RA Goes Graphic: Comic Books, Manga, & More

“RA Goes Graphic: Comic Books, Manga, & More”

Held Saturday, May 3rd 2008

The 2008 Readers’ Advisory Spring Retreat at the MN Landscape Arboretum

Ice Breaker: History lesson on graphic novels. Share a title that you like or have heard of, or thought was intriguing (though you may not have read it!)

So what’s up with the art work? Christopher Jones, a DC Comic book penciller/artist will help us break down the process of creating a comic. He also will share his knowledge and information on the local comic book scene and make some recommendations.

Christopher Jones (www.christopherjonesart.com) has been working in comics professionally since 1989, penciling, inking and sometimes writing for publishers including DC, Image, Malibu, Caliber, and Sundragon Comics. Most of Chris' work in recent years has been penciling for DC Comics, where he is the regular penciller on The Batman Strikes, the comic based on the new Warner Brothers animated Batman series. Chris currently holds the title as artist of the most circulated Batman and Superman comics of all time. Chris won this trivia-worthy title when he provided pencil art for installments of the mini-comics distributed with the Justice League toys in Burger King kids meals in 2003. The comics had print runs of 35 million copies.

Manga -- An introduction to “That Japanese Stuff.” Anna Waltz will help us answer some of our most pressing questions: Are you confused by these new publications? Do you feel as if you need to learn a new language just to keep up?

Anna Waltz is a local science fiction writer and life-long comic book collector. She frequently speaks at sci-fi and anime conventions. What's good? What do you need to watch out for? Come learn about Japanese manga and why it's so popular. We'll examine the history, lingo, categories, publishing, and trends of this exciting genre.