Pack Rat Magazine is the dandy highwayman you’re too scared to mention

A big fat congratulations are in order for Marek Bennett, comic strip author/artist, and friend to Pack Rat Magazine. Those of you who have been visiting our site from the beginning will remember the interview we did with Marek about his Comics Workshop for kids. And now Marek’s work has received the recognition it deserves. He recently won the Xeric Grant for comic book self publishing. Read the press release below for more info. Well done, Mr. Bennett, kudos to you from your friends at Pack Rat.

“Mimi’s Doughnuts” Wins Xeric Award

Prestigious Self-Publishing Grant Goes to New Hampshire Comic Strip

Henniker, New Hampshire — The weekly comic strip “Mimi’s Doughnuts” has won a coveted Xeric Grant for comic book self publishing. With this award, creator Marek Bennett will self-publish a trade paperback anthology of the past four years of his comics.

The Xeric-funded anthology, entitled Breakfast at Mimi’s Doughnuts, will collect the best of the strip’s first two hundred episodes, plus several pages of original artwork and special features. Bennett plans to release the collection in the spring of 2009.

“Mimi’s Doughnuts” follows the lives of an extended family that runs a small neighborhood doughnut shop in fictional Claymont, New Hampshire. Bennett bases the strip loosely on his wife’s childhood growing up at family doughnut shops and diners in Claremont, New Hampshire.

“The characters and stories are mixtures of people and places we’ve known, people and issues I encounter in my teaching, and new ideas that come up every day,” says Bennett. “It’s the perfect setting to address so many of the issues facing small towns all over our country today.”

Past storylines use humor to deal with serious topics like diet, politics, littering, real estate development, lung cancer, domestic abuse, and global warming. Often, real-life stories and adventures find their way into Bennett’s comics. In 2007, while Bennett’s family rescued over thirty stray kittens from an abandoned house in Henniker, his comic strip characters found themselves also rescuing feral cats.

Bennett has drawn “Mimi’s Doughnuts” since 2003. The strip currently appears weekly in New Hampshire and Vermont newspapers. Bennett also offers quarterly mail-order ‘zines of his comics, with subscriptions available at his website. Bennett’s popular Comics Workshop programs for elementary- and teenaged artists run all Summer long at several locations in New Hampshire. For more information, visit Bennett’s website at: www.marekbennett.com.

The Xeric Foundation of Northampton, Massachussetts, supports independent self-publishers in the comics industry through competitive grant programs. The Foundation was established by Peter Laird, co-creator of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. For more information, visit: http://xericfoundation.org.

Pack Rat Magazine enjoys the phrase “pirate’s booty” because, tee hee, booty.

So here’s a fun fact about me. I love weird humor. Like really weird, totally left field, never see it coming in a million years kind of jokes. But not like Aqua Teen Hunger Force kind of humor. Even I have my limits. Things like The Onion, Space Ghost Coast to Coast, The Colbert Report; these are the kind of things that get me rolling in the aisles. Enter Married to the Sea. Written by Drew and Natalie Dee, these daily comics are bizarre, sometimes in the extreme. I assume that the graphics are public domain images/old brochure type art that they just scan and then add funny captions to, but it’s possible that they draw the images themselves. I haven’t been able to find any info one way or another. I think it’s funnier to assume that they are stock images, it gives the whole thing a twisted New Yorker “caption cartoon contest” feel about it. Anywho, here are a few of my favorites below.

Pack Rat Magazine won’t tell your heart, your achy, breaky heart.

I found this sweet site full of uplifting comics that I wanted to share with you. Called Bird and Moon, the title comic describes a night when one lonly bird rendevous with the moon and finally finds a friend. Author and illustrator Rosemary Mosco is based in Toronto and claims she’s new to the comic world, but she handles sequential art like a pro. Even for someone like me (who fears and avoids birds), her comics are refreshingly minimalistic and touching.

The moon has to go home, and I’m sad too!

Hi kids!  the Feb/March Issue is finally out and rarin’ to go.  Click on the pdf link below!  And remember, if you think you could do better, you’re welcome to show us what you’ve got. Submission deadlines for next issue will be March 20th.  Happy reading.

issue3.pdf

Check out Pack Rat Magazine, Issue #1!

It’s my personal opinion that you can’t spend your money on anything better than a graphic novel.  They have it all!  Great story telling, amazing art, and like a movie they have immediacy as well as  the clarity of vision.  But, like a book, they leave so much open to your own imagination.  They are, in a word, brilliant. And I’m not the only one who thinks so.  Graphic novel sales have skyrocketed in the past ten years. I remember having to drive an hour away when I was a teenager, just to get a look at the good stuff. These days they are in every major chain bookstore.  But maybe you haven’t caught the fever yet.  Maybe you’re trying to avoid superhero comic book cliches.  Well I found a helpful article from Time magazine, published about a year ago, called “5 Gripping Graphic Novels for Grownups.”  The titles they recommend are a good place to get your feet wet.  And after that I guarantee you’re going to be going back for more.

Looking for more crafting goodness? Check out Pack Rat Magazine, Issue #1!

All of you who work in publishing crafts (you know, books, ‘zines, etc.) get ready to get excited. I found some wicked awesome free fonts at TypeNow. They are based on movie logos and I LOOOOOVE them. My favorites are Apocalypse Now, Bewitched, Dark Crystal (natch), Mars Attacks, Ren & Stimpy, The Simpsons (obviously), Star Wars (of course), Spongebob Square Pants, and 28 Days Later. Plus they have fonts from band logos and video game logos, and really all the awesome, pop culture fonts you could ever possibly want. Be sure to bookmark this site.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

I’ll admit it. Today I am not feeling very insightful and creative, so I’m phoning it in a little by recommending you go to homestarrunner.com. I say phoning it in (a.k.a. half assing it) because I realize that most hip and with-it people already know about Homestar, Strong Bad, Strong Sad and the rest of the gang. But, on the off chance that our hip and with-it readers have simply been too busy and have up to now miss out on the greatness that is
homestarrunner.com, I humbly present it to you. Homestar Runner is a cartoon character and his dimwitted adventures and those of his friends are free (Pack Rat’s favorite word) for viewing at the website. There are two things that make this site fan-freaking-tastic. A) Its freeness. Viewing the cartoons are free, playing the games are free, most of the down load are free. Free. B) Strong Bad is the weirdest, funniest, most out-of-left-field character this side of Space Ghost. He is Homestar Runner’s nemesis and he is a luchadore (spanish wrestler, like Nacho Libre but waaaaaay funnier. Check him out below) that never wrestles. He and his brother, Strong Mad, and his side kick The Cheat stir up trouble for Homestar and his friends…Did I mention it is free? Anyway, it is hilarious and a wonderful distraction at work, err, thing to do on your lunch break. And one last bonus, you don’t have to download anything to view the cartoons, they’re all flash video and run directly off the site. Yee-haw!

Hey kids, wassup? Sorry the blog has been spotty. Finals week here at the old Grad School Emporium where if you buy one degree, you get the second one double price. Sorry. I’m a little sleep deprived and I guess a bit loopy. But I’m not too sleepy to pass along this awesome little nugget of info. This Saturday, May 5th is FREE COMIC BOOK DAY all across America. Yup, you heard that right. FREE COMIC BOOKS, no strings attached. Hit up the website, freecomicbookday.com, to see what titles will be offered up gratis (check out one below), and where you can go to get your FREE COMIC BOOK. My money’s on the Oni Press book being the best. Oh wait, no its not! You might be asking “What have I done to deserve this?” Well, its not just about you, friend. This is a nation wide campaign to hook the uninitiated into the addictive world of comics. If you’ve never read a comic before, I know the über nerd-boy arena of the comic book shop can be intimidating, but don’t let that keep you away from what is both a beautiful art form and a great source of entertainment. Worst comes to worst, get one of your friends to go with you and promise them DQ or something after. Dollars to donuts (whatever that means) though, after getting some free swag you’ll skip the ice cream to go home and read.

Today’s recommendations brought to you by Art Director Kay-bubz

I’ll say right now, I’ll say it to anyone and I’ll say it right to their face: I am a comic book nerd. Straight up. I still remember the first comic book I bought. I was thirteen and I actually gave my little brother money and made him go buy an X-Men comic for me while I hid around the corner. But that was a long time ago. These days I buy my comic books with abandon, relishing in the fact that I am a) one of the dorks and b) a girl engaging in a “boys” hobby. Of course, everything changes. These days I have more or less retired the super heroes in favor of the indie, more true-to-life tales. And I have to tell you, comic books are exploding on the indie scene as people are beginning to realize the opportunity that this crossroads between visual art and writing can provide. I am sure we have several crafties out their, cobbling together their own little graphic novels. Well, if you need inspiration or you’re just looking for a good read, take a look at indiespinnerrack.blogspot.com. This blog is full of fun audio interviews with the women and men behind tomorrow’s Next Big Thing. And there’s even an interview with comic book legend Alan Moore (From Hell, V for Vendetta). So go ahead, push up your glasses, straighten your suspenders, kick back and enjoy the nerdom.

Since this is time sensitive, I want to write a special blog about it. If you live in the Boston area and you like ‘zines, clear you calendar for the weekend of March 24th and 25th because the Boston Zine Fair is coming to town. It’s going to be from 10 am - 6 pm both nights and will be held at Massart. Check out the website at bostonzinefair.org.

Their official statement:

The Boston Zine Fair is a weekend-long event with the aim of bringing together zinesters, artists, small presses and other producers of independent media. The conference includes two full days of tabling, an opening night show with live bands and readers, as well as potluck meals throughout the weekend. There are also numerous hands-on workshops and discussion panels which give us the opportunity to learn new skills to use in our own creative enterprises, as well as to explore the importance of independent media in a corporate-owned world. The Boston Zine Fair is free and open to the public. In previous years the Boston Zine Fair (formerly known as Beantown Zinetown) has drawn hundreds of both local and national publishers, and has been a great way to build community and just enjoy each other’s company.