Back from Vacation
So I’m back from a week of vacation and back from celebrating my 40th with my family and having a really good time.
I wanna thank everyone who left kind messages on Substack, YouTube, and all the socials - and those of you who reached out to me in person.
You made the birthday feel as good as it possibly could, even though I may have been feeling a little bit down about it at times. I had a really good time, and I really appreciate everyone.
The big thing is, I knew the vacation was coming and had been planning for it for a long time, so I made sure that videos were recorded and ready to go while I was away. If I didn’t tell you, you wouldn’t have known I was on vacation.
I left a little gap to talk about being 40 while I had actually turned 40 - a little bit of me being artsy, I guess. But I still had videos going through the rest of the week, the newsletter planned, and everything.
Showing Up Even When You Don’t Feel Like It
Then I kind of got lazy and rested on my laurels. I hate doing these posts the day of, because I feel like I’m not giving you my best.
I’m also returning to the gym after a long absence. I hit 40 and thought: you know what, I better start taking my health seriously before the health takes me seriously.
One of the things about the gym is you have to go whether or not you want to go. There’s a difference between going when you’re not ready versus going when you just don’t feel like it.
You don’t wanna go and injure yourself, especially as you get older - something I’ve experienced myself, where I pushed through like I would in my 20s, tried that in my 30s, and paid the price for it.
So on those days when I’m rested, relatively healthy, and still don’t feel like going - I go anyway. Maybe I don’t give 100%, maybe I give 80%. Maybe I’m not targeting PRs on the squat rack or the bench press.
I’m just going through the motions, and I find that when I start going through the motions, things get a lot easier.
Some days they don’t. Some days it’s a slog from beginning to end - and frankly, that’s kind of how I’m feeling today with the newsletter.
I had a really hard time getting something together this week. I put way too much thought into it. I had some very clear goals and things I wanted to talk about up until now, and now I’m kind of coasting.
Fortunately, that is a topic in itself: when you don’t feel like it, just do it anyway. You don’t wanna phone it in, you don’t wanna put out subpar work - but sometimes the act of doing is what gets you going.
Finishing the Crimson Frontier Script
One of the big things I really had to push through lately was finishing the script for Crimson Frontier.
Usually what I do is finish an issue, send it to the artist, and then let the pressure of knowing they’re working on issue one push me to start writing issue two. I usually have a strong outline, so I’m not going all over the place.
But with Crimson Frontier, I strayed so far from the outline that I was pretty much reworking it as I went. I wanted to make sure the series made sense from beginning to end - and that became a struggle, because normally I have the guidepost of a strong outline to follow, and this time I blew it up as I went.
I think it’s much better for it. I think you guys are really gonna enjoy this series when we finally get to it.
I’m finalizing the timeline with Daniel now to see when he thinks he may be able to deliver the book - I’m hoping late summer, but it may be fall.
Either way, I think it’s gonna be a lot of fun, and it’ll be a natural transition from From Parts Unknown to SNIP to Crimson Frontier in the direct market and on Kickstarter.
From Parts Unknown - Issue 2 and Beyond
From Parts Unknown number two is hitting shelves this week, which is very exciting.
It’s a little bit longer of a hiatus than I would have expected, but in trying to do the FOC trick - where you order issue one and then get proper orders for issue two - it meant that we skipped May.
So on June 3rd, we’ve got the next issue of From Parts Unknown coming out.
And I’m getting everything together for issue five, which has something really cool happening - something a little different. We have a brand new cover created by Daniel. He’s working on that right now before he jumps into Crimson Frontier.
So if you supported the Kickstarter campaigns, this is something brand new that you haven’t seen before. I really do appreciate those of you supporting both - you’re gonna like how issue five turns out.
SNIP Fulfillment and Big Smoke Pulp Misprint
I’m also actively finalizing the fulfillment for SNIP. Issues one and two will be hitting your mailboxes very soon.
Gemini will be doing all the US fulfillment and I’ll be handling international. It takes a lot off my shoulders, but I still need to get everything together so they know who to send things to.
And then there’s Big Smoke Pulp. We just finished Volume Two and got those books out to people - which is great. However, there was a misprint.
The reprints of Big Smoke Pulp Volume One, the paperback edition, cut off at a weird place where even the title goes right off the edge of the page.
Fortunately, we can fix this. There’s a bit of a delay getting it all corrected, because I want to make sure I’m not sending another incorrect version to everybody.
Printing errors happen - I’m working with the printer to get that sorted and get proper copies in everyone’s hands very soon.
I really thought we’d be done with the print portion of Big Smoke Pulp by now and I’d just be focused on the audiobook. Instead I find myself chasing the print again.
It is what it is. That’s part of publishing, and that’s the struggle I asked for. I’m happy to have it, but not always happy to deal with the challenges that come with it.
I don’t want anybody to regret having backed something from Pesto Comics. I don’t love that things go wrong - but I love the opportunity to fix it, and I love learning all this so that next time I know exactly what to look for before things go out to backers.
Naked Kaiju Woman #3 and SNIP #3-5 Coming Soon
Naked Kaiju Woman number three should be launching any time now. I’m just waiting for three more pages from Rafael, and then I’ll be comfortable hitting the button - because I know the book will be done by the time the campaign’s over.
Once I get those last three pages, I’ll announce a date and we’ll get Naked Kaiju Woman number three launched.
And as soon as that’s done, we’ll get SNIP three, four, and five launched on Kickstarter as well.
That means making sure both campaigns are ready to go so that when one finishes, I can jump onto the next - fulfilling Naked Kaiju Woman while running the SNIP campaign properly, while also getting SNIP number one ready for the direct market.
It’s a lot at once, and I love that. But it’s also slowing me down on getting some cool new projects off the ground.
I’ve been talking with a couple of other artists on projects you haven’t heard of yet at all, and I’m very excited to talk about those once we’re much further down the line.
Closing Thoughts
It’s all about making sure the train keeps rolling and things get where they need to get on time, at the quality I hope to deliver - which is better than you’d expect. That means showing up every day, whether I want to or not.
I’m here today, and I will be every week that I possibly can. I may not be perfect, I may be late here and there, I may not always have as much to talk about - but I wanna thank you for always being here and always providing your support.
It means a ton, and there’s a lot of cool things coming.
If you haven’t already, make sure you go to your comic shop and pick up From Parts Unknown number two next Wednesday. Pre-order issues three and four as well - and five will be coming after that.
Make sure they’re all pre-ordered so your comic shop knows to order them.
And make sure you follow Naked Kaiju Woman number three on Kickstarter, and SNIP three through five on Kickstarter.
There’s a lot more coming, and I can’t wait to share all of it with you. It’s thanks to your support that it’s all possible. Thank you very much - we’ll talk again next week.
