Random Comics News Story Round-Up

* I believe the Eisner Award nominations are imminent.

* the writer Sean T. Collins notes that Jeffrey Brown has been writing about process lately. If I remember my recent press releases correctly, Brown's new book is out today.

* I'd wish Greg Stump a happy birthday today, but I have no idea how old he is, so he has to settle for a line in this post. Sorry, Greg!

* for no particular reason, here are a few suggestions from last week's call for fun webcomics that came back after the supplemental list went up: Space Girl, Chester 5000 XYV and the comics that occasionally pop up on old andy pandy. I'd never heard of any of these and they're all accomplished work of one type or another. The second is naughty, if that makes a difference in your wanting to click on it.

* here are some comics reviews from the editor of St. Louis, Bryan Hollerbach.

* did I miss this? Because that's a crappy way to find out you're out of a job.

* finally, because Diamond's new minimums left open whether or not Xeric Foundation winners will get automatic access or merely special consideration to be carried in the all-important Direct Market catalog Previews, I thought I'd publish a recent positive-experience letter from cartoonist Felix Tannenbaum here:

Here's the story of one Xeric Winner's experience with Diamond and the new minimum order system.

I won a Xeric grant in May of last year and was able to get my GN (Chronicles of Some Made) printed and finished by the winter. I had heard that Diamond was pretty rough on small press stuff so I never bothered to research how they worked. However, I was approached by one of their representatives at APE last year, and he encouraged me to submit my book and an application to Diamond, which I did.

In December they agreed to distribute COSM to retailers in April of this year, and then the news came in about the new minimum orders. I was very anxious about not making the minimum. Even though my book is a GN, it is a modestly priced one, and if I was to meet the new minimum order I would've had to sell about a thousand copies, which was of course very unlikely. The purchasing brand manager who I was dealing with let me know that the new minimums wouldn't start until the month after, but I would still have to contend with the old minimum order which would mean I would need to sell a little over 500, which of course, is also unlikely.

However, he told me that the guidelines are held much stronger for floppies that have a longer print run; so long as I had a "reasonable amount" of sales, they would distribute the order. So I crossed my fingers and waited.

COSM was in the February issue of Previews. I distributed some free copies through Diamond to retailers in order to let them know about it (unhappily, I did have to pay for this service which seems a bit unfair, as retailers get the book for free and any sale is pure profit, but i digress). In addition to that I received some favorable reviews at a few online comics sites.

In March I got a purchase order from Diamond -- only 220 were sold, but they are distributing them! I am not entirely sure if this is because of the Xeric, or because I barely made the deadline before the new minimum,or because I have a graphic novel instead of a floppy; but they will be on sale on April 29th, and if I understand correctly, COSM will continue to be listed in previews.

So that is one guy's experience. I had prepared myself to be disappointed by my experience with Diamond, but they have been upfront, prompt and very helpful to me. I hope I am able to sell a whole crap load of comics with them!

Felix Tannenbaum can be found on-line here. It's a new era at Diamond with a rolling reaction to various recessionary pressures and some of the above may have occurred under different policies and/or sensibilities, but I thought it worth putting out there.
 
posted 7:30 am PST | Permalink
 

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