Janelle Asselin
A Vision for a Better World: An Interview With Cartoonist Maria-Elisa Heg [Hire This Woman]
Hire This Woman is a recurring feature on ComicsAlliance that shines a spotlight on female comics pros, whether they're relative newcomers or experienced pros who are ready to break out. In an overwhelmingly male business, we want to draw your attention to these creators --- and to raise their profile with editors and industry gatekeepers.
Cartoonist Maria-Elisa Heg does a bit of everything including writing, drawing, coloring, lettering, and singing. She's primarily worked on anthologies, educational comics, and auto-bio comics. She's also co-head of Zinefest Houston. Just like last week's featured person, C.M. Bratton, you can see her in person at the Hire This Woman panel at STAPLE! in Austin, Texas, on March 7th.
The Storm of Women’s Rights: ‘Lady Killer’ Brings Feminist History To Life
There aren't many decades that brought as much change for women as the 1960s. The roles and rights of women changed and the world met second wave feminism --- and yet, especially at the beginning of the decade, women were still often expected to fill only the role of a housewife and mother.
This is where Joëlle Jones and Jamie S. Rich's Lady Killer comes in, set in 1962. Lady Killer's heroine Josie is exactly the housewife and mother that the times demanded she be, and a focused career woman who happens to make a career out of assassination. It's a book that carries a lot of weight as a story about a woman in a time of great change. It's also a book that's easy on the eyes.
Bookscan: Women and Children Were The Big Comics Moneymakers in 2014
Brian Hibbs has put up his great yearly analysis of the Bookscan numbers over at Comic Book Resources, and they reflect a change that's slowly dawning on many people in comics right now: books for women and children are where the money is. Nine of the top twenty books sold and tracked by Bookscan last year were by women, and twelve of the top twenty were books for kids.
CBLDF’s Guide ‘Raising a Reader’ Gets New Printings
While the CBLDF's primary mission is legal defense (as per their name), they also offer valuable educational tools. This includes Raising a Reader! How Comics & Graphic Novels Can Help Your Kids Love To Read, a guide aimed at parents and educators. Written by Dr. Meryl Jaffe and featuring art by Raina Telgemeier and Matthew Holm, this great resource teaches adults how to engage kids in the comics medium. While a US version has been available for a while now, the CBLDF is doing a new US printing as well as their first ever UK printing (in British English). Both versions will be available in May.
Comics Alliance’s Favorite Witchsonas, Straight from Tumblr
Cartoonists Brittney Sabo and Victoria G. Elliott have created a delightful event for the folks of Tumblr: Witchsona Week. Everyone and anyone is encouraged to create a witch persona for themselves --- a personal avatar that presents the version of a witch they want to be or see themselves as --- and the results are fantastic.
Since this is the second annual week of this sort, artists who created characters for the previous Witchsona week are encouraged to explain what's new with their witchy avatars. There's a broad range of styles and attitudes amongst the artists represented, and a lot of talent on display.
Exclusive Preview: Space Cities and Dead Gods in HaloGen #1 by Tierney, Chan and Milonogiannis
Frequent collaborators Josh Tierney, Afu Chan, and Giannis Milonogiannis have teamed up again to create HaloGen, an exciting new space adventure featuring a tough female lead investigating the death of a god. The three have collaborated in the past on the critically acclaimed Spera series of graphic novels which, like HaloGen, were published by Archaia. ComicsAlliance has an exclusive preview of issue #1, out March 4th.
HaloGen features a heroine named Rell who is chasing a rumor about the body of a dead god floating in space. The world around Rell seems to be a mix of future science and superstition, as even in future space cities, people will kill for religion. Her job is to figure out where the god is and retrieve it, but that's not a simple task, and Rell is not a simple character. Check out the preview below!
Making the Reader Root for the Villain: An Interview with Writer C.M. Bratton [Hire This Woman]
Hire This Woman is a recurring feature on ComicsAlliance that shines a spotlight on female comics pros, whether they're relative newcomers or experienced pros who are ready to break out. In an overwhelmingly male business, we want to draw your attention to these creators --- and to raise their profile with editors and industry gatekeepers.
Writer CM Bratton has a long resume, including eight novels, multiple screenplays, and, of course, comics. Her next comics work is based on her novels and is titled Me Zombie, You Food. You can see her in person at the Hire This Woman panel at STAPLE! in Austin, Texas, on March 7th.
Exclusive: No Need To Sail The Seven Seas – More ‘Cursed Pirate Girl’ On Its Way
Cartoonist Jeremy Bastian's Cursed Pirate Girl is an intricate work of art that follows, as promised, a cursed pirate girl who travels the seas engaging in adventures, in a piratical Alice in Wonderland kind of way. Illustrated like a late-19th century fever dream, it's a book that rewards repeat reads. The first graphic novel was released as a hardcover in 2012 by Archaia to great critical acclaim after a successful Kickstarter campaign in 2010. And now, a new Cursed Pirate Girl story is on its way from Archaia this summer.
Joelle Jones & Jamie S. Rich on the Tireless and Always Together ‘Lady Killer’ [Interview]
Joëlle Jones and Jamie S. Rich are taking readers back to the mid-century lifestyle in their series Lady Killer, but with a twist. Loving, sweet, capable housewife Josie is actually also a ruthless, trained assassin.
Jones and Rich have crafted a complex, fascinating story with a particularly great lead character. The creators' attention to detail regarding the 1960s timeframe and the various gender roles and attitudes of the time give the comic a solid foundation --- which leads to some great friction in the heroine's work/life balance. Plus, she murders some people with grace and violence. ComicsAlliance talked to Rich and Jones about their inspirations, and their plans for the lethal Josie.
Artist Brian Churilla Talks Digital Art Process on Hellbreak [Exclusive]
To promote his new Oni Press book Hellbreak with writer Cullen Bunn, artist Brian Churilla has been putting together these great process gifs to show how he creates his art. As an artist that works entirely digitally, Churilla has gone to great pains to still give his work texture and depth. He does all the linework using an iMac and Manga Studio 5 before passing it off to colorist Dave Stewart and letterer Jared Fletcher.
Check out an animated gif, exclusive to ComicsAlliance, plus the variant covers for Hellbreak #1 and an explanation of his process.