I had a few (local) requests for this design on a T-shirt, so here it is. I tweaked the colors and fixed the font, but otherwise, it’s the same design as the Halloween bulletin board that inspired it. And it can be yours on a T-shirt, sticker, mug, water bottle, and dozens of other functional products.
Check out Respect Your Local Monsters in my RedBubble shop. (This is a great time to buy from RedBubble. Pretty much everything is on sale!)
I’m glad to have accurately communicated the humor in these stories.
A high school English teacher sent me this photo of his students enjoying my work. He said he taught Bonnie Jo Campbell’s stories in his class, and I wonder which ones. I wonder if he teaches “Family Reunion.” I wonder how young readers respond to the accurate depiction of soon-to-be-destroyed male genitalia. I seriously hope that the teacher vetted these comics thoroughly. In some communities that picture would not fly.
If you want to traumatize children with my work, I do have copies to sell (and I expect I won’t have many left after the Society for the Study of Midwestern Literature’s annual symposium, where I will be talking about Bonnie Jo Campbell, and Bonnie Jo Campbell will be releasing volume 3 of these comics, providing I finish 7 more pages in the next 4 1/2 weeks) and you can order them by emailing me at littledragonblue@gmail.com. It’s $5 for 1 (that includes postage) and $8 for both.
It gets the message across, I think.
I said I was going to do this and I did it. Poly Pride, Poly Love is available on many fine products in my RedBubble shop. So now I have 3 non-heteronormative designs in my shop, I have to create a new portfolio to house my message. I had way more to say about this design and accidental representation spotting but it took me way longer to draw than estimated and now it’s late and I’m tired.
Anyway: T-shirt! And I actually have a comic in the works.
Featuring one of the most charming retro style rocket ships I’ve ever drawn.
This rainbow colored design took up most of my drawing time this week. I’m the kind of person who could easily spend another week tinkering with it but I’m also the kind of person who can let it go. It’s cute and it gets the message across. “The Future is Non Binary and Intersectional.” I prefer “nonbinary” spelled as one word, actually, but this is how it went up in the shop.
The main thing is that I’m sick of people using erroneous binary assumptions to tell other people (me) how to dress, act, think, talk, or fit into society. Open your freaking mind.
The man’s got a plan. And a van. But he’s not getting this bus.
Just a quick shout-out to the ’52 Ford Bus T-shirt! This is the one I drew for The Man after he saw the Vampire Bat posing gothily on a real ’52 Ford Bus and became unreasonably obsessed with owning a ’52 Ford Bus. I told him this was the only rusty old bus he was going to get while he was married to me. I did it out of love. Tough love.
And he finally got around to acquiring one, and here you see a rare shot of The Man modeling like the handsome hunk of manhood he is. I really neglect hyping my RedBubble shop, where you can buy this, and other fine designs, on a wide variety of quality products. Someone should get this design on a onesie. It would be charming.
Someone did buy a onesie with my Athena, Goddess of Wisdom design. I thought it was the Fox but he said it wasn’t, and then I saw that the customer had actually sent me a message about how happy he was to find an Athena onesie because his daughter was named Athena. You go, baby Athena. You are the most classical baby on the block.
You can get your own ’52 Ford Bus here!
Look into his shiny black eyes and try to say no.
There were a couple details from “American Salvage” that seemed especially striking, and this ermine definitely topped the list. So cute! In the story, the white-furred ermine has been scarce in Kalamazoo, Michigan, having been long over hunted due to the value of their gorgeous pelts, which probably look way better on their original owners than any subsequent possessors of said coats. They are returning to the area of the salvage yard due to it being neglected for so long, but soon enough they will pave the place over to build more suburbs, and what will become of the poor weasel then?
At any rate, I’ve spiffed up his lines and memorialized the elusive ermine in my RedBubble shop. You can support the artist and can get Ermine on a T-shirt, sticker, and a variety of other fine products.
What can I even say about this? Well, I’m all about being not ashamed. So I am not ashamed. Whimsical designs haven’t made my rich. Maybe off-color ones will do the trick. Perhaps small town orgies will by my claim to fame.
The words aren’t mine; they came out of a serious conversation with my friend the Coyote. He was only trying to be a little funny. Obviously, the statement is objectively true. You can’t do it alone. As soon as it came out of his mouth, I said, “That’s a T-shirt,” immediately seeing the design fully formed in my mind. So why shouldn’t I draw it and post it in my RedBubble shop? I work fast now.
RedBubble has a bunch of new product types, including wall clocks and acrylic blocks. I’m not sure what you do with an acrylic block. I remember them being a thing in the ’70s, but now we can just use obsolete electronics for paperweights. But surely, someone, somewhere would be delighted to received an acrylic block as a present.
DON’T CLICK ON THAT LINK! IT’S NOT A REAL LINK! IT’S JUST A SCREEN SHOT!
Someone thought I wrote a book about dead trees. But it’s not about dead trees. It’s printed on dead trees! Big difference.
That’s right, The Hermit is a paperback now. I certainly hope that the legions of people who told me they really, really, really wanted to read my book but they really, really, really couldn’t read it digitally will buy it. The ebook is $5 and the dead tree version is $15 but my margin is about the same on either one.
Do you want my dead tree book? You can buy it by clicking on this sentence.
I’m terrible at marketing, but, with much difficulty, I did manage to send out an email blast. The Man will do some more specific marketing of the book when we get back from Thanksgiving, but for now, I sent out this broader email, which sort of outlines all the ways a person could help my career simply by clicking links on the internet. It’s great if people buy things, but they can help out even without spending money. This is what I sent:
Let’s face it: I am hilarious. And talented. And deserving.
If you disagree, go ahead and click on something more stimulating.
If you believe that my work does not suck and that the world would be a better/prettier/more exciting place with more Monica, then I hope you don’t mind taking 5 minutes out of your life to give me a little boost, keeping in mind that I’m a person who rarely asks for help and who has never sent a mass email blast, and this probably makes me more uncomfortable than it makes you.
How can you help Monica? The possibilities are myriad and varied.
For example, you could purchase my contemporary fantasy novel, The Hermit, in electronic or in its long-awaited paperback format.
Have you checked out either of my QWERTYvsDvorak sites?
On QWERTYvsDvorak.com you can enjoy out a visual history of my artwork, including the increasing popular Dragon Comics, which are apparently pretty funny, and even funnier if you already know me.
On my RedBubble site, you can buy T-shirts, pillows, tote bags, travel mugs, art prints, cell phone cases, stickers, and numerous other useful and attractive household items featuring my original design.
Click around and you might see something that appeals to you. If you do, all I’m asking is that you share it with your social networks. Like a page on Facebook, or Tweet it on Twitter, add a heart on RedBubble, hurl it into the void on Ello or Google+ or Livejournal, or email it to your grandmother. Of course, if you want to buy a hoodie, notebook, or coffee mug from my shop, I’ll be eternally grateful, but if I’m not selling anything you want or can afford, you can still help. Please take 5 minutes out of your life to help shove my work out into the universe and convince Google that my life has relevance. Every click, upvote, and repost counts.
Of course, if you don’t believe my life has relevance, feel free to delete this email.
Not sure where to start? Here are some of my more popular pages:
Comics (I’ve drawn hundreds!)
Funny: https://qwertyvsdvorak.com/2016/08/17/superkids/
Controversial: https://qwertyvsdvorak.com/2015/12/15/the-problem-with-symbols/
Political: https://qwertyvsdvorak.com/2016/02/02/2-ways-of-looking-at-socialism/
Sad: https://qwertyvsdvorak.com/2016/02/03/the-things-you-carry-a-comic-from-my-subconscious/
Designs (I’ve got dozens! And most designs are available on most products!)
A T-shirt for kids who love My Little Pony and seahorses
Blue morpho butterfly notecards
Golden Barrel Cactus Flower duvet cover
Quick links for the technologically timid:
Click here to buy an electronic version of The Hermit on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Hermit-Monica-Friedman-ebook/dp/B01HAN68L4
Click here to buy a paperback copy of The Hermit: https://www.createspace.com/6729470
Click here to browse my RedBubble design portfolio: https://www.redbubble.com/people/QWERTYvsDVORAK/portfolio
Click here to read my blog:
If you don’t want any stuff, but do want to financially support a working artist, you can donate directly through my Patreon. Patreon is a site where patrons can directly support artists by making small monthly donations. Even as little as a dollar a month is welcome. Donate $15 more and you can receive a small token of my esteem.
Click here to donate directly to my Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/QWERTYvsDvorak
All the sites mentioned here are trusted, secure sites through which you can safely make payments.
If you would like to purchase a copy of my Bonnie Jo Campbell Mothers, Tell Your Daughters you can send $5 and your mailing address to my littledragonblue@gmail.com PayPal account.
Perhaps it’s just my biased opinion, but I happen to think that both the real-paper version of my novel, or any of the charming products in my RedBubble shop, would make spectacular Christmas, Hanukkah, birthday, unbirthday, or just because presents for all of your loved ones. Other people buying my work would certainly make a spectacular present for me.
In any case, I wish you a delightful, happy, and whimsical holiday season.
Rawr,
Monica
(Dragon)
Time for you to fly?
Yesterday’s comic had a positive reception, which is really all you can ask for. Today all I have is this sweet butterfly sticker, but who cares because we are going to Comicon! I got media passes for being a contributor to Panels.net, which means free media badges for me and my photographer’s assistant, aka The Man, and I got paid for the wedding shoot, which means, for the first time in my history of going to Comicon, I’m actually going to be able to buy comics.
Every year we say we’re going to cosplay but I never get it together. Mrs. Kitty thinks I should do Garnet from Steven Universe, which would be fun, but the character I’d most like to cosplay would be Agatha Heterodyne from Girl Genius. Alan Moore’s Promethea would also be a riot, but no one would know who I was. Or I could just be Poison Ivy like everyone else in the world. Except, no, I’ll just be wearing my Comic Book Legal Defense Funds T-shirts and probably skorts because this is Phoenix and it’s likely to be very hot and somewhat sticky.
As for the butterfly sticker, it is available in 4 sizes, from small to really rather large for a sticker, prices ranging between $2.40 and $14.00. You can check out the various options and acquire your own Blue Morpho Butterfly sticker (seriously, the extra large one is 14 inches across, pretty stunning) or some other product with the Blue Morpho Butterfly design, in my shop. I’m not sure why I haven’t sold more of these stickers; I’ve sold a ton of Blue Morpho Notecards. Anyone wanna show this sticker some love?
At the risk of potentially promoting myself or something: more Dragon merch! There are 6 new designs in the Dragon Comics portfolio on RedBubble, some of which have been a while in coming.
Dragon and The Man beneath the Milky Way
Dragon and The Man beneath the Milky Way looks great on a dark colored background. Get cozy with nature as you watch shooting stars arc across the dust lanes.
Cool Clothes. And a Beard.
Cool Clothes. And a Beard brings together some of the Internet’s most endearing nonsense: 3 wolf moon, nyan cat, international bearding competition winners, and Billy Gibbons of ZZ Top.
The Machine
It’s a water heater! It’s a wankel rotary engine! It’s a solar panel! It’s…The Machine. Fuel your machine with this inexplicable contraction on a coffee cup, or advertise the fact that you’re a no-nonsense machine by wearing a ridiculous T-shirt.
Dragon and Owl Painting in the Desert
Creative minds need to find creative ways to pass the time while they’re waiting for the world to recognize their sublime artistic genius. Join Dragon and Own Painting in the Desert and keep your creativity well-fed with tea and pebber nodder
Whatever You Need for Comic Effect
If your sofa needs a little random insanity, Whatever You Need for Comic Effect is available on a pillow. Who needs a bag of many things when you have a magic cave? Carmen Miranda hat, fun size trebuchet, or wearable triceratops head, it’s all within easy reach.
Dragon Rages against the Kids’ Electronic Devices
Give in to a little primal rage against the machine with the Dragon Rages against the Kids’ Electronic Devices; take it with you wherever you go with a travel mug. Or get a sticker and slap it on someone’s Kindle screen.
That’s all the publicity I have in me right now. Support a tortured artist.
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qwertyvsdvorak 