We are finally back from the San Diego Comic Con!

Despite spending 30+ hours in the air and my being lactose intolerant in a country where even the cheese comes with a side of cheese, all of our Australian contingent had a really successful con, with guaranteed work, job offers and piles of possibilities for all.

Wolfgang Bylsma and Australia’s own Gestalt Publishing  hit the con (via Tokyo) hard, where they announced a number of projects including Rombies (a Roman zombies book written by me and illustrated by Skye Ogden) and set up all sorts of distribution deals, licensed properties and other projects.  This is Gestalt’s year, people.  They’ve arrived.

The hinted at ‘WarGame’, to be illustrated by the awesome Wayne Nichols, had interest from no less than five publishers, so that’s looking like it may be in development soon.

A new Star Wars project looks like it’s on the cards for me, with another one appearing on the Dark Horse website later this week.  There are also a number of projects that I can’t even hint at that look like they will almost definitely happen.

Randy Stradley and I finally got to meet – Randy is a damn fine editor who I owe a lot and I will work for forever if he lets me.  Let me, Randy!

Some random highlights:-

- The enormous Invasion image that could be seen from miles away in the convention center.

- Meeting Gerard Way and Joss Whedon – Fellow Dark Horse writers (I think they do some other stuff too).

- Dinner with Randy Stradley and Colin – Wine, beer, steak and Star Wars;  what a combo.

- The tour of the DC Wildstorm offices in La Jolla – Big thanks to Ben Abernathy for lunch and all of the free books!

- Catching up with Todd McFarlane again and his praise of ‘The Example’ – Still blows my mind that that guy has so much time for everyone.  I’d love to write something for him soon.

- Meeting other creators like Mike Mignola, Jeff Darrow, Dave Dorman, Steven T Seagle, Mick Harrison, Daxiong, Brian Wood, The Fabulous Fillbach Brothers, Gabriel Ba, Adam Hughes, Bryan Talbot, Dave Gibbons, Robert Kirkman and Joe Kelly.

- The surprise of reading Joe Kelly’s ‘I Kill Giants’ on the plane ride home – The single best thing I’ve read this year.

- The Mustang we hired to get around in.

- The bar directly across the road from our house.

- And, lastly, the all-Australian dinner where Nicola Scott and I had a quick meeting before asking about twenty people to get up from the table and move to a cheaper restaurant… class.