Eat Cake Frosting

THE ELEPHANT BOOK NOW IN SALE!

Sat, 11 May 2013 20:41:07 -0400

OH SNAP IT’S HERE:
https://www.etsy.com/listing/150943952/the-elephant-book

Come See Me In Mt. Laurel Tomorrow!

Fri, 03 May 2013 18:47:00 -0400

Tomorrow is Free Comic Book Day! Once again the comic stores of the world will be giving out free comics and the comic artists of the world will emerge from their dank caves, blinking in the harsh sunlight, to make appearances at local shops, stores and libraries. I’ll be at the Mt. Laurel Public Library in Mt. Laurel, New Jersey (100 Walt Whitman Ave. Mount Laurel, NJ 08054):

http://www.mtlaurel.lib.nj.us/

I’ll be doing sketches for visitors, portfolio reviews for anyone who’s game and create-your-own superhero activity sheets with the little ones. If you’re in the area, come say hi to me from 11AM to 3:30PM!

Against the organizer’s wishes, Fish Puppet will also be in attendance. He will be doing interviews for his YouTube channel. Please come get interviewed and share in the ill-behaved magic that is Fish Puppet.

SHUT UP THEY'RE HERE DROP WHAT YOU'RE DOING

Tue, 23 Apr 2013 22:30:29 -0400

Available in my Etsy store later this week!

OH SNAP NEW WEBSITE

Sat, 23 Mar 2013 00:24:31 -0400

My website has FINALLY got all its updates done and its new design laid out, thanks to my fabulous friend Erika Door, who did all the coding and design! I still have a few things to add, but the basic pages are all there! XD Go check out the all-new site and let me know what you think!

www.bizenghast.com

RIDDLE ROAD 2 STARTS SHIPPING TODAY! ALSO, A SALE!

Tue, 19 Mar 2013 16:15:00 -0400

The title says it all…RR2 copies are going out the door starting today! The first fifty sold (of which there are still TWO LEFT in my Etsy store!) will include a special page insert featuring an artist sketch by me!

You may be interested to know that I recently upgraded my ashcan book printing and packaging in three different ways! First, the paper upon which they are printed is slightly thicker and the covers are done in a brilliant white cardstock, meaning they’re an altogether prettier presentation!

Secondly, Lucky Crown has recently invested in a great big enormous quality copy-style printer, meaning NO MORE GREYED PAGES! The fine people of Staples Copy Center will have to find someone else’s books to screw up, because each Lucky Crown ashcan book is now individually printed, not copied, for perfect alignment, clarity and overall panache!

And finally, starting with the regular post-first-fifty sales of Riddle Road 2, all ashcan books will ship inside their own clear, protective resealable plastic sleeve, to keep them nice and fresh on your shelf!

What’s the best news about all these changes? They’re FREE! The extra cost of all these upgrades are coming out of my profit and NOT being passed on to you. The price for each book will stay the same, but the quality of each one is vastly improved. Just another way Lucky Crown tells you how much we LURVS you. Like MORE than a friend. Lucky Crown wants to take you to the picture show and then smooch in the park!

Speaking of how much we love you, did you know there’s a SALE GOING ON RIGHT NOW? A BUY ONE, GET ONE 1/2 OFF SALE? My god, it’s true! Buy any one Poison Apple Princess Print, color or black and white, and get the NEXT one at half price (and have it ship for just fifty cents!) Every other print you buy will be half as much, how exciting! Discounts will be manually refunded after purchase!

Click below for the sale!

LINK: http://www.etsy.com/shop/LuckyCrown?section_id=13290956

Happy Tuesday, you crazy kids!

-M

The first 50-buyer special copies of Riddle Road 2 are almost...

Mon, 18 Mar 2013 14:34:00 -0400

The first 50-buyer special copies of Riddle Road 2 are almost sold out! These are the copies that come with a special artist sketch inside each one. Only 8 left, so get yours now!

http://www.etsy.com/listing/126175260/the-riddle-road-volume-two-pre-order

A special 4-page David and Valerie mini-comic is also included in each book! Basically the whole book is special, special as can be!

For the first time, I’m selling prints of the princess...

Fri, 15 Mar 2013 23:34:00 -0400

For the first time, I’m selling prints of the princess drawing series from The Poison Apple Book of Stories ashcan! This is the first time in years that any PABS artwork has been available, as the PABS ashcan had a very limited print run.

You can buy the original black and white versions:

[link]

Or the NEW COLORED VERSIONS, including a color-exclusive design of Wendy Darling!

[link]

Buy more than one and pay just .50 cents in shipping each additional print!

FOR SALE NOW:...

Tue, 12 Mar 2013 17:32:26 -0400

FOR SALE NOW: http://www.etsy.com/listing/126240001/the-emerald-city-necklace

I finally got some time to finish up a necklace I’d been working on lately! This one was a lot more involved and intricate than some of my others, and I think it turned out great. I REALLY wish I could take better pictures, because these photos just don’t do the colors justice. The large center stone in particular has this fabulous iridescence to it that’s so pretty! And the crystal beads on the neck band are SO glittery! Someday I’ll get a good camera and learn to take good pictures.

Volume two of Riddle Road is NOW available for pre-order!:...

Tue, 12 Mar 2013 01:31:39 -0400

Volume two of Riddle Road is NOW available for pre-order!: http://www.etsy.com/listing/126175260/the-riddle-road-volume-two-pre-order

The first fifty buyers will receive a special sketch page added into their book, with an original sketch on it! :D Sorry, I can’t take requests for people’s sketches, as there are just too many sketches to keep track of, but I promise every sketch will be fun and unique!

And ALL copies, not just the first fifty, will come with a four page mini-comic called “David and Valerie”, featuring the gender-swapped versions of the cast of Bizenghast! I was going to make this comic the first fifty buyer bonus, but then I was like, “NO. THE PEOPLE HAVE TO SEE THIS.” Because it’s seriously great and all readers must check it out. So EVERYONE gets it now!

PLUS when the books ship, I’ll finally be putting up my new website, which will have a special Riddle Road section on it and a David and Valerie mini-section!! Woooooo!

SO MUCH EXCITEMENTS! Buy yours now, because the first fifty copies went FAST on the last volume! they don’t cost any more than the regular volumes, and you get the bonus sketch page! Yay!

Shiny Sharing Time!

Fri, 22 Feb 2013 00:41:12 -0500

ATTENTION COSPLAYERS, COSTUMERS, MODELS, FASHION DIVAS, NICE PEOPLE:

My princess company is attending the St. Christopher’s Hospital for Children’s Prom night in April, a prom held for the long-term care child and teen patients of the hospital. Some of the teens who are patients or are regularly in and out of the hospital’s care may never get to attend their own prom, so the hospital does a charity prom event for them. Fittings and dresses are provided by Fairy Godmothers Inc. for the girls and tuxedos by Men’s Wearhouse for the boys.

Check out this great article about the prom: http://blog.kjbethel.com/2012/05/st-christophers-hospital-for-children.html

In addition to attending the prom in princess costume, I’m organizing a small drive RIGHT NOW for jewelry, handbags, clutches, formal gloves, shawls and wraps and other small things amongst my costuming friends, so PM me if you’d like to mail something to me and I will give you my PO Box to mail it. I know lots of my friends have nice necklaces, bracelets, earrings, cute little purses and things like that which you would love to donate to a good cause! And don’t get me started on how many of you have brand-new makeup and makeup brushes just sitting around doing nothing.

If you have anything worth donating so a young girl can have a special prom night (especially those of St. Christopher’s Hospital!), PLEASE DO SO. These are the currently accepted donation items:

Gowns – Must be dry cleaned, must be fewer than 5 years old and in good condition.
Jewelry, Purses, headbands, tiaras – Whatever you think a 2013 Prom Queen would wear!
They also accept NEW Make-Up, gently-used gloves and shawls

They are no longer accepting shoes at this time.

THE DEADLINE IS MARCH 15TH. I have to drop this stuff off in person at the Prom Fair in Philly on the 16th, so be SURE I have the stuff by then!!

PM me dudes and make a donation! If you have absolutely nothing on hand, consider donating to their website through Paypal. Let’s make some princess wishes come true, people!

I’m selling off all the leftover pony/angel wings from my...

Wed, 06 Feb 2013 14:23:51 -0500

I’m selling off all the leftover pony/angel wings from my booth at Anime LA at clearance prices! I won’t be selling these again, these are just the remainders of what I sold at the con, so there are very limited quantities of each color and design. Check out the listings for each one here:

http://www.etsy.com/shop/LuckyCrown?section_id=13050670

These were all handmade with love by me, my sister, my mom and dad and even my little brother helped. It was a labor by the whole family over Christmas holidays!

Get yours now and EARN YOUR WINGS! :3

Getting Beat Up

Tue, 05 Feb 2013 13:44:56 -0500

I wanted to mention a thing on here about something I hear all the time. I get a lot of feedback from fans who, for reasons unknown to me, bemoan the fact that they wish they looked like me or were popular like me. Seriously. People say this. I can’t count how many girls write to me and say they wished they were me, because they feel they’re not pretty or outgoing enough. I have nothing but sympathy for young people, especially girls, who feel they aren’t attractive or well-liked, or feel like outsiders in their school or social groups. So let me tell you a little story.

When I was in middle school, I got the shit kicked out of me, all day, every day. That’s the story right there. I got beat up constantly, I was the absolute lowest rung on the popularity ladder, I ate lunch by myself every day and the other kids made fun of me to my face, in front of teachers, whenever they felt like it. It was a different time, before bullying awareness, when “kids will be kids” was the lazy teacher response to most harassment. I was everybody’s punching bag, from breakfast until I got off the bus after school. I got my stuff stolen, I got slapped across the head when I walked by people, I had rumors about me spread as on-going jokes for everyone in my grade, I got my locker graffitti’d and one time this one boy wrote a short story for literature class about me and my brother being involved in a drive-by shooting. He got away with it, because this was 1994 and also my literature teacher was a horrible woman who cared not one jot for the funny “foreign” family that had moved to their small redneck town (I grew up in Germany, but I was born in Kansas and was an american citizen. Didn’t matter. From the moment I arrived, I got the nickname “nazi” and it stuck forever). One time in 5th grade, my teacher took me outside the classroom and gave me a candy bar and told me to wait in the stairwell. The next day, I learned from a girl that she had herded the WHOLE GRADE into one room and implored them to stop being mean to me. That was easily the most humiliating moment of my life. And it only made the bullying worse. I wasn’t allowed to SPEAK in the hallways, for fear of getting jeered and mocked, so I just learned to be quiet and look at the floor when walking. It took me many years to train myself to make eye contact with people after I left school, because I spent so long trying to avoid other people’s eyes in case they felt like beating me up. I still have a very hard time looking in people’s eyes when I talk to them.

On top of that, I was damned funny-looking. I didn’t feel comfortable with myself and had low self-esteem, so I wore my dad’s big plaid flannel shirts and a baseball cap all the time. My hair was super oily and so frizzy that one of my nicknames was Mary LeFro. I didn’t own any makeup, didn’t know how to apply it anyway and was generally an all-around stringy, gawky kid right up til high school. I spent a lot of time hiding under the stairwell to eat my lunch so I wouldn’t get picked on in the cafeteria. Even the lunch ladies felt sorry for me and would offer me extra dessert sometimes, which only embarrassed me more.

The point is, I spent a lot of time reading and drawing and avoiding everyone around me, for self-preservation’s sake. But inside, I never let it break me. I never stopped thinking that I was worth something and that I had every right to whatever everyone else was enjoying at the time. To this day, I have no idea why I didn’t just become an utter introvert and give up, since I couldn’t even open my mouth most of the time without getting yelled at or mocked or shoved. But I never let it stop me from doing what I wanted. I think I was just too stupid to quit. When we had to do the humiliating activity of square-dancing in gym class and the teacher said the girls could pick their partners, every girl froze up and refused. Wouldn’t you, at age 11? Not me. I picked the cutest boy in class, the one every girl had a crush on, the one so far out of my league that the light leaving HIS league right now wouldn’t reach me for another 35 million years. And even though he moaned and gagged and made insulting complaints the entire time he was forced to dance with me, I MADE THAT BASTARD DANCE WITH ME. Because I didn’t care. I was a human being and I deserved every chance that other people got. When we had student elections, I put my name on the ballot. When we voted for middle school prom queen, I put my name on that ballot too. I didn’t care. Didn’t matter that I’d be laughed at. Something inside of me always told me to just go for it, no matter how crazy it was.

And when I went on to high school, things got better. It was a bigger school, with a lot of different kids being bused in from other towns…people who didn’t know me or care. I started experimenting with my appearance, trying new clothes, speaking up in class and generally becoming more accepted. I even got on the short-lived cheerleading squad our school started (short-lived because that school was very liberal, WAY full of nerds and we cared more about the chemistry-h/physics-h club than cheering, apparently). I was later diagnosed with clinical depression and put on medication, which I’m still on, but even that didn’t slow me down. Even developing an eating disorder from the years of peer taunting about my looks didn’t slow me down. I beat it down and I control it and I don’t let it control me.

Now I can look back and know that I am who I am today, not because I was blessed from birth with looks or charm or good fashion sense or confidence, but because I was blessed with something far more important: a need to prove myself and an unquenchable fire inside me. Nobody could ever put it out, no matter how hard they tried. Everything I have or am today is because I worked hard for it, studied it, practiced it, asked for it, demanded it and then took it anyways when people said no. And these experiences haven’t made me bitter or made me hate everyone. I like people and I have a persistent optimism (meditation and positive thinking have helped greatly), mostly because I can take a look back at my formative years and think “at least it’s never going to be THAT bad again.” I think I accomplished a lot just by living through that and not becoming a hateful, jaded person who persists on looking down on anyone fashionable or outgoing or popular out of habit. I never became the comic book nerd who likes to laugh at “the pretty, stupid people who watch reality TV and go shopping all the time.” Because judging other people without knowing them is one of the things that people did to me when I was young, and I always said I’d never be that kind of person.

So if you’re young and you feel like you can’t measure up to someone whom you think has everything, you’re wrong. You’ve got absolutely everything they’ve got, you just haven’t used it yet. The only thing they’ve got that you don’t are their own personal problems that you don’t even know about. Trust me, everyone has huge problems of their own and their lives are far less wonderful than a couple online photos and a blog make it look.

Anyone under the age of 20 has no reason to expect perfection from themselves. Being awkward and goofy-looking and not knowing where you belong in life is the actual DEFINITION of the word teenager. Don’t compare yourself or your accomplishments to someone who is twice as old as you and has twice as long to figure all that stuff out. Just do your best and don’t let anyone make you feel like you’re inferior to them, because I’m giving you my personal guarantee that you’re not.

And if you have the chance to square-dance with the cutest boy in school, don’t care that he’s going to call you ugly and horrible for picking him. Grab that bastard and make him dance.

I thought it would be fun to do a gender swap of Dinah and...

Mon, 28 Jan 2013 03:42:08 -0500

I thought it would be fun to do a gender swap of Dinah and Vincent, so here are David and Valerie! XD

I was messing around with the idea of doing a short gender-swap ashcan story of them, sort of like Adventure Time with Fiona and Cake, while I’m working on the next Riddle Road. What do you think? Of course I’d have to mix in a lot of comic-style content along with the story, because what’s the point of witnessing gender-swapped Bizenghast if you can’t SEE them? XD

OPPAN PRINCESS STYLE

Sun, 20 Jan 2013 23:45:43 -0500

So had to do two last-minute parties yesterday because nearly all my boss’ princesses were sick with flu. I was Snow White for both parties. The dad put on a dance mix for us at the second party, which included gangnam style, so everyone got to see that rarest of sights, a full-grown Snow White dancing gangnam style. The parents thought it was the funniest thing ever, apparently. Possibly more hilarious was the sight of eight 3-yr olds in puffy princess dresses doing the same thing. If only someone got video of it, youtube would go nuts.

Also of note, this exchange took place at the first party, during story time:

SNOW WHITE: (reading) And then they had a delicious blueberry pie! Do any of you like to eat pie?

CHILD 1: I like to eat cherry pie!

CHILD 2: I like to eat grass!

CHILD 3: I eat grass too!

CHILD 4: I eat TREES!

CHILD 5: I EAT BEARS!!

SNOW WHITE: ……..

CHILD 5: And I eat deers.

SNOW WHITE: ……..How wonderful! *sparklesparkle*

Another Live Chat!

Thu, 17 Jan 2013 16:19:45 -0500

Doing another live chat this Friday on my justin.tv channel, at 9PM eastern time (6 PM west coast time)! Be there or be box-shaped!

http://www.justin.tv/malicelegrow

I have it on good authority that Fish Puppet may be making a guest appearance!

For those of you who aren’t used to using that site, you won’t see any video or anything until I go live at that exact time. Then a live video will appear. You don’t have to sign up to watch, but you do have to create an account (quick and easy and free!) to chat with me and others during the live video. It’s like a chat room with video as well. So if you have Qs about Bizenghast, the new season of the series, future ashcans and other Etsy stuff, snack suggestions for Edaniel or just want to talk, that would be really super amazing!!

Also sometimes I sing, but not very well.

:)

Sun, 13 Jan 2013 14:30:09 -0500

Thanks, dude at Shoprite who lent me four cents! I thought I brought enough for lunch, but I was silly and forgot the tax. You’re a cool guy!

A fun sketch I did for a fan at Anime LA this last weekend!

Sun, 13 Jan 2013 03:48:18 -0500

A fun sketch I did for a fan at Anime LA this last weekend!

Live Chat Today (Friday!

Fri, 11 Jan 2013 00:08:02 -0500

Hello my snakeys!

Because my friend Robert did a live chat on Justin.tv that was very fun tonight and because I’m a shameless copycat, I’ll be doing a live chat tomorrow, Friday the 11th (or I guess today? Since it’s midnight here while I type this!) at 10 PM eastern time (that’s 7 PM for you west coast types). You can find it here:

http://www.justin.tv/malicelegrow

For those of you who aren’t used to using that site, you won’t see any video or anything until I go live at that exact time. Then a live video will appear. You don’t have to sign up to watch, but you do have to create an account (quick and easy and free!) to chat with me and others during the live video. It’s like a chat room with video as well. So if you have Qs about Bizenghast, the new season of the series, future ashcans and other Etsy stuff, snack suggestions for Edaniel or just want to talk, that would be really super amazing!! I hope everyone will try to attend and I get to talk to some great people!

-M

Anime LA This Weekend!

Sun, 30 Dec 2012 19:16:34 -0500

Sorry to be gone, I’m very busy finishing The Elephant Book and also getting ready for Anime LA this weekend, the 4th-6th, in Los Angeles:

http://www.animelosangeles.org/ala/

I’m the artist guest of honor this year and i did the badge, t-shirt and booklet art for the con! I’m so excited to see how they turned out! I’ll be doing panels on Friday and Sunday, so please go check them out!

You can also find me in the Dealers’ Room all weekend at the Wonderbolt-themed booth…I’ll be selling pony cosplay wings, art prints and sketches! Also my SISTER will be with me! This is her first time at an anime con (or meeting otaku of any kind), so be sure to come by and make a good impression. She’ll be the one telling embarrassing childhood stories about me to anyone who asks, no much how I try to stop her. I’ll also be giving out free Wonderbolt ribbons to visitors at my booth! because YEAH WONDERBOLTS.

Please come visit us!

:D
M

Hey Alice! What day are you going to be at ALA for?

Thu, 27 Dec 2012 20:08:30 -0500

All three! I will be at opening ceremonies on Friday and I have panels Friday night and Sunday morn. At all other times you can find my table in the dealers’ room! Look for the Wonderbolt Pony display! :)