Kids' comics

We've been fans of TEEN BOAT since we saw the first mini comics, and the fact that they're having a book launch ON a boat is entirely fitting.

Garen Ewing has been working on his three volume graphic novel The Adventures of Julius Chancer: The Rainbow Orchid for over a decade. The final volume was recently released by Egmont in the UK, and it seemed a good time to talk to him about his influences, his process, and his future plans.

As any parents out there know, the iPhone/tablet as babysitter is a rapidly growing tradition among harried moms and dads. And as reported in Variety, DC is launching a DC Nation app to take advantage of this market—and grow future readers.

Although the video is not embeddable (that we can see), Scholastic sponsored this chat with Jeff Smith, Kazu Kibuishi, and Raina Telgemeier which was streamed to classrooms across the nation. If I was a kid in school, cartoonists drawing pictures is what I would definitely like seeing in class.

Remember how we keep telling you that kids' graphic novels are the fastest growing segment of the US GN market? One of the reason for the spurt is that the books keep getting better. For example, GIANTS BEWARE! from First Second by writer Jorge Aguirre and artist Rafael Rosado. It's a pretty simple tale:

Here's what I discovered at the recent American Library Association Mid-Winter conference in Dallas, Texas! Librarians are rocking the graphic novels!

2012 sees Telgemeier's next book, DRAMA, and it's another bullseye to the interests of middle-schoolers, dealing with the ever popular school play. On her blog, she just released the cover and it looks like another winner.

DC and Lego have teamed for an app that offers all-new, all-free comics. This could be significant, for reasons explained below.

In related and interesting news, Dav Pilkey's two Super Diaper Baby spinoff graphic novels will get e-books on January 31 of this year, each with supplemental material for that e-book/DVD extra format. These have the potential to be among the biggest selling e-comics of the year -- or not since every kid has a print version. Worth keeping an eye on.

With all the popularity of High School Musical/Glee/American Idol and other performance-based media these days, comics have been tiptoeing around this genre. There was Siena and Mark Siegel's To Dance; and Raina Telgemeier's upcoming DRAMA!, due this fall. And here's a new one from Papercutz, Dance Class: So You Think You Can Hip-Hop by Béka, aka Bertrand Escaich and Caroline Rogue. Aimed squarely at tween girls, it's another French pick up for the publisher, and it looks pretty charming.

Given that creator Pendleton Ward is a huge comics reader and sometime cartoonist and that half the staff consists of folks you would normally see at Stumptown, AND that the cartoon itself is heavily influenced by generations of alt.comix (Ward says Trondheim's Dungeon comics are a huge influence) ....it's a surprise that up until now there hasn't been an ADVENTURE TIME comic book based on the hugely popular Cartoon Network show. But now BOOM!! is remedying that with a new ongoing monthly series written by Ryan North (DINOSAUR COMICS) with art by Shelli Paroline (ICE AGE: ICED IN and MUPPET SNOW WHITE.) It's part of Boom's KaBOOM! kid line. Also of note: the book is coming out from BOOM! rather than DC, which, like the Cartoon Network, is owned by Warner Bros.

While you may be in full-on holiday panic mode, there's always spring...and Halloween. Next spring's Courtney Crumrin, Volume 1: The Night Things, Special Edition will see the sardonic young monster-hunter in color for the first time. Ted Naifeh's all ages gothic waif is one of the first -- and the best -- of this sub-genre of comics, and it looks great in color by Warren Wucinich.