Where On Earth Is The Thaddeus Mist Lego figure ?

Well, here he is...

It's taken a little while mainly as I've been hunting down a figure with a suitably impressive hat...
Check out the WesterNoir Book 4 figure over at strangestoftimes.blogspot.

DemonCon7 - to Maidstone and back again...

So, there I was at 6.30am on a cold February morning, sat in my Ford Focus, in a bus stop layby, somewhere in Newcastle-Under-Lyme, waiting for Gary Crutchley. As I sat there thinking about the long drive ahead it occurred to me that maybe the bus stop that Gary had meant to meet at was the one that I'd passed a few hundred meters back up the road.
I decided to text Gary, just to let him know where I actually was, on the off chance that I had somehow managed to stop in the wrong place.
Which of course I had.
And so at around 6.45am with Gary sat beside me riding shotgun, we left Newcastle-Under-Lyme and hit the M6.
We began chatting straight away, well it was more like we picked up where we had left off the last time we had got together, and started talking about WesterNoir.
By the time we reached the M1 we had plotted up to about issue 20.
By the time we reached the M25 we had gone back and tweaked a few things. Enriched a few situations and fleshed out some of the rules that constrained what we were creating.
At around 10.40am, we stopped off for breakfast in a Service Station somewhere just off the M25, I love a nice Full English Cooked Breakfast, Gary turning his nose up at it as it wasn't too healthy decided instead to have pretty much the same thing, but in a roll. I deduce the the bread must have some fat-absorption-conversion property that I'd never been made aware of.
During the journey, conversation had roamed from books to film through comics and onto comic companies. It always helps a journey go faster, well, seem faster when you have someone to talk to, and so it was that 3 and a half hours later, but seeming like only an hour, we left the motorways behind and found ourselves in Maidstone.
For once, we actually found the venue pretty easily, maybe it was because we used Tom-Tom and not Col-Col, who can say. Maybe it was just that Maidstone really isn't that big. We even managed to park the car not too far away.
Of course it was far enough when you have to make a couple of trips lugging boxes but, with Gary still talking about the need for Accent UK to buy a trolley, we soon found ourselves set up in the Royal Star Arcade. It was all pretty hectic at first with people setting up shop as potential customers wandered around us, potential customers that is, that consisted of a troop of Storm Troopers, Darth Vader and various other Star Wars characters.

 We sold only one book in the first hour and had that feeling that it was going to be one of those days. Both Gary and I made a quick dash to pick up a hard cover copy of It Came ! by Dan Boultwood (he had a very small pile of copies and we didn't want to miss out).
And then we got back to find our stall getting a little busy. And it pretty much stayed busy for the whole day.
All books sold in pretty good numbers but WesterNoir sold most copies, and true to form Stuart Gould of UK Comics, our printer, turned up with a box of Issue 4. And great it is too. The best seller for us was actually our sketch pack editions, where we bundle all 4 issues of WesterNoir in a bag and then the customer persuades me to part with one of Gary's great little original sketches.

Gary was more than happy to tell the customers
just how good WesterNoir is...

A nice moment occurred when one of our customers, having just bought both of The Wolfmen books, told us how her ex-boyfriend had left her and taken all of her comics and CDs with him, amongst which was her treasured copy of The Man Of Glass. What else could we do but give her a replacement copy. We couldn't help with the CD collection though, she didn't look the type to be interested in Pink Floyd.
I did make a trip out from behind the stall to top up the Car Parking ticket, and one to get a few drinks but that was pretty much it, the rest of the day we had a constant flow of customers or people wanting to chat. It was a really enjoyable day.

A Cyberman stopped by to pick up a copy of Robots,
I didn't have the nerve to tell him he wasn't in it.

Graham Beadle knows how to run a great little con, and I hope it stays just the size it is and keeps the atmosphere it had on Sunday.
For those who picked up WesterNoir Issues 1 and 2, on the promise that Graham was going to stock the books in his Grinning Demon store, he took 4 copies of Issues 3 and 4, so if you liked Issues 1 and 2 then I wouldn't wait too long before getting him to put them aside for you.

First Convention of the Year - DemonCon7.

We've a table at this year's DemonCon event in Maidstone, on Sunday.

and mostly through the hard work of Gary Crutchley, we'll be launching Book 4 of WesterNoir at the event... and if I can get things sorted, we might even be raffling a page of his artwork.

That's if I can bear to part with it ...
Gary will be with us signing books and generally enthusing about the whole WesterNoir story, which gets more and more interesting every time we meet up.
It'd be great to see you if you're in the area.

The 2014 Event season starts...

..with the DemonCon7 event in Maidstone, Kent on the 16th February.
We've been wanting to make it to this event for a year or so now but it's always either clashed with something we'd already booked, or been the week before or after. This time we put it to the top of the list. We are aiming to launch issue 4 of WesterNoir at this event, and all is on track to see this happen. Pop over to Strange Times blog to see the cover development for Issue 4 and Gary's blog to see the first three pages.
..we've also book a table at the MCM event in Birmingham on the 22nd and 23rd of March.
It's looking like it's going to be another busy year.

The Last Comic Con Of The Year.

So, we'd managed to get ourselves into the Main Hall at this year's Thought Bubble comic convention in Leeds.
We'd nearly missed out on the whole thing as tables were sold out within an hour of being announced, and for those of us with a day job we found out too late. But we got lucky as we moved from the 'hoping for a cancellation' list, through 'a table in the 3rd Hall' list, to 'a cancellation has actually happened in the Main Hall and you're in the Main Hall' list.
Our concern had been that in the new 3rd Hall we might not see as many customers as we would in the Main Hall and so we jumped at the chance.

The event had a really good vibe, with the banners etc.

Putting all of the worries behind us, I picked up Colin at around 8.30am and with Jemma in the back of the car getting excited about meeting Mark Buckingham and Kieron Gillen, we set off, and for once there were no roadworks (to talk of), no heavy showers, no lorries trying to squeeze you into the central barrier and... ok.. we did have a little diversion when we missed our exit from the motorway, but it was a good journey.
We had arrived about 30 minutes before opening time and had no trouble getting our tickets (including the extras) and finding our table. A great start.
Gary Crutchley, co-creator, co-scribe (well, he does most of the actual scribing) and artist on WesterNoir arrived not long after doors opened, which made for an even better start.

Me and Gary Crutchley.

We were good to go.
The only question was, as Colin mentions over on his report, would the extra (3rd) hall draw in extra comic enthusiasts or would it just mean that the number of people that came last year would have more to choose from.

Thom Ferrier (Ian Williams) and Colin catch up.

Well sales weren't bad. They didn't hit last year's number, but we had fewer new titles out this year, but sales were better than the year before that, so I think it's an upward trend (hmmmm... sounding a little too salesman-like). We had a lot of repeat customers (which is great), met some really nice people (and very talented they are too) from Portugal, caught up with a lot of friends in the Independent Comic scene and Jemma got her Mark Buckingham Fables sketch (Bigby) as well as Kieron Gillen's signature on her Journey Into Mystery TPB.

Gary was happy with the response to WesterNoir...

Westernoir issue 3 sold really well, to those who had the first two issues, those who picked up all three or those tempted by Gary's great sketches to buy a sketchpack. It was great to have Gary around on Saturday, and of course we manage to talk about future issues over a coffee, you can read Gary's report of his day over on his blog.


Colin and Gary.

As we weren't sure where we were going to be this year, or even if we had a table at the event, we'd decided not to book hotel rooms and so it was a quick drive back across the Pennines for a little rest and restocking.
Sunday started badly... for me.
On putting on a clean shirt (that'll teach me) I disturbed a Queen Wasp, who had decided to spend the winter in one of the shirt sleeves. My wife watched me dance around the bedroom, trying to take the shirt of without getting stung too many times, looking more like Lee Evans than John Travolta I sorry to say. Anyway... I think I only got stung once and the wasp was then introduced to the outside of the house (she was alive and buzzing when I last saw her).

Queen wasps are not small creatures.

Anyway, manning up (with a little Savlon and an anti-histamine pill from Colin's wife Karen) we were once again on our way back to Leeds.
Jemma had a new Fables book to get signed and a new character to get a sketch of.

Jemma hiding...

I had to find James McKay to get my copy of Dreams Of A Carbon Future (see my blog for more details) and Colin had a lot of people to catch up with and small press books to buy (as is his way :o).
Sunday was quieter than Saturday.
We did attract some attention with our 'Accent UK in Lego' display case, and had some fun with people matching Lego figures to Accent UK books.

Looks like the Invisible Man is missing...

We did sell enough books to make this a good Con (and I was really happy to see so many WesterNoir and Robot Shorts books selling) from that perspective, Jemma (as a fan-girl) got some quality sketches, we caught up with friends, creators, readers and would-be creators and are certainly looking forward to next year's event.


The wrist bands allowing entry always looks a bit worse for wear after 2 days.  

Thought Bubble...

Just a quick reminder that Accent UK have a table in the Main Hall at next weekend's Thought Bubble Comic Festival in Leeds. Hope to see you there.

Also, don't forget to check out Colin's blog, for his review of our last event.

To Comiket and back...

Yesterday Colin, Gary and I went to the Comiket Con in London (around the back of King's Cross station).
It's the second time Comiket has been at this venue and lst time around we did pretty well.
Setting off on the 7.20am train from Crewe all went pretty much to plan and pretty soon Colin and I found ourselves meeting up with Gary in Euston station before heading off with bags full of comics. I must say that it's a tough venue to find first time around but we knew where we were going and so, apart from my suitcase wheels buckling under the pressure, we made good time and were set up 30 minutes or so before doors opened.
As is typical of these events the doors opened to a trickle of customers, the trickle being pretty constant through the day. Paul Gravett got the Drawing Parade off and running straight away. This is where artists get to sit at the front of the hall and draw, with their creative process being projected over their heads onto a large screen. It's quite absorbing watching other artists as they do their thing.

Colin, Gary and I talking with Joel Meadows (Bleeding Cool News photo)

It was a slow day, but comics did sell, not as good as the last event but this show is always fun to be at and is really like no other show in the UK.
It was great to have Gary behind the table with us, talking to customers about WesterNoir and to meet readers of the first two issues as they picked up the third (and it was good to meet you Aaron, hope you enjoyed Issue 3). I also got to see an almost complete version of Issue 4 on Gary's iPAD).
It was also good to see Owen Johnson at his table selling Raygun Roads, with art by the incomparable Indio!
All in all a very enjoyable event, the number of customers were down a bit and consequently so were sales but we had a really good time.
Travelling home was a bit of an ordeal though.
The 8.10 pm out of Euston to Crewe was delayed by 20 minutes.
When if finally set off it had to stop outside Wembley somewhere for 'isolation', which was a little worrying but nobody turned up in hazmat suits and in another 20 mins or so we were off once again.
Approaching Rugby (our first official stop) the Train Manager asked that anybody with 'medical training' go to Coach D.
We then spent about 40 minutes in Rugby station and ultimately a man was stretchered off accompanied by paramedics (I hope he's OK now).
And so we finally arrived into Crewe at about 11.30pm.
These things can't be helped but it did make it a very long day.
Still, looking forward to the next one.