So, Greg Collins, Anna Smudge’s book designer gave me a very valuable piece of advice, which I will most definitely pass down to my children, and encourage them to pass to theirs… Never brush your teeth and then drink a glass of orange juice. It is vile. It is disgusting. It tastes like acidic bubble bath and haunts your taste buds until you have breakfast the next morning. Well, Greg told me this and instead of listening to his advice, it got me curious. So, I went home and tried it and have deeply regretted the experience ever since. I even mentioned it in an interview I had with Richard Vasseur from Jazma Online. Check it out!

Cool interview with Jazma Online

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Back when we were discussing what the characters in Anna Smudge actually looked like, Glenn did some preliminary sketches for a bunch of folks. Check out his initial sketches and my comments below. And check out this interview Glenn had with Wizard Magazine about working on Anna Smudge.

Donny "the Meatball" Fratelli

A is a little rotund. Donny is a humongous giant of a man, and he devours chocolate cannolis like there’s no tomorrow, but he’s no Jabba the Hutt. And in C he’s just a little too ape-like and dumb. Not nearly scary enough. After all, this man steals candy from children and makes small infants cry! The B version that Glenn drew of Donny is perfect. Exactly how I had always pictured him in my head!

Mrs. Summer

Man, when Glenn faxed these sketches over I could not stop laughing! We ended up going with version C. A was a little too bird-like, and B was just plain creepy.

The Naked Seaweed Man

I went with A. You see, NSM used to be a very handsome and successful man before his crazy seaweed, rhyming days. So, I still wanted you to be able to see a glimmer of the guy he used to be through all of that foliage. And let me tell you, many of my girlfriends thanked me for making that decision, and really want to know who Glenn’s model was for the final drawing.

Jacob Pierce

This was the first sketch of Jacob, and after staring at it for a good five minutes, I lost my appetite for the rest of the day. It was absolutely disgusting. It was perfect. Only thing is Jacob doesn’t have curly hair, and he’s a thin kid. So, Glenn kept the gross factor intact, put Jacob on a strict diet, and stuck some hair relaxer on his head.

Okay nothing grosses me out more than a mushy brown banana on top of my cereal. I only like to eat bananas when they are nice and ripe. Maybe it’s because I have vivid memories of having to take this disgusting medicine when I was younger, and it was thick, yellow, and supposed to be banana flavored. Yuck!!

And while we’re on the topic of bananas… I was interviewed by a big gorilla at the New York Comic Con. Well, I was actually interviewed by two very nice ladies, and there just happened to be a hairy gorilla standing next to us. Go figure!

I’m 4 minutes 36 seconds in. But the guy talking before that is Neal Adams, who is pretty much the best Batman artist ever. Check out Gorillawire TV.

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Check out some NYCC photos. It was three days of total nuttiness. We had a great booth with five-foot-tall posters and an endless supply of donuts. It was wonderful to have our entire creative team there at once. Glenn flew in from the UK, Greg from Florida, and our brilliant book designer Greg Collins from Queens.

Glenn Fabry and I getting interviewed by the press at the same time.

Me and Julianna.

Greg Horn had his own booth, and a massive crowd surrounding it the whole time. But he managed to meet up with Glenn and I for interviews, and occasionally popped by the Anna Smudge booth to chat.

Check out an interview Glenn, Greg, and I had with Newsarama in a glass room overlooking the Comic Con!

Also here’s a podcast Glenn and I did with Peter Jaffe from Comixology.

Comixology interview with Glenn Fabry & MAC

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Wanna see how the cover of Anna Smudge: Professional Shrink came to fruition?

Well, up top is the crummy sketch I sent to cover artist Greg Horn when I was first trying to describe to him what I had in mind. The second is the  much more awesome sketch that Greg sent back to me. Greg’s a very famous artist in the comic book industry. Every time I got sketches from him in my inbox it was like Christmas!

Check out Greg’s interview with Wizard Magazine about the revision process the Anna Smudge cover went through.

http://www.wizarduniverse.com/041608horn.html

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