Way overdue catch up…
So, things that have happened: The Kickstarter was a general success! Books got printed, i’ve had a number of launch events and started to get backers copies out to them.
As all kickstarters to there was a small budget issue, made the mistake of thinking my printer was quoting me the price with tax. Didn’t catch the problem until the Kickstarter was half done, my bad. But I mostly just printed a few less books to take the bite out of that. Still was a bit of a problem, the discrepancy wasn’t insane but started looking for ways to run things on less $. Was already planning to talk to them about it but it motivated me to get in touch, so i’m pleased to be working with my friends at Studio Lounak to ship out the books via their infrastructure, that’s going to let me do a lot more with less. Will be taking them the first batch of books to go out next week.
I’ve also used the problem as an excuse to try to get as many copies out in person as I can, one on one or at small gatherings. Something made more possible by the fact about a quarter of my support in the crowdfunder came from Montreal and Toronto. My home town and current city of residence. That’s worked out quite well, putting a more personal touch on things for some supporters. Wish i could do that for all of them really. Money saved on shipping aside it’s really great getting to meet people. Sometimes just in passing, on other occasions my visits have lasted an hour or so as we talked about whatever.
The tour portion of this adventure is about half way thought as planed so far. Earlier in May I had my first official launch event at The Dragon in Guelph. Then there was the madness of TCAF 2014, followed by events in Kingston and Montreal.
All wen’t pretty well all things considered. Though i’m acutely aware I could use at least one if not two assistants to help plan and promote all this stuff.
This coming weekend [the 24th and 25th] I’ve got an in store event at The Paradise comic shop in Toronto, and then i’m tabling at the Toronto Indie Arts Market Small Press fair at the Gladstone.
The following weekend I’m Back in Montreal tabling at FBDM, which will be my first time exhibiting at the home town comics festival. Also nice as it’s just blocks from my home. The FBDM runs the 30th to the 1st of June, but i’ll just be tabling the 31st and 1st.
Then the 7th, i’m in Ottawa. I’ll be at the Comic Book Shoppe on Bank street, and i have a table at the small press book fair that i’ll check in at for the last couple hours. My friend Liliane Menard will be taking care of things for the first half of the small press show there.
And then on June 14th and 15th, Mark Sable and I have a table at the ReedPOP NYC Special Edition show. He’ll be there both days and I’ll join him at the table on Sunday. Saturday, to maximize exposure for Dream Life, i’ve got a small half table at the New York Comic Fest. Bit nuts doing two shows the same weekend but I found out about the festival after and suspect from the guest list it’s the kind of event I NEED to have Dream Life at so he ho, lets go!
Late June I’m going to try to make it out to the east coast of Canada, but nothing is finalized and I think after doing shows ever weekend till mid June, i might need to stay home for a couple of weeks to recover first!
I’ve done a couple podcasts in the midst of all this. Tired and rambly, I think I talked too much but you can catch them here, and here.
