Post Christmas Present!
So, apologies if you've already seen the lobster book, but I'm extremely proud of it and feel it's worth whorin' around.
A couple months ago, I realized that I wasn't going to have enough money to give people gifts this year, so I wrote a holiday story and asked my friend Zandria Sturgill to illustrate it - then we could give it to people instead of, you know, gifts. Although we didn't make many copies (they were very labor-intensive; I spent 8 hours in kinkos just cutting them), Zandria made a special digi-version, which you can read here.
My gift to you: Christmas Follies of the Half-Jewish Lobster
A little about it: I just came up with a dumb little lobster story, but Zandria's art really brought it to another level. She worked for a good two months using mixed media to create the textured illustrations. I knew she worked well with grotesque things and sea life, so I pretty much gave her the source material and told her to do whatever with it.
It came out better than anything I could've imagined. A lot of people I've showed it to have said that it's a little scary for a children's book, which we both take as a great compliment. I think that children books are too harmless these days. Some of my most vivid memories are from reading Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, illustrated by Stephen Gamill. Gamill's pencil illustrations are incredibly gruesome, yet beautiful at the same time (look it up if you don't know what I'm talking about). But it's also supposed to be funny and I snuck a little bit of edumacational stuff in there as well.
So, enjoy!
A couple months ago, I realized that I wasn't going to have enough money to give people gifts this year, so I wrote a holiday story and asked my friend Zandria Sturgill to illustrate it - then we could give it to people instead of, you know, gifts. Although we didn't make many copies (they were very labor-intensive; I spent 8 hours in kinkos just cutting them), Zandria made a special digi-version, which you can read here.
My gift to you: Christmas Follies of the Half-Jewish Lobster
A little about it: I just came up with a dumb little lobster story, but Zandria's art really brought it to another level. She worked for a good two months using mixed media to create the textured illustrations. I knew she worked well with grotesque things and sea life, so I pretty much gave her the source material and told her to do whatever with it.
It came out better than anything I could've imagined. A lot of people I've showed it to have said that it's a little scary for a children's book, which we both take as a great compliment. I think that children books are too harmless these days. Some of my most vivid memories are from reading Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, illustrated by Stephen Gamill. Gamill's pencil illustrations are incredibly gruesome, yet beautiful at the same time (look it up if you don't know what I'm talking about). But it's also supposed to be funny and I snuck a little bit of edumacational stuff in there as well.
So, enjoy!