Fresh off the high of Comic-Con...

... it's back on the road for me and VIETNAMERICA for a jam packed 48 hours. First, I'll be leading a workshop this Friday at the Union of North American Vietnamese Student Association conference in Denver. It's part of their Identity Compass track, and I'm honored to have been invited to participate in this annual event. Unfortunately, it's only open to conference attendees, but later that evening the fine folks at I Want More Comics will be hosting me for a public book signing from 6-8 pm. And then on Saturday, there's this:

This event with cartoonist Noah Van Sciver is organized by my good pal Charlie LaGreca to raise funds for Comic Book Classroom's literacy program. He's pouring his heart and soul into expanding and promoting Denver's comics community so if you're local, c'mon out!

What do the awesome Adrian Tomine, Jessica Abel, Dave Choe, and myself all have in common?

Many moons ago, we were recipients of a grant for comic book self-publishers from the Xeric Foundation.

2012 will celebrate its 20th anniversary of financially helping young cartoonists learn the in's and out's of self publishing—letting us jump into the deep end to learn how to swim without the danger of drowning. Sadly, 2012 will also mark its final grant cycle. Their amazing support when I took my first baby steps down the comics path ultimately led to VIETNAMERICA, so there are not enough words to express my profound gratitude to the organization and its founder Peter Laird. Yes, THAT Peter Laird!

On a happier note, I'll be exhibiting this week at SDCC! As it has been since the dawn of time, I'll be sharing a table with pal Joanna Mulder in Small Press K-12:

SDCC marks six months since VIETNAMERICA's release, so it feels extra special to finally be bringing my newest book to my oldest show. Anyone need a 4-day attendee badge, including Previews night? Hit me up before Wednesday. Hope everyone's enjoying their summer—it's sunny out there so remember to wear a...

(Finished illo of the sketch snippet from the last post. For a textbook gig.)

Kings County artists represent!

Big, awesome, phenomenal news: I've been awarded a 2011 New York Foundation for the Arts fellowship in the nonfiction literature category! Additionally, among the 16 nonfiction recipients, I was selected for the Gregory Millard Fellow. Awardees were informed a couple weeks ago, but I'm still stunned by this incredible honor and recognition for VIETNAMERICA. NYFA's official press release went live yesterday.

That's the big development from the last few weeks, which have otherwise been filled with eclectic illustration projects. None of which I can share yet, but here's a sorta thematic in-progress collage of tiny snippets from each one:

After a quiet month for promoting the book, things are ramping up again: I just participated in Random House's amazing Author Event for NYC Educators where I got to meet teachers, librarians, principles, and students advocating for more graphic novels in the classroom; this weekend I'm leading several workshops at the Catalyst Foundation's Culture Camp; SDCC's right around the corner; and book stuff in Denver soon after.

July marks six months since VIETNAMERICA hit the shelves, and it's been a wonderful, unpredictable ride so far. Expressing my gratitude to everyone for their book coverage and support keeps flip flopping between twitter and here, so here's a roundup of recent press:

Amazon's "Best of 2011 So Far.."

Angry Asian Man

From Your Desks

Los Angeles Public Library

Page 45

To every NYC high school teacher...

... who won't already be on a tropical beach recovering from their latest school year, this Thursday is Random House's 3rd Annual Author Event for NYC Educators! I'm honored to be one of four presenting authors—and the only cartoonist—given this amazing opportunity to speak directly with you about VIETNAMERICA, and its classroom possibilities. The other authors (and I'm shaking with nervousness as I type this) will be Neal Bascomb, Monique Truong, and John Prendergast.

This is the second RH high school event I've participated in since my last post, with the first being the graphic novel presenter for their Creative Writing Competition's award ceremony. This is an annual competition for NYC seniors with the three awardees in poetry/spoken word, fiction/drama, personal essay/memoir, and graphic novel receiving $2500, $5000, and $10,000. It's a wonderful program to help support young creatives, and I encourage every local soon-to-be senior that enjoys writing to participate next year!

In the latest VIETNAMERICA news, Amazon's selected it as one of its top Summer Reading for Adults—only one of two comics/graphic novels to make the list! That's an awesome boost as it hits the road again in July. First stop in a couple weeks will be workshops at the Catalyst Foundation's Culture Camp in upstate New York.

And now some recent figure drawings to fulfill the visual component of this post...

Going's on

Seems the freezing, rainy embrace of winter just transitioned straight into the sweltering, wet blanket summer in lovely Brooklyn so I'll just stay inside and keep working. Here're roughs for a 28-page collaborative comic that I'm doing full color art for:

It's for the government, so I'd tell you more about it but then I'd have to kill you. Also screened the first batch of those Mudhra tees from a while back:



Currently available at Manhattan's Kula Yoga. Any retailers interested in carrying, please feel free to gimme a shout.

Lastly, thanks to Laurie Gaughran of Humanities Prep for having me in for an artist visit with her ethics classes last week! It was quite eye-opening to spend a couple hours with such intelligent and thoughtful students, and has helped inspire me to put together a lesson plan for VIETNAMERICA just in time for Random House's upcoming NYC Educators Event of which I'll be one of the four featured authors.

Welcoming Spring

Here's an album package I recently finished. What's shown is the front and back sides of the disc sleeve unfolded as a single image. I also supplied interior art, and will post those after it hits store shelves.

I'm a sucker for playing with floral patterns. It's extremely meditative and spontaneous compared to my more refined, process-driven approach to other illustrations and comics.

Travel notes

This Saturday evening, I'll be hanging out and signing books at Philadelphia's Locust Moon Comics from 6-9. The co-owner Chris Stevens and I collaborated on a short comic many moons ago, so I'm looking forward to our mini reunion. All you locals c'mon out for some comics and booze!



Over the past several weeks, I've been traveling and exhibiting at a lot of comic festivals trying to get the word out on VIETNAMERICA. It's been an amazing time, but poorly documented because I basically didn't have a camera when anything interesting happened (yet another case to be made for coming out of my technology cave and upgrading to a smart phone?). Thankfully, other people had cameras so here're some random pics...

Portland, when not raining, is absolutely beautiful... even to a jaded, callous city boy like myself.

During Stumptown, I finally got to meet in person Thi Bui, a fellow Vietnamese cartoonist also chronicling her family's refugee experience with comics. No feelings of competition and intense rivalry there; not... one... bit. An interview we did a while back just posted at HYPHEN, and check out the current issue for our little collaborative comic! (True comic nerds might recognize the Ignatz Awards which serve as great bludgeoning weapons. Unfortunately, neither of us can claim any of the prestigious comic trophies in this pic—they all belong to Craig Thompson)

Some sketchbook pages from the road...

My awesome hosts for TCAF were my cousin John, a musician and producer, and his wife Lillian, an animator. Workaholics, both of them!

Cintiq envy:

For pics of all the TCAF exhibitors, check out Jamie Coville's archive. He also recorded a few panels, including the one I participated on—Telling True Stories—which you can listen to here.

With freelance apparel graphics, you never know if your anonymous commercial work ever actually makes it into stores so it's always fun to see one of your designs in the wild on a stranger:

My final dinner in Toronto (animator cousin included free with meal):

And on one of the few days I actually spent at home, Spring finally arrived in the form of the Brooklyn Botanical Garden's Cherry Blossom Festival:

ABC and TCAF!!!

Enormous thanks and gratitude to ABC producer Tina Trinh for filming and assembling a great piece on VIETNAMERICA that just aired on World News Now! You can watch the segment at their news site here.

After a brief layover at home to wash my clothes and pack up some more books, I'm back on the road for this weekend's amazing Toronto Comic Arts Festival!

I haven't exhibited since '07, so super thrilled to return this year—definitely the show I've been looking forward to the most! Chris Butcher has supported me since my earliest self-published days, so it's an honor and privilege for VIETNAMERICA to be part of his baby: a phenomenal international celebration of comics that's FREE to the public! Find me at table 110:

On Saturday from 1:30-2:15, I'll be on the panel Telling True Stories with David Collier, Jim Ottaviani, Zach Worton, and Tory Woollcott (moderated by Greg Means). Should be a hoot.

You know what else is a hoot? Drawing naked people. Not making it to figure drawing as much as usual in light of all the recent travel, but here're a few pages:

Another weekend = another show!

This Saturday and Sunday I'll be in Reading, Pennsylvania exhibiting at CGS's SuperShow:

The fine folks at Comic Geek Speak were some of the earliest supporters of VIETNAMERICA, so I'm honored to be participating for the first time in their artist-centric comic extravaganza. Now for some work:

This illustration is for my pal Michael Lapinski's comic Feeding Ground, a supernatural modern day thriller about werewolves and The Devil's Highway. I had a lot of fun with my twist on the book's dark tone and paying homage to the state of my youth. Being a fan of seeing other artists' work process, thought I'd share my own on this piece. Here's the initial sketch I showed Michael (always drawn at print size):

Then it gets enlarged and refined with blue pencil before inking, which for the most part I use this refillable brush pen which fellow cartoonist Leland Purvis turned me onto a while back. (I'm too impatient for dipping brushes, and this brush pen's size has a lot of versatility)

Next is adding ink washes (usually done on a separate piece of watercolor paper that has the line art lightly printed on it, than scanned and combined in P'shop):

And finally, P'shop colors. I try to limit my palettes and for this illustration, most important was capturing the beautiful and brutal heat of the desert, so it made sense to use complimentary greens to emphasize the sickliness and weariness of the traveler.

Gradually getting the hang of this "press" thing?

Here's a sneak peak at my contribution to a collaborative comic with Thi Bui that runs in the next issue of HYPHEN.

Sorry for the low res, but don't want to give too many spoilers before it hits the stands next month. I've been really fortunate to do various interviews recently to help spread the word with journalists, writers, fellow comics-connoisseurs, etc. Although I've tried to tweet them in a timely manner, seems I've missed a few so I'm correcting that wrong now and sharing the link-lovage:

I met with downtowntraveler writer Leslie Koch in an East Village cafe one afternoon and here's the result.

Journalist Ky-Phong called me up from Orange County after discovering the book and voila.

Ph.D. literature candidate Jade Hilde took time out of her busy course load to email with me for diaCritics.

And Dylan Cassard and the rest of the comicbookofthemonth crew just ran VIETNAMERICA through their gauntlet here.