The season of holiday cheer and festive gifting has descended upon us like a feathered flurry of ravenous harpies.  Their joyful talons outstretched, poised to tear seasonal revellers into decorative ribbons of mirth and merriment.

If you love the holiday season as much as I do, you’re probably spending most of your time these days agonizing over what gifts to buy whom this year. Particularly those comic book fans that are always oh-so-hard to shop for – you know the ones, that sister with an obsessive webcomic fixation, or that husband that can’t be torn away from his DC and/or Marvel monthlies.

Well stress no longer, gentle reader. For The Fabler Blog has once again provided a list of gift ideas for comic book fans.

Actually, a lot of these gift ideas would  apply just as well to anyone on your holiday buying list, whether they consider themselves to be existing comic fans or otherwise.  These are gifts for anyone (that just happen to tie into comics in one way or another).

Most items on the list fall into a price range of around $15 – $40, with only a couple of notable exceptions.

Let’s get started, shall we?

Holiday Cards at Topatoco

The first item on the list isn’t technically a gift item, but I’m including it anyway.  Reason being, because Topatoco is awesome and holiday cards are the best presents for friends that don’t quite make your “willing to spend more than 5 dollars on” list but you still want to know you don’t quite hate them.

This year’s holiday card selection includes designs from Hijinks Ensue, Sam & Fuzzy, Exploding Dog, Bad Decision Dinosaur, and the always fabulous Brandon Bird. One set will set you back $15.

Machine of Death

What if all of your favorite webcomic writers and illustrators came together to produce a ‘Creative-Commons-licensed fiction anthology’ of short stories about a machine that could tell people how they are going to die? This hypothetical self-published collection of sci-fi tales would (naturally) be edited by Ryan North of Dinosaur Comics, and within its pages would be something so sinister… so dripping with insidiously evil energy, that even Glenn Beck would be forced to take note.

Blow your friends’ minds with the revelation that this book exists. Blowing may be initiated at Amazon or Topatoco for the meagre sum of around $18.

Questionable Content Vol 1

I can’t get enough Questionable Content. Seriously. Jeph Jacques lays down clever wit and believable character-driven stories of everyday life like Flava Flav drops borderline intelligible hype chants about being awesome. That is to say, he does it well. Scarily well.

Despite QC’s status as a long-running webcomic (of roughly seven years), Jacques only just recently released his first print collection of the strips with Questionable Content Vol 1. The book contains the first 300 comics, minus guest strips, and includes artist commentary.

A perfect gift for anyone interested in closely scrutinizing the personal lives of a circle of directionless, indie-music-loving friends as they crack jokes, get drunk, and consume lattes. $18  plus shipping.

Speaking of shipping, all of the items mentioned so far are available from Topatoco and are subject to their Holiday shipping deadlines. Check their site to find out how much longer you can put off your online Holiday shopping.

The Abominable Charles Christopher -  Book One

If spying into the love lives of infallibly clever indie rock kids falls outside of your giftee’s realm of interest, maybe they’ll be interested in following these exceptionally well-drawn adventures of a loveable, yeti-like beast.

Karl Kerschl’s ongoing masterpiece The Abominable Charles Christopher (his contribution to the Transmission X stable of webcomics) is one of the most highly-lauded internet comic strips out there.  And for good reason. It’s hard to put the innate charm of ACC into words, so instead I’ll recommend you pop on over to the site and read through a few strips yourself.

The Abominable Charles Christopher – Book  One is a prestige hardcover book collecting all of the comics from the first two years of the series. You can pick the regular edition up over at the TX Shop for $40.

Tangles

As if I haven’t gone on about Tangles enough, I will endeavour one more time to relate the sheer emotional power contained in this book about a daughter and her Mom’s struggle with Alzheimer’s Disease.

The author, Sarah Leavitt, wrote and illustrated this graphic memoir as a personal look into the ways in which her relationship with her Mother changed after the latter was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s.  Alternatingly heart-wrenching and quirkily charming, I think that Tangles has perhaps the broadest appeal of any item on this list.

Available from Freehand Books for $23.95 US/CDN.

Two Generals

Have an estranged Uncle interested in Canadian WW2 history? A second cousin who likes adventure comic books that double as immaculately-researched period pieces? Or maybe you just know someone that appreciates good art, a good story, and a solid helping of Canadiana.

If any of the above are true, you may be interested in purchasing a copy of Scott Chantler’s graphic novel Two Generals for someone on your gift list. Ostensibly about Scott’s real-life grandfather Law Chantler as per the entries found in his WW2 war diary, Two Generals is really a story about friendship in the face of the uncompromising realities of war.

Two Generals can be purchased for $17.55 CDN on Amazon.ca.

Bigfoot

The latest graphic novel from Quebec-based illustrator Pascal Girard, Bigfoot is, according to publisher Drawn And Quarterly,  “a reflection on youth and budding romantic feelings”.  Drawn with wonderfully expressive simplicity, Bigfoot is the story of an average small-town teenager who finds unwanted internet fame when a youTube video of him dancing in his living room goes viral.

My recommendation of this book, which just released on December 7th, is based largely on Girard’s previous graphic novel, Nicolas. Nicolas is about Girard’s younger brother, who passed away when they were both very small. It really highlighted Pascal’s ability to capture readers through nostalgically relatable dialogue and simple-but-lively linework.

If Bigfoot can tell a story that’s even half as poignant as Nicolas, this D+Q graphic novel is one worth having. Consider it for the indie comic collector on your list, available for $20.95 CDN from Amazon.

Scott Pilgrim’s Precious Little Box Set

Here’s where we segue into gifts that might gel better with more ‘mainstream’ comic fans. Beginning with – naturally – the box set of Scott Pilgrim Books by Ontario-based writer and artist Bryan Lee O’Malley.

I would wager ten solid hypothetical dollars that you know someone who loved the Michael Cera film, Scott Pilgrim vs The World, but has yet to read any of the comics on which the script was based. This is your opportunity to educate that person on what they’re missing out on.

Scott Pilgrim’s Precious Little Box Set, collecting all six volumes of Bryan Lee O’Malley’s epic tale of a slacker versus the seven evil ex-boyfriends of the girl of his dreams, can be found on Amazon.ca for $56.70 CDN.

Sweet Tooth Vol 2: In Captivity

Though you’ll have to postpone your gift-buying until December 14th to pick up this title, it will most definitely be worth the wait.

The second collected Trade Paperback of Jeff Lemire’s Sweet Tooth saga, Sweet Tooth Vol 2: In Captivity, collects issues 6 to 11 of the post-apocalyptic tale about animal/human hybrids and an unlikely source of hope in a bleak world.

Sweet Tooth nabbed Lemire an Eisner nomination for Best New Series, a distinction well-earned for his uniquely expressive, distinct style of drawing and tense, gripping storyline.

Vol 2 of the Sweet Tooth saga may be procured at your local comic shop for around $14.99.

North 40 Trade Paperback

Another relatively new must-have trade paperback is the fantastically illustrated Cthuluean adventure, North 40. Written by Aaron Williams and illustrated by fellow Calgarian Fiona Staples, the collected run spanned six issues of Lovecraftian mayhem centering around a rural Midwestern  town.

The collected edition dropped on Nov 10, and I can attest that it makes a swell addition to any horror comic enthusiast’s collection. Williams writes a mean Midwestern narrative of tentacles, witchcraft, and surly small-town Sheriffs, but Staples really cements the viability of North 40 as a holiday gift bursting with awesome.

Her ability to render a wide selection of horrific monstrosities in varying situations involving mutilation, blood-sucking, and general ultraviolence goes uncontested.

The North 40 Trade Paperback can more than likely be obtained at a local comic retailer for somewhere in the neighbourhood of $17.99.

The Walking Dead Vol 13

You may have heard about this show that’s getting a little bit of attention on obscure blogs and irrelevant news sites. It’s about zombies, see, but it’s really big budget and it’s actually based on this really exceptional comic series… wait, you already know about this?

Maybe I’m not making any revolutionary statements by suggesting that you check out Robert Kirkman’s zombie epic The Walking Dead, now a critically acclaimed television series on AMC. But hey, if you have a horror comic fan on your list that keeps halfway abreast of current titles, chances are they have already read at least some of The Walking Dead comic series.

Volume 13: Too Far Gone, which collects issues 73-78, released on November 26th. This close to the Holidays, there’s a good chance that any current Kirkman readers may have put off purchasing the book in case someone close to them with a strong intuition towards comic gifts were to consider picking it up.

You could be that person of strong intuition. Seize the power today, live up to your potential as an ideal gift-giver, and buy Volume 13 of The Walking Dead for approximately $14.99 at your local comic shop.

The Green Lantern Omnibus Vol. 1

It wouldn’t really be a gift guide for comic fans if I didn’t include at least one obligatory product for each of the respective  DC/Marvel  fans on your list.

Green Lantern may be at the centre of the current DC hype machine on account of the pending feature film starring People Magazine’s Sexiest Man Alive, but the character’s appeal to long-time comic fans goes waaay back. So far back, in fact, that DC decided an Omnibus collecting the original Lantern Hal Jordan’s first adventures would be useful/neat/relevant to fans of the character.

This first Green Lantern Omnibus collected Green Lantern issues 1-21, as well as Showcase # 22-24. The epic-sized hardcover tome covers Jordan’s origin story, his induction to the Lantern corps, and the introduction of a host of characters and villains seminal to the Lantern mythos.

This book is available for $55.18 CDN from Amazon.ca.

Obsessed With Marvel

You know, there are countless DC and Marvel collected trades out there that would make perfect gifts for many of the comic book fans out there. Necessary trades, like collections from Ed Brubaker’s run on Captain America, or Grant Morrison’s superb take on the Batman & Robin title. Both the Green Lantern Omnibus and this last gift entry, Obsessed With Marvel, are less ‘necessary’ books and more companion novelty items that compliment any comic fan’s collection.

The good news there being that, unless you’re shopping for a completionist collector, they may be less likely to own either of these products.

Obsessed With Marvel is a Hardcover trivia book with an interactive digital component that keeps track of your quiz results.  Boasting 2,500 questions spanning every corner of the Marvel Universe, I can’t see this getting old anytime soon. Check it out over on Amazon.com, where it currently sports a modest $19.77 USD price tag.

- Written by Kevin de Vlaming

Over the course of three months, comic creators posted full, 24-plus page comics for their peers to review, comment, and vote on.  After the finalists by popular vote were announced, the Fabler editorial folks went through and hand-picked three winners.

We figured, hey, if you liked their work enough to vote them into the finals, maybe you would like to know a little more about the talented individuals behind the comics.

The Grand Prize winner of this particular contest was Kutztown, Pennsylvania resident and illustrator Scott Ferguson, for his comic Scout Crossing. Ferguson, who nabbed a Wacom Cintiq 21UX by winning 1st place, originally came up with Scout Crossing because he “always wanted to do a comic about trends, and (he) wanted to have fun with it.”

Scout Crossing is more, of course, than a comic about trends. It’s a cleverly written story about a guy who could stand to apply himself a little more, a couple of strong, sassy ladies that for some reason stick by him, and the over-the-top pop culture stereotypes that want him dead. All this with awesome art and a chain-smoking Pizzly Bear to boot (look it up).

I talked to Scott about Scout Crossing, his early roots in comic books, and more.

The interview is below:

KD: Is illustration a full-time gig for you?

SF: Yes, I’m completely self employed. Nerf This is the comic which basically supports me, and on top of that, I also make a living working for various art directors and publishing houses around the US doing branding and illustration for their projects.

KD: How far back does your interest in comics go? Do you still remember what specifically got you hooked you on the medium?

SF: Hah, my interest in comics goes back to elementary school, where my older brother had a collection of X-Men and Image comics. This was around 1995 I believe, because I remember Spawn and the Savage Dragon were fairly new.  After this I started reading Spider-man and decided both that my favorite villain/hero was  Venom, and that I wanted to start my own comic.  (I may have been 11 or 12).

KD: How did you get started actually making comics?

SF: This might be something of an anticlimactic answer, but after reading some other comics on the web, I thought that I could do something like that, and maybe if I try hard enough, I could do something even better (still a very far-fetched idea).  After I started Nerf This, I almost immediately began to notice that drawing a comic every day was helping me become a better illustrator, and the feedback I was receiving was fantastic, so comic-ing became something almost like a disease (a fun, healthy disease of course).

Next I want to start a small press company for the comics I update.  The most important thing I’ve always wanted to do was to avoid ever drawing for a huge company.  I’ve always wanted to draw for myself.

KD: If you had to name three of the biggest influences on your artistic style (or storytelling), who would you absolutely have to mention?

SF: I’m not sure if I really have strong influences, but there are a few comics that come to mind.  Artistically, I’m completely envious of D. Helmer’s “the Meek“, I hope to have half that talent one day.  Ramone Perez’s “Kukuburi” – that man is a master of his craft, and I always look forward to what he’s coming up with.

Lastly, this applies especially with the writing, The Abominable Charles Christopher by Karl Kerschl. His ability to develop a story is a great thing, and his punchlines are brilliantly timed.

KD: How much of Scout Crossing is informed by your own experiences with cultural clichés? (the pretentious scenesters, the coffeehouse indie kids, etc)

SF: Scout Crossing is my favorite project because of the experiences that have accompanied it.  I used to live in a city that had an awesome coffee shop which was always packed. My friends and I were there almost every day, and the mix of people and styles you saw were great. The same applies to the bands I occasionally work with – I find myself being introduced to a new music scene with almost every client I meet.

I was just at a small art show last week, and someone who looked to be a few years younger than me walked past me, and even rolled his eyes… this was especially awesome because he had just a mustache, capri pants, a beanie, and sandals made from rope.  I immediately thought, “Wow, I’m drawing you in Scout Crossing”.

I love indie culture, the art, the music, all of it.

KD: How did Scout Crossing originally get its start?

SF: This answer might be a bit wonky, but I honestly just started drawing a few pages, and the story started coming together in my mind. Now, after 45 pages, I have a clear goal where I want the story to go.  Scout Crossing is entirely dedicated to my oldest brother, who was also an artist, and much more talented than myself.

KD: How do you go about  creating a page of Scout Crossing?

SF: My friends are a huge inspiration for my creating comics. They like Scout as much as I do, and we’re always throwing around ideas for what could happen. Having more than one person’s insight and brainstorming on a project is just as important (if not more important) than the art itself.

This next part of my answer is going to be honest, but completely embarrassing.  After I have an idea, I completely draw and render the strips before I actually write out the panels.  I have a decent concept of what I want my characters to express in a post, and that helps my finalize the writing.

The “equipment” I use is pretty straightforward, I sketch out a page on 11 x 14 bristol board, scan it in at 600 dpi, and I’ll set up my panels and frames accordingly.  Once I have this all done, I’ll begin tracing my lines with my old intuos 2 tablet, and once that is done, I move on to coloring, shading, highlights, effects, and textures, all in that order.  I use Photoshop CS5 to do all of this, and by the end of a piece, I often have over 50-60 layers in a single document.  All writing for the comic is done in Adobe Illustrator, so once that’s done I just import the lettering over and bubble it out.

KD: The other webcomic you’re currently regularly updating is Nerf This.

What could you say about the tonal differences between the two comics, and the different experience that each presents when you sit down to create a strip/page?

SF: It’s almost like night and day, Nerf This is very simple compared to Scout, especially aesthetically.  With Nerf This, you really don’t have to worry about camera angles or character placement.  I love writing and drawing both of them – they both have a different style of humor, and I believe that if I just had the one comic and not the other, I’d almost be terrified I would get a little bored.  The one thing that is a universal emotion for me is that I can’t allow myself to feel uninspired with either. I have to constantly update all of them, and I have to be excited about it every time I sit in front of my computer.

KD: Last question, just for fun.

If a film exec approached you tomorrow about a movie based on Scout Crossing, who would you tell him you’d like to see play the characters we’ve been introduced to so far?

SF: First, I would tell the guy that he’s making a horrid mistake, and my comic is nowhere near the quality of the movie screen. Then I would run in circles until I tired myself out from excitement.

Buuuut, I need to be more movie savvy for this… I could say maybe James Mcavoy for Boyd Pizzly.  Nora Zehetner for Penny Smashworthy, Joseph Gordon-Levitt for Scout Crossing, and maaaaayyyybe Emma Stone for Liz.  I would also include an actual Pizzly Bear for Pizzly Bear.

(If you sum this up, you can obviously see that I don’t make any sense.)

Congratulations to Scott again for being the First ever First Place Winner on a Fabler Contest! I’m definitely looking forward to seeing more of Scout, as well as the wickedly funny Nerf This.

For more from Scott, you can visit his home page, follow him on Twitter, or check out his comics on The Fabler.

-Interview by Kevin de Vlaming

The gladiator arena of a shopping event known as Black Friday has also come to pass, marking another herald of the soon-to-be-frantic X-mas buying season.

If you’re like me and you don’t start buying your holiday gifts in June, there’s a good chance you’re still scratching your head over what to buy your rolling crew. That’s a crew that you roll with. Like friends, only with more rep. Nevermind.

Anyway, point is, if you have some presents left to buy for individuals even mildly interested in comics – don’t sweat it! The Fabler is here to help.

Presented for your X-mas shopping convenience, we’ve compiled a shortlist of some easily recommendable titles and miscellany, complete with links to their respective websites for online ordering.

I’ve arbitrarily chosen five categories to organize the following suggestions within, and – for bonus convenience – alliterated each of the category titles.

Canadian Comic Holiday Shopping Ideas

Humour

Hark! A Vagrant: Never Learn Anything from History

It is regularly unanimously agreed upon that Kate Beaton is hilarious. Her webcomic Hark! A Vagrant, which irreverently pokes fun at great moments (and people) in history, is validly difficult to read without chuckling. Try it, I dare you. Buying this collection of some of Kate’s best strips for someone as an introduction to her work has to be among the best things you could do for a person (providing they have any sense of humor at all).

Bear Nuts: Volume 1

Alison Acton writes a funny webcomic about a group of cute cartoon bears that live together in the zoo. Only the bears have personality disorders. Some have addictions, some dabble in sadomasochism, and still others regularly self-medicate. Oh, and there are actually bears named Gay Bear, Crack Bear, and Tanked Bear. I guarantee you know someone who will find Acton’s perverse imaginings a riot.

Least I Could Do: I Am Not a Credible Source

Ryan Sohmer and Lar de Souza are known for not one, but two famous webcomics. WoW fans might know them best for Looking for Group,  but Least I Could Do has to be their most consistently funny collaborative work. Whether you have a self-aware narcissist on your x-mas list that you’d like to spitefully mock, or if you just know someone who likes sex  jokes often embedded with pop cultural commentary, this collection of LICD’s sixth year of strips is a no-brainer.

Horror/Sci-Fi

Jan’s Atomic Heart

Robots, revolutionaries, and conspiracy plots abound in this future thriller set in Germany. Artist/writer Simon Roy might be new to comics, but his debut effort is a radtastic romp through an impressively fleshed-out alternate universe.  You don’t have to think robot terrorists plot are sweet to be able to appreciate receiving this book as a gift, but it probably helps.

The Nobody

Jeff Lemire appears twice on this list, and for good reason. The Nobody, a modern retelling of Orson Welles’ the Invisible Man, is a contemporary work of genius. Both poignant and faithful in tone to the original, the Nobody successfully transplants the mythos created by Welles to modern small town North America. With art perfectly matched to the book’s somber tone of isolation, the Nobody would make a swell gift for anyone with a love for classic thrillers, small town mysteries, or David Lynch films.

Heartfelt

The Complete Essex County

The second Lemire title that I mentioned, this trilogy collects all of Jeff’s individual Essex County tales (Tales from the Farm, Ghost Stories, and The Country Nurse) into one indispensable volume. Jeff has a talent for using his imagery an artfully sparse dialogue to tap into some of the most powerful emotions of the human experience; loss, loneliness, and ultimately, the sense of unspoken kinship that universally keeps families together.  I highly recommend this book for pretty well anyone, though hockey fans or individuals who grew up in rural surroundings might get a little something extra out of it.

True Loves (Vol. 2)

Jason Turner, together with his wife Manien Bothma, conspired to create the first volume of True Loves in 2006.  What resulted was an intriguing, genuine look at the beginnings of a relationship between two young residents of Vancouver, BC. Funny at times, while other times introspective and thoughtful, True Loves highlighted the ups and downs of an honest romance out on Canada’s West Coast. They released the second volume this past year, exploring the trials of the pair from the first volume as they endure the very real trials of a long-term relationship once the ‘puppy love’ phase has long since passed. Just a few panels of this comic are all it takes to be hooked. Also check out Turner’s website for samples of the fantastic art.

Hip titles for younger readers

Emiko Superstar

Written by Mariko Tamaki (of the provocatively well-worded graphic novel Skim) and illustrated by Steve Rolston, Emiko Superstar takes on teenage identity transition and self-discovery with a fresh sense of realism rarely present in young adult fiction. I don’t mean this book is filled with sex, drugs, and violence, for those reading into my previous statement – just that it doesn’t reek of the same dishonesty you might see in, say, a coming-of-age film starring some former mouseketeer (or something along those lines). More importantly though, Emiko Superstar really is a fun read.

Jellaby: Monster in the City

The second Jellaby book by Kean Soo is probably best bought together alongside the first, as Soo originally intended them to be a single, 300 page story. This Shuster Award-winning-story spins the tale of Portia, a ten year old girl who just recently moved to a new school, and her friendship with the titular character – a six foot tall purple monster named Jellaby. The story is undeniably charming, the artwork distinctive and eye-catching; really, what Jellaby represents is an instant children’s classic.

Hey, it’s a miscellaneous category!

Overqualified

The least directly comic-related item on my gift suggestion list, Overqualified qualifies as a great gift idea for fans of the webcomic A Softer World. Joey Comeau, who writes ASW, penned this collection of cringe-inducing cover letters as a project that originally started with several fake cover letters he actually made and mailed out. Through a series of these cover letters, Overqualified tells a story of a protagonist rife with human flaws as he candidly spills his guts out to strangers in desperate bids for employment.  Fans of A Softer World will immediately recognize Joey’s trademark dark witticism present in the letters.

Topatoco’s Collection of Holiday Greeting Cards

While Topatoco is an international purveyor of webcomic-related goodies and not a dedicated source of Canadian content, I would be remiss not to point out the excellent selection of Holiday Greeting Cards they have available for order. Be sure to check out card designs by Ryan North of Dinosaur Comics and Kate Beaton of Hark! A Vagrant.

Abominable Charles Christopher Signed Prints

Karl Kerschl’s epic weekly webcomic has earned him a healthy helping of accolades for its skilful narration and beautiful art. While technically this isn’t something exclusively released in 2009, you can place orders for recent strips to be printed, signed, and delivered for a very reasonable price.  Who wouldn’t love an artfully illustrated print of the large, furry, loveable (and easily confused) Charles Christopher?