My Halifax Comic Con Experience

Well, the Halifax Comic Con just wrapped up a few hours ago at the WTCC.

Personally, I had a swell time. I actually sold more books here than I did in Montreal. I hope this is an increasing trend with comic book conventions. One thing that definitely helped my sales this time was the one poster I put up:

That got people laughing. Best of all, it got a few people saying, "That's funny. I'll buy it." Believe it or not, that poster even helped me sell my book to a Buddhist. At first he was concerned that Jesus Needs Help was sending a fiercely aggressive pro-Christian message and with so much Christian propaganda all around he didn't want his kids "corrupted" by my book. But, after he read the above poster, he realized that the book isn't really promoting Christianity in any serious way and so that helped take the edge off enough for him to actually purchase a copy for his son.

I guess I stumbled onto something good right there.

Yeah, the reception towards my book was about typical for your average Comic con crowd. It was:

- part delightful curiosity

- part attitude

Like I said, that refund poster really entertained people and others that came by my table really liked my Censor Monkeys concept. But, so many saw the name Jesus, gave me an eyeroll and kept walking. Some of them didn't even take one of the free handouts I had. How much of an asshole do you have to be to pass up a freebie? Who does that? Even the Roadrunner would eat every bowl of free birdseed he was given, even when a canon was pointed straight at his head. He managed to survive that ordeal. What the Hell was your problem?

There were even two girls who didn't understand the concept of the book even after the whole thing was explained to them.

Yeah, I can't really sum their reaction up better than that.

But, I should really focus on the more positive aspects of the Con, shouldn't I? For instance, I saw some great costumes both home-made and otherwise. One lady actually crocheted a Yoda costume for herself that looked really cool. I saw a neat Optimus Prime costume made out of cardboard boxes. More than a few people dressed up as either Mario or Luigi (I even saw someone dressed like Wario). I saw a really great costume of Electro, one of Spiderman's many nemeses. And, as always, there were plenty of sexy costumes worn by sexy ladies. But, sadly, I didn't manage to capture ANY of that because I forgot my camera at home on Saturday.

That's what I felt like doing to myself. Although, i did manage to bring it on Sunday and caught this really cool Bender costume:

Someone even dressed their cat up as Batman:

I'm sure there's a "Catwoman in heat" joke in there somewhere.

That's all I managed to really capture for costumes this year. I'm sure the Hal-Con official website will have plenty of pictures with people in costume soon enough (or, by the time you've stumbled onto this, maybe they're up there now).

Oh, hey. I also met a great artist there. Her booth was right beside mine. Not only did she have wonderful art on display, she was good enough that she could do commissions right there at the Con, and they weren't just your typical big-head caricatures either. Her name is CK Russell. I'd say that getting a picture drawn by her would qualify as a good time. Therefore, I am typing the following statement:

For a good time, contact CK Russell.

Write that on every bathroom wall you can find. ;)

I also ran into some of the people who work at Inked Well Comics. They came over and chatted every so often an at one time they even offered me a cookie. You've got to love a business that does that.

I also met this guy:

Before that he was talking about how his desire was to see Jesus burn in Hell. That's his opinion and he's more than entitled to it.

Well, that's my Halifax Comic Con experience in a nutshell. Like I said at the top, I had a swell time and I look forward to being there again next year hopefully with a second comic book for sale.

Oh yeah, I also met a dalek while I was there. He was a fun guy but he can't hold his liquor.

{I should clarify something about what I said near the top. Despite what it may look like, I do not consider everyone who doesn't like my book as an idiot. That would not be a good thing to do for two big reasons:

1. Even if they are idiots, the obligation is still on me to tap into that "idiotic" mentality. Any marketing guru will tell you that.

2. That theory has really not been proven in any way yet. You see, over the passed year that I've been selling this book, I've found that most if not all the people who say they hate it haven't actually read it. Inversely, most of everyone who HAS read my book has loved it. Therefore, this shows that the biggest problem has been with the presentation of the book and not the book itself............ so far. I think if more of the people who claim to hate it (or at least not think much of it) would actually read a copy first then I and everyone else will have a better assessment of the book's overall quality. And, more importantly, anyone objecting to the book will have a much better idea of what it is they're objecting to.

There! I hope that clears things up a little.}