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- KC Newsletter! January 2025
KC Newsletter! January 2025
Quick and dirty
This issue: New socials, novel sketches, bouncing back
This month’s finances and what all got done!
Y’all can probably guess that January was kind of a wash; I spent over a week dealing with The Latest Family Tragedy back in Tennessee, which always tends to fuck up productivity around here by causing psychic damage, taking up time, and absolutely wrecking my tendonitis by driving so much, but lol what can you do. We still got four comic pages up, and I wrote around 17,400 words of prose, which is better than nothing. My paycheck this month fell to around 840 dollars but I sort of expected that both due to the dip in productivity and also like. Everything that has happened in the world in January.
I’m still sort of physically bouncing back and I got a lot of other work to do today, so I’m gonna try and keep this one brief!
Shop stuff!
Lee is ahead of their own schedule, so they have time to make the She plushes again! Now’s a good time to get one if you’ve been waiting on that.
I also added the Volume 3 pdf’s to the shop! You can now get the first three digital editions from there if that’s something you’re interested in. The regular restock of physical Volume 4 books are still TBD, since I straight up don’t have the cash to get them printed right now. That also means I don’t have the cash to get any other books printed anytime soon either, so if that concerns you now might be a good time to pick some up!
By the way: Those of you who are signed up for the relevant support tiers should have gotten your Volume 4 pdf a couple weeks back, check your emails! I’m gonna turn off the download sometime this week probably, so make sure you’ve collected yours.
I’m officially ditching Instagram for a bunch of reasons. I’m replacing it with Bsky, which I have no intention of using socially BUT if you’re looking for an account to send you update reminders, that’s one you can do. I just went ahead and replaced the Instagram icon on the site with my linktree since this sort of thing seems to be happening faster these days. I’m leaving the Instagram up for a little while so folks who might find their way there can be directed elsewhere, but it’s dead, feel free to unfollow it.
I also started that Youtube channel! It’s very small rn, but I’ve got the vague idea of posting once a week-ish, with one more set to go out sometime this week. I have no idea how to make videos, and I still don’t really have my footing yet with traditional art, but that was sort of the point in me starting to post about all this anyway SO you can go over there and watch me learn stuff if you want. I’m using it to post digital comic process videos too, since folks really liked that Volume 4 cover video I posted during the preorders. I appreciate y’all’s enthusiasm, I was surprised people are so interested! I’m gonna try and record that sort of stuff more when I think of it.
For the record, I have no intention of officially monetizing this, and I personally have never subscribed to a Youtube creator even though I use it literally every day. I normally like to be up front with y’all about like, helping me with algorithms and such, but I have no delusions that this little side project is gonna like Be Anything lmao. Subscribe or don’t! My intentions here are to try and make some pleasant space for a few minutes at a time and share some art, please feel free to interact with it however you prefer.
Novel update!
One good thing about the last panicked jaunt across the United States is I’ve learned my mobile writing setup works really well! I still got a decent amount of writing done this month, and even finished the draft for another chapter last week which. I haven’t done in a while actually. I’m approaching the novel work like the comic script, which means I like to build a big skeleton then hop around adding tissue wherever I feel like working that day. It keeps me from getting bored, but it DOES mean sometimes I go months without feeling like I’m accomplishing anything significant, so finishing a big piece is always exciting. We’re also getting uncomfortably close to 90k with over a third of the book to go still, I’m trying really hard to keep it under 120 so let’s all keep our fingers crossed.
I’ve started picking at a cover design too! I’m vaguely aware in the current Indie Publishing World people make a big fuss over the cover reveal, but given this story came out like eight years ago now and y’all see these characters all the time anyway I don’t feel like building it up to be some huge surprise is gonna accomplish much here. Also I do what I want lol. Here’s the rough sketch!
I thought I was done drawing that fuckin tower lmaooooo guess AGAIN
Subject to changes of course, but I think it’s a good start! I’m still feeling a bit cagey about my cartoony style for a novel cover, but frankly it’s a cartoony book. I like cartoons, did you know?
This bit is really subject to change, but I’m toying with the idea of some traditional ink illustrations for the inside pages too. I’m not sure if this’ll get done, that’s like a dozen additional art pieces at least, but wouldn’t that be fun? What’s the point of being a writer and an artist if I don’t do both. It would also be a fun excuse to revisit some of the MHE stuff with my current art ability hehe. I’ve still got to work out how I wanna do these exactly, but I’ve been working on one of the simpler ones with Ulrich as a test run. He’s not even a little bit finished but here he is anyway just for you:
got the important bits done first
Still working out exactly how detailed these ought to be, I’m gonna try and record the traditional work on this one for Youtube, so keep an eye out if that interests you.
State of the Artist
My wrists are still not at 100% but I think we’re on the upswing now at least, and I’m back at the gym so here’s hoping the line keeps going up. I don’t really have the time or spoons to get into much else going on rn, so I will end with “everybody hang in there.”
Everybody hang in there!!
-Aria
Upcoming Appearances!
VinCon
March 1-2, Fort Collins, CO
Commerce City Minicon
March 25th, Commerce City, CO