I need to update my list of places you can find me! I keep forgetting to put it into my website… let me put it here, hopefully it’ll make me remember.

Twitter / @autojoy (very active!)
Tumblr / schmautojoy (active)
Flickr / autojoy (very inactive…)
This is My Jam / autojoy (active-ish)
ScentBase / autojoy (active-ish)
Google+ / Kate Brown (very inactive…)
Instagram (or Webstagram) / autojoy (active)

In other news, I’ve just completed a set of illustrations for a Phoenix Tale Feather short. I used a different style, and really enjoyed the chance to exercise my illustration skills. I’d like to do more, but illustration gigs don’t come up for me that frequently (probably because…. I’ve not really pursued them, haha). I’ll post the pictures once they’ve been published — to my knowledge, they are going out in the Hallowe’en issue. The story itself was right up my alley (as well Editor Ben knew!!)… very interesting fairy-tale material. I read it several times ^_^

Last week, I was in Dundee, visiting the Comics module they have going on there at the DJCAD. I was very impressed. I met and spoke with Phil and Chris who are running the Comics Module and the Comics MLitt courses, respectively. They both have a deep love of comics, current and past, and seem to have their heads screwed on in terms of what would be useful to the students. A good deal of their budget is set aside to invite professionals currently working in the field to visit and speak with the students, which I think is so vital… we only had the one guest (Paul Grist! :D) come to our course for the Swindon HND SA, and I felt it was exceptionally beneficial, and a serious shame we were unable to have more guests visit. (Also certain tutors may have spoken over the top of said guest a fair bit…………….) The Dundee courses also work towards compiling an anthology of the students’ comics so they have something definite to work towards, are able to learn about print etc., are able to see their work in real print, and are able to take the book along to events and sell it. So! Yeah, I was very impressed, and I wish them the best… I hope it expands into a full-blown BA! I think that’d be excellent! With what’s achieved in the space of 10 weeks for the Module students, imagine what could be done in three years…! Many thanks to Phil and Chris for taking care of me for my visit, I felt very welcome.

ALSO DUNDEE HAS A VOLCANO OMG!!!!!!!!

There’s been a lot of gaming in our household (flathold?) recently! Lots of… OLD games, to be more specific! Me and Paul have been playing a lot of Heroes of Might & Magic III since last year, for starters… it was something he’d played a lot as a kid, and wanted to try it again. I got well into it, too. In return, and mostly thanks to gog.com/, we’ve been playing a lot of games from when I was a kid, too.

I was nuts about Zork when I was younger, specifically the 3D ones (I have to say I had little patience for the text games back then), so we’ve gone through Nemesis and Grand Inquisitor… and have started tackling Zork 1, but jeez it’s hard, man! Then we moved on to Riven. Then, on to The Journeyman Project 3. I was surprised at how well they’d held up! Most times when returning to old stuff you’d loved as a kid, it turns out to be a bit shitty. We also played one of Emma’s favourite games from her childhood, The Last Express, which was amazing, and, for us, not tainted by the blurry glasses of nostalgia, neither.

In terms of modern gaming, the thing on the plate has been Journey. It’s incredible, and everyone should play it. I had been so excited for it, as I’d loved Flower, and it did not disappoint. I cried buckets as it finished. Play it. PLAY IT NOW.

Oh god, also! Dear Esther! It perhaps wasn’t quite what I was expecting, (I think I’d reckoned it was to be more of a point-and-click – whereas, I think, it’s more akin to a visual novel? Sorta?) but yeah, wow. Totally a game everyone should play. I am very much behind what it was doing as a game.

I like… unique games. Obviously that’s not all I play – I’m a big fan of the Harvest Moon/Rune Factory series, and Zelda, and to be quite frank if you’ve played one of those you’ve played them all – but I do love, love, love individual pockets of funky goo like Journey, like Dear Esther. Much love…

(Quick round-up!)

Thought Bubble was great! It was my first time there, and the first time the comics festival covered the weekend as well. I had masses of fun and I really liked the attendees. I would say a huge number of them were A) younger than me and B) female. Very embarrasingly, I missed the first half of the first panel I was meant to be doing, which was about the then-newly released Nelson… though I did catch the last 20 mins of it and I’m not certain I would have been terribly useful anyway, everyone on the panel looked like they were doing a super job :)

On that note, Nelson is excellent! I’ve finally had a read-through and it is actually quite astonishing as a project. The thing that struck me overall was the vulnerability of Nel, and the emphasis on how quickly our lives rush past, the decisions we have to make in the blink of an eye, and the way memories can transform into stories – almost as if they’d happened to someone else – after a certain length of time. Have you read it yet…? Do you own it? You should! It’s a superb cross-section of the UK comics industry, and the book’s profits go to charity. Please consider supporting it – click here for the Blank Slate store page!

So a week after Thought Bubble (nearly typed ‘Bibble’, tee hee) it was off to Malta Comicon! This was my second overseas convention. We were all very well looked-after as guests, and were treated to some sight-seeing on the following week! We visited the War Museum and the Inquisitor’s Palace. I found the latter absolutely fascinating – I admit that the majority of what I knew about the Inquisition was down to hear-say and its representation in popular culture. So, to discover everything about the Maltese Inquisition was really eye-opening. ALSO! We visited Mdina on the final day, which, as was mentioned off-hand as we entered the city gates, was used as part of the set for King’s Landing in Game of Thrones. I promptly shat myself in excitement… and then my camera battery ran out. Damncakes. I *did* get a fat bunch of photos from the Inquisitor’s Palace however, so I gotta process those and get ‘em up on my Flickr at some point!

But yeah. Was sad not to spot either Jaime Lannister or Corto Maltese. They must have seen my fangirl aura approaching like a swarm of bees and hidden themselves (I don’t blame them).

So, really I’ve been so busy recently I’ve forgotten what my office looks like -_-; I absolutely have to cut down on events next year – my work schedule has really taken it in the face. Gotta try and catch up as much as I can…!

Speaking of work! Did you manage to catch Issue Zero of The Phoenix? :D I had one waiting for me when I got home! It was such a good read, and I’m so excited about January! Please tell me you’ve subscribed? You’ll be getting an awesome product and you’ll also be supporting the UK comics industry!

That’s about it from me… sorry for a non-pictoral post. I know it’s a bit boring :( I’m so squeezed for time at the moment!

Take care! Oh, and if you’re in the Melksham area, me, Emma Vieceli and Paul Duffield are signing and sketching for you at KOMIX on Saturday 10th! See you there…!

Hello! Paul and I have just returned from having a week-and-a-half break in Winchester, following the end of Freakangels. It was nice and relaxing… we got to do a lot of things that generally we are not able to do (like go outside). I actually got a small tan on my left hand. (Seriously).

I took a couple of photos with my “real” camera, which I should process at some point… in the meantime, I did take a few with my iPhone and put them through instagram, which you can see here: http://web.stagram.com/n/autojoy ^_^

I have updated the list of places which are carrying copies of Fish + Chocolate in my shop, which also includes Plan B Books in Glasgow, owned by my university mate Peter! Once again, I am very happy these shops have supported F+C, so if you’re looking to buy a copy and you’re within reach of one of these places, do consider purchasing from there ^_^

I’ve also updated the list of events I am confirmed to be at this year, on the bottom of the front page of my site :)

That’s all! I hope to provide you guys with some more news soon ^_^/

My self-published book, Fish + Chocolate, is now available to purchase! It’s up in the shop section of my site.

I’m attending several events this year, so check out what I’m going to on the front page of my site, since I’ll be taking the books with me! Hope to see you there, and I hope you enjoy the book. I’m excited to put it out there in the world…! Let’s see it take its first steps! :)

If you would like to review the comic, please email me directly at extra.minty@gmail.com and I will get back to you.