This indeed was mine and chum Bolton's first trip to the festival and we had a tip-top time. The whole shebang was well organised, there was lots to see and do and best of all, there was a fabbo 'chum-like' feeling to the whole weekend. Huzzah for the team of volunteers on hand at the show - from their careful managing of the queues for signings that threatened to overwhelm us small-pressers tables, to the merry distribution of drinks and sarnies to us over the weekend. It's quite often the case that the work of the folk behind the scenes at these sort of shows gets overlooked, but their work was indeed invaluable.
Huzzah also then for the folk who organised and put the show on. I know that I'm not the most experienced of convention-comic-seller, but I'd be massively surprised if this doesn't become my favourite show of them all.
(Am I managing to sell this to you yet?)
Like I said, we had a grrrrrreat time. I sold a fair few comics (and brought a whole lot more), talked to a whole load of lovely people (far too many to mention) and got simply overwhelmed by the amount of fantastic work that is being done in the comics world - all handily gathered in Leeds the past weekend. I've come back from up north nothing but inspired by the work I've seen and really can't wait to get cracking on with new stuff of my own.
The only criticism then (and hardly a fair one), is that there was almost too much to see there. I did only nip away from the table for an hour or two over the weekend but have come away kicking myself about the people I was keen to meet and talk to, but simply didn't find the time. I'm looking at you, Paul Rainey, Rob Jackson, etc, etc, etc.
So, some piccies then......
Meself and Bolton's table - just up the road from the very pleasant Peter Doherty and equally lovely Geof Darrow. I do hope that they weren't too intimidated by sitting this close to my humble scribblings gentle reader.
The obligatory bag of swag what I came back with....
I'm not going to list these in too much detail (they're all worth your while picking up), but honourable mentions here to Laura Howell's always-super Gilbert and Sullivan, the second issue of the fabbo Hitsville, the spook-tacular Boo! anthology, and my personal hit of the weekend - the fantastic Fever Dreams by Adam Murphy.
(Top also to catch up with chums Steve Quirke, Kel Winser, fellow MC2ers and Stephen Aryan, amongst other peeps)
Our only task now is to sort through the pile of cracking entries what we had to our drawing competition over the weekend.... Leeds was indeed full of very talented young (and not so young) artists. Watch this space for news on the winners.....
Yippee for Thought Bubble then chums. I'm already looking forward to next year's.....
Your chum
RT
