Glasgow MCM.

Wrapped around a wonderful evening with Bob Layton (see below post) was the Glasgow MCM comic event.
Two days of Cosplayers, thousands of people and hopefully customers.
This was the first event for the WesterNoir trade paperback collection and I'd decided to just focus on that and left issue 5 and 6 at home, along with the Tales Of WesterNoir issues.
We also decided to use our suitcases on the tables to sell comics from.
To see if it worked or if it put people off.

It seemed to work pretty well and apart from the one person who was more interested in the suitcases than the comics inside them, it was pretty effective. Getting lots of positive feedback from customers and fellow comic creators.
We had a slow day on the Saturday but this was made up for by a very good Sunday.
The newer titles, the WesterNoir TPB and Colin's Moments of Adventure, selling far more than  other titles was a healthy sign.
We caught up with a lot of friends around the Comic Village and once again I was impressed by the quality of what was on offer.

I even sold a copy of WesterNoir to Hulk Hogan :o)
All in all it was a solid Con sales-wise. Down a little on previous years but good enough to go back to next year.

An evening with Bob Layton.

We've met Bob a few times over the last year or so. Chatting with him before the doors open at a number of the MCM events around the country.
He always been friendly and more than happy to spend his time chatting about comics, movies and well... life in general.
So, there we were in a hotel in Glasgow on Saturday night, having a beer before the restaurant booking for 8 was ready and there was Bob Layton.
He popped over the say 'Hi' and we asked him if he'd like to join us for tea.
'Sure', he said.
We walked him through 10 minutes of Glasgow rain to the Rotunda where we squeezed an additional customer around a nice round table and what followed was a wonderful night chatting with Bob.
I won't share details here but I go as far as saying it was both informative and educational... and a laugh.
He even joked with Gary Erskine about his lost luggage and how his lost had translated into more business for Gary.
What a nice bloke.

During the evening Bob also bantered with the staff in the restaurant, which I think is what won us a free round of drinks.
And then it was time to once again brave the weather and so we asked for the bill.
Bob proved himself to be as generous as he was good company and covered the bill himself.
This is the man who put the Iron into Iron Man ... well... he probably saved the character from being can cancelled many years ago... and was involved in a number of the marvel movies that we are all enjoying.
A wonderful evening.
ps. Bob's luggage turned up at 5.30pm on Sunday. Too late for the convention but at least he has all that fabulous original artwork back in his hands.

Kia Wordsmith

I wrote the first issue for a fantasy story a while back.
It's one of those stories that needs the right artist to bring it to life, and I guess I forgot about it as I focused on the other comics that I currently have in production.
And then Ian Ashcroft got involved, producing art, with a Tales of WesterNoir story and when I saw his artistic style the Kia Wordsmith story sprang back into my mind and I asked Ian if he'd consider doing something bigger than  a 10 page story with us, once Tales of WesterNoir was done and dusted.
He said 'Yes'.
And so I sent his the script a few weeks ago, and he loved it.
Kia Wordsmith is in production.
And I can't wait to see how the world develops around her.

The Asylum 2016.

Over the past year we have been approached by the organisers of a huge Steampunk event in the UK. They like what we are doing and have noticed that Stephenson's Robot (in particular) is quite popular with people wearing Victorian garb and sporting a nice pair of goggles,, amongst other things.
Now that we have three issues of Stephenson's Robot out we decided that this was the year we'd give it a go.
Nearer the event we were advised that we'd do a lot better if we embraced and became part of the event, rather than just stand behind a table.
Hmmmm... a challenge. More so for me as I'm not one for dressing up.
We set to work.
Looking for interesting ways to display comic books and also looking for some Victorian type clothing ... a hat for one.
Fast forward a few months and there we are. In Lincoln. Having a pre-convention pint with Steve Tanner and then wandering around and taking in the sites.

Colin talks to Steve as if he knows a little about Lincoln
whilst Karen looks on knowing better.

 Saturday morning we were quite quickly set up in a room in a room in a building right next to the very impressive Lincoln Cathedral.

A new thing for us. Standing in front of the table. Old suitcases holding a reduced stock of comics.
It was a slow start and I think throughout the weekend we suffered a little from being in a new venue which was a little out of the way of the other attractions and activities.
We decided to put the WesterNoir banner outside, by the gate to the Cafe below us...

I think it helped as we did start to get more customers.

And very splendid they looked.
We didn't get much opportunity to wander around the event, although Colin did make the most of his trips to get cups of tea...

The costumes on display went from the very smart to the completely amazing. It's great to see so much attention going into what people wear, Some of the interpretations of what Steampunk covers were inspired.

They were both quite unaware that their
every word was being recorded....

The event was spread across 4 days, of which the comics were available for 3 of them.
It was a pretty mixed affair really. Saturday and Bank Holiday Monday were quieter than the Sunday. We had a good mixture of normally attired locals and steampunk attired travellers.
All of our books gained a degree of interest but Stephenson's Robot sold best, as expected.

We will return next year and try to put the comics building on the map.
We had a great weekend ... must work a bit on our costumes though as they were quite poor when compared to what other people had created.