Thank tank

I am delighted to share the official press release and take this opportunity to thank the NZ Book Council for choosing me to participate in the Graphic Novelist and Comic Artists Exchange Residency with Taiwan.

My colleagues are an astoundingly talented group of professionals:

• Tim Gibson has a background in illustrating worlds, characters and monsters for films including Tintin, District 9 and Avatar. His website www.mothcity.com offers a fresh take on the traditional murder mystery and is distributed through digital comics distributor ComiXology. Tim’s work has been widely anthologised and Moth City is considered a ground-breaking approach to storytelling. 
• Ant Sang is an award-winning graphic novelist who has also produced numerous short comics for local anthologies and educational purposes. Shaolin Burning was awarded an Honour Award at the 2012 New Zealand Post Children’s Book Awards and was selected for the Storylines Notable Books list that same year. His 2004 comic series The Dharma Punks will be reprinted in graphic novel form for the first time in 2014.
• Chuang Yung-shin is one of the most well-known commercial film directors in Taiwan. In 1997 he published Film Maker’s Notes, a comic which recorded his life and works and has been reprinted 18 times. Since then he has gone on to publish further award winning works, including The Window and ‘80s Diary in Taiwan1.
• 61Chi graduated from the Art Department of Taiwan Normal University. Her first book of comics, Room, was published in January 2014. 61Chi belongs to the new generation of Taiwanese comics artists with versatile drawing talents and a broad range of skills across genres, including children’s illustration, American style realistic drawing and Japanese aesthetic style.
• Ahn Zhe was born in Taipei in 1985. While his work encompasses graphic design, illustration and storyboard design, his true passion lies in art as well as image and word creation. His works include The Dream Under the Bed, published by TITAN Publishing Co. Ltd. in 2011, and he has also contributed to collections such as 80s Taipei x 90s Hong Kong.

The aim of the exchange is to:

• foster collaboration between artists
• enable the creation and publication of a cross-cultural graphic novel
• create an opportunity for graphic novels to be discussed and explored within an international context.

Which means I'll be part of a sort of awesome graphic novel think tank - I can't wait!

Something to be in

September's issue of Flash Frontier is just out, and I'm so proud of the features page this month.

I owe a huge debt of gratitude to Adnan Mahmutovic for trusting me with his personal story in our graphic interview: "Something for Being" was an absolute privilege to work on. I'm grateful, too, to Michelle Elvy for letting me run the whole piece. I feel like we all broke some new ground.

Two happy

I'm very grateful to Felino A. Soriano for including my fictions "The Thirsty Dog" and "Dog Lying in the Snow" in Sugar Mule #47, and doubly happy to see writer and lit-hop pals Ezra Letra and Jamez Chang in this issue, too - check out their three poems - powerful stuff.