Impractical marine engineering experience is less useful but often more fun.

A quick little San Diego update before I go jumping on a plane tomorrow: AiT have just posted their signing schedule for Comic Con. It may be a little subject to last minute changes, but if all goes according to plan you should be able to find me doing a signing stint at 4pm on Thursday & Saturday and at 1pm on Friday. And that’s booth number 2001, in case you were wondering. Hope to see a few of you there!

Very busy! Very! But not so busy that I can’t take time for a few quick updates. Firstly, I got to have a nice long chat with Tom Spurgeon the other day and the resulting interview can now be seen at The Comics Reporter. One of the things I mention in the interview that I think might be worth repeating here – I’m currently looking for artistic collaborators on a number of graphic novel projects. If you’re a comics artist and you think you might enjoy illustrating one of my scripts, drop me an e-mail on merlin (at) e-merl.com with some examples of your work. It may take me a little time to reply as I’m away on my travels for the next two weeks, but I promise everyone who gets in contact will hear back from me as soon as I can manage it.

Speaking of travels, San Diego Comic Con International is – yikes - less than a week away! This year I’ll once again be based at the AiT/PlanetLar booth, so do say hello if you happen to be passing by. I’ll have on hand copies of the Necessary Monsters ash-can, a new All Knowledge Is Strange mini and maybe even some artwork from the new Marvel project that you’ll be able to take a peek at.

Once I return from the US I’ll be stumbling, no doubt sleep deprived and half blind towards Oxford where I’ll be setting up for The Caption Comics Collective gallery show. The show will be open for the whole of August at the Oxford Jam Factory, with a special gala-opening night taking place on 8th August at 8pm. I’ll be displaying my work alongside a veritable gaggle of cartooning talent so I’m sure it’ll be well worth popping along to if you happen to be in the area. I imagine it would be handy if there was some kind of flyer that contained all the pertinent details about the show. But wait! What’s that oblong image to the left of these very words? Huzzah!

Keeping my vow of more regular updates, I bring to your attention the new anthology comic, Who Gives A **** About Mickey Rourke? The great and the good of the British small press scene are present, each giving loving tribute to the legendary Hollywood actor turned boxer. They also let me in for some reason, so look out for a one page horror tale from yours truly entitled The Right Eye Of Mickey Rourke. Apart from the countless lies it’s a 100% true story. Honest.

Elsewhere in Marvel Comics news, I recently got to see the pencils for the first chapter of the new serial I’ve written for them. I think I can probably safely reveal the story’s title – Endless Stolen Sky – without giving away any info as to who it might star or what it’s about. And the pencils themselves are full of awesome – I’m now on the edge of my seat waiting to see the other five chapters brought to life.

I should probably try and post to this blog more often, yes? Anyhoo, got quite a few things to update you on. First off on the webcomic front, Necessary Monsters is now up and running with new pages being added every Monday and Wednesday. The Rule Of Death is of course also still updating regularly on Fridays at Serializer. Add to that All Knowledge Is Strange which updates on Tuesdays and Thursdays and that means – heavens! - I’m now running brand new comics five days a week. How on earth did that happen?

Meanwhile In the world of print, it would appear to be a good time to read my work in other languages. Le Dernier Cow-Boy has now been released by L’an 2 and is no doubt available from all good bookshops in France as we speak. While over in Spain two anthologies I’m in - Best New Manga and Giant Size Avengers - have received Spanish Translations (El Gran Libro Del Manga and Los Poderosos Vengadores, respectively). If any of my multilingual readers would like to let me know what they thought of the translations, then do get in touch.

While I’m thinking about anthologies, I should also mention that I recently wrote and drew a story for the Accent UK Robots anthology. The book is currently available (via Diamond) in your local comicbook store and you can check out a preview page from my contribution here. It’s a silly little thing, but I’m quite pleased with how it turned out.

What else? Oh yeah, I finished writing the sixth and final part of my next Marvel gig the other week. Although I’m really not allowed to tell you anything substantial about it yet and I’m sure I’ll have a few rewrites to do once my editor’s had a chance to go through it. But look for something quite fun with my name on it to appear from Marvel around the end of the year.

Stop the presses! Those attending the Bristol International Comic Expo will be able to get their hands on an exclusive preview of the first chapter of my new webcomic project, Necessary Monsters. Just wander over to the London Underground Comics table and you’ll be able to find either myself or my artistic collaborator Sean Azzopardi on hand to sell you a copy of our thrilling new pictorial spy-horror narrative.

Those not attending the show may want to point their browsers at the link I slipped into the above paragraph as it will take you to the new Necessary Monsters website. Not too much to see there yet as I’ve still to do a popper design job on the place, but if you poke around you’ll find a few nuggets of info about our new soon-to-be-weekly webcomic serial.

Jumping on a plane in the morning and heading out to New York for the NYC Comic Con. The plan this year consists mostly of just wandering around and seeing if I can track down some more writing gigs. Bonus points and free comics to anyone who successfully identifies me in the crowd and says nice things about E-merl. Oh and if you’re reading this and you’re a publisher (unlikely) or someone I know (more likely) attending the convention, then drop my an e-mail on merlin (at) e-merl.com and I’ll see if we can figure out somewhere to meet up.

A few weeks ago I did an interview with Alexander Danner which he’s now turned into a rather jolly article all about little ol’ me at Webcomics.com. Go take a look for an idea of where my head’s at currently, comic creation wise. Towards the end of the piece there’s also a new little detail about the upcoming Marvel gig and the first official announcement of my other big project this year, Necessary Monsters. Can’t say too much about NM yet, but to whet your appetite here’s a sneak-peak of some artwork courtesy of my collaborator on the series, Sean Azzopardi.

It’s The UK Web & Mini Comix Thing this Saturday and I’ll be there in Mile End selling my wares as usual - do come and say hello if you’re in the area. Alternatively, if you fancy a little comics rebellion, head over to Camden on Saturday where a gaggle of young upstarts will be running a rival stall in Camden Market. Fortunately, thanks to some fiendish political manoeuvring, I’ve arranged events so that my comics will be available for sale on the Camden stall as well. The cutthroat world of British comics ladies and gentlemen – it always pays to think two-and-a-half steps ahead.

Point your inter-browser at these co-ordinates and you can now download the electrical podcast trickery of myself and Alex Fitch ruminating on the subject of comic periodicals and my own pathway into said medium. Huzah!

Oh, and because I mention it in the interview – Yes, I’m writing something else for Marvel at the moment. Don’t think I’m allowed to say what yet, but it’ll probably start appearing in a Marvel comic near you towards the end of the year. More news as it happens.

Two bits of unrelated news linked by the letter R. First off, I just recorded a radio interview with Alex Fitch for London based Resonance FM. I’m convinced I blathered like a crazy person, but Alex assures me otherwise. I guess you can judge for yourself if you’re in London on Thursday and tune to 104.4 FM at 5pm. There’ll also apparently be a podcast of the interview available, so I’ll throw the link up for that as soon it goes live.

My second R of the day stands for Robots, the new anthology book from Accent UK which is now available for order via Diamond in good comic shops everywhere. I mention this because I’ve got a story in the book called Robot Heart about a guy with, well, a robot heart. Head over to the Accent UK site to see further previews from the other contributors. Looks to be a fun anthology judging from all the names involved and the work on display.