick was to draw the whole thing in ballpoint pen on a little notepad I carried with me everywhere. Most panels weren't even drawn to fit a particular piece of text; I just drew lots of stuff and then assembled it all later. So the end result is closer to my sketchbook than to my usual comics. Ah - if only I could still draw like this... One day I want to reprint this story as a tiny fat book - ie: in its original format.
In the same format as 'The Last Fox Story', this is a thing about being homesick in London during the Gulf War (written and drawn 16-22 January 1991) and dedicated to Trace Hodgson, a NZ cartoonist who joined one of the Peace Camps set up between the two armies. This has never been reprinted, but may one day...
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This is a simple selection of illustration work done between 1984 and 1990, mostly for the NZ Listener. Most were done for the Jazz column written by my uncle Nigel Horrocks (now editor of NetGuide magazine), but there are also illo's for articles on the news media, attitudes to vasectomy and a psychology conference. Also included are two ad's I drew for VMS Ltd, a very fine comic shop in Wellington (now transformed into Graphic, on Cuba Mall). The cover's from my sketchbook (or more accurately, notepad). I'm very fond of a lot of these old pictures, but I warn you the reproduction quality ain't great... One day I may do a complete collection of my illustration work (either as a mini or on the web).
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I wrote 'Mirabel' in 1989-90 when I was new to London, homesick and lonely. I got as far as doing very detailed roughs in ballpoint (which were drawn in 1991 after 'The Last Fox Story' and 'Opposite Equinoxes'), but never got around to doing finished art. One of these days I still might, but in the meantime Tim Kidd and Sophie MacMillan persuaded me to put the roughs out as a minicomic.
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This collects 'Li'l Ainjil' (from the SPX book, 1998), 'There are no words in my mouth' (from Comix 2000) and 'Summoning' (from Le Roquet #1, 1992).
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This is 'Dirty Comics' - the story I did for Fantagraphics' Dirty Stories volume 1. This mini I put together for friends, with the Tijuana Bible printed as a separate A6 (landscape) insert and stapled in. It also includes 'Alma Larissine's Kisses'. . ADULTS ONLY.
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This is actually an essay (rather than a comic): 'Inventing Comics: Scott McCloud's Definition of Comics' which I began writing in 1995 in response to McCloud's Understanding Comics: the Invisible Art. Initially it was going to be an article called 'Logophobia' for Jeff Levine's fanzine Destroy All Comics, but it dragged on and grew and grew until in 1998 Bart Beaty asked me to contribute to a special issue of the Comics Journal on McCloud's book. Well, I missed the deadline by a week, but by that time 'Logophobia' had grown into a 9000-word monster. In despair of it ever seeing light of day, I made it into this mini, but apparently the Comics Journal is going to publish it soon - so that would render this mini obsolete. So it all depends how patient you are, I guess (assuming you're interested at all, that is...)..
