Interview with Publishers Weekly

Here's an interview with me about Mom's Cancer posted yesterday by Publishers Weekly, THE industry journal of the book business. Writer Dean Simons and I had a good, long conversation that he condensed into this article that hits the high points.

I didn't mention it earlier because it appeared to be behind a paywall, and when you click that link you, too, will hit a paywall that reads "PW Pro Content." But I think I stumbled onto a glitch: if you click on the "Questions?" prompt on that pop-up screen, it opens a new tab while revealing the article on the original tab! So just click back to that first tab and it should/might be there.

If you want to go to the trouble.

Getting a write-up in PW is a big deal because booksellers, librarians, critics, and other people in publishing pay attention to it. I'm grateful! 

Wednesday on the Hornet

Snapped this photo of Pathfinder 1 with the USS Hornet while Laura and I were walking to lunch. Wish I'd had the timing or presence of mind to be closer to the Hornet; without all the road and fencing in the foreground, it would have been a real postcard photo!

I spent a few hours aboard the USS Hornet  Sea, Air and Space Museum today, consulting on updates they're making to their Apollo exhibits, to which I contributed 14 or so years ago. It was a beautiful day on the Bay, highlighted by a rare appearance by the Pathfinder 1 Zeppelin, the first rigid airship of its type to fly since the Graf Zeppelin II in 1939. 

I've seen plenty of blimps but don't think I've ever seen a real rigid airship before. The Pathfinder is a pet project of billionaire Sergey Brin and is about half the length of the Hindenburg, which must have been extra awesome in its day because Pathfinder was plenty impressive enough.

It felt especially meaningful for me to revisit Hornet's Apollo exhibits as Artemis returns from the Moon (Hornet was the ship that recovered Apollos 11 and 12 from the Pacific in 1969). I worked on my little project, took my museum-CEO daughter to lunch, and headed home, all the time thinking about the Moon and the 57 years between then and now.

Among the Hornet's artifacts are an Apollo command module boilerplate--a prototype used for testing (CM-011 if anyone wants to look it up)--and a Sea King helicopter, the same type used to recover Apollo 11 and 12. The actual helicopter used in those missions crashed in the '70s. This one is the same model that was painted to look like the original for use in the movie "Apollo 13."

The Hornet also as the Mobile Quarantine Facility (i.e., Airstream trailer) used for Apollo 14, as well as one of the Biological Isolation Garments the astronauts donned to protect the Earth from potential Moon germs. (Spoiler alert: there weren't any Moon germs, but they weren't sure of that at the time.)

The Hornet is closed to the public on Wednesdays, but it would be a lie to claim I was alone. There were museum staffers on hand plus two school buses worth of students. However, an aircraft carrier, even an old one like the Hornet, is big enough to swallow a hundred people without a belch, and once in a while you can still get half a hangar deck all to yourself.

San Francisco shining across the Bay, featuring three modes of transportation: rigid airship high in the sky, ferry plying the waters toward Alameda, and, in the distance above the city, a red Coast Guard helicopter.

Copperfield's Book Event, April 9

North Bay Friends! A reminder that I will be doing a talk and book signing for the Mom's Cancer Anniversary Edition Thursday night, April 9, 7 p.m. at Copperfield's Books in Santa Rosa, Calif. Copperfield's is a terrific independent bookstore chain, and my event will be at their Montgomery Village shop.

I don't have many personal appearances on the calendar, so take advantage of the rare opportunity! I'll be happy to sign any of my books, or even anyone else's. I'm not too picky or proud.

Copperfield's is asking people to RSVP at this link, although I promise that nobody who shows up without a reservation will be turned away. Hope to see you there, thanks!

Artemis Earthset

Just made this my new monitor background image. I like it more than the better-publicized close-up photo of Artemis's Earthset you're seeing today. I think it provides more scale and perspective, plus from a practical POV it has a lot of neutral gray that makes my desktop icons pop. What a view, what a thrill, what a time to be alive!

By the way, it took me longer than it should have to find a reasonable-quality version of this photo. NASA is sharing all their best stuff at this link.

250 Words on Overwriting

[I try to start my day writing 250 words on anything. I’ll post one every Tuesday until I run out of good ones.]

"I have made this letter longer than usual because I did not have time to make it short.” --Blaise Pascal

I tend to overwrite. I learned that about myself in my first job out of college as a reporter for a small daily newspaper. I also learned to use it to my advantage, and made it part of my writing process. 

For example, when I write a first draft and check my word count, I'm very happy if it comes out 10 to 20 percent long. I know I can tighten it into a nice lean piece that clearly says what it must and nothing else. That's my goal.

On the other hand, if my first draft comes up 10 or 20 percent short, I’m in trouble. Padding is agony.

That’s even more true in comics. I’m a words-first cartoonist, which means I script my story and then draw it. I’ve known pictures-first cartoonists who work out their story as they draw, which to me is voodoo. My scripts look like a theatrical play or screenplay: very lean, mostly dialog with some descriptions, directions and doodles. 

Once I have a script, I go through every line to find opportunities to show instead of tell, deleting any text I can replace with art. My ideal comic is one in which half the meaning is conveyed with words, half with pictures, and neither makes complete sense without the other. 

I don’t always achieve that ideal, but when I do it’s enormously gratifying. 

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Artemis II

I'm utterly absorbed by NASA's live coverage of the Artemis mission today, as the spacecraft takes a long loop around the back side of the Moon. 

I confess I doubted that having the crew take turns looking out the window and describing what they see would have any real scientific value. I couldn't imagine what they'd see that hadn't already been photographed close-up by other missions like Apollo or the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO), which has photographed every inch of the lunar surface. 

But I'm convinced that their perspective is unique and has unique value. LRO sees trees, the astronauts are looking at the forest. And regardless of whatever scientific value their observations have, the feeling of being there with them is priceless. It's riveting.

250 Words on the Colbert Questionert: Part Two

[I try to start my day writing 250 words on anything. I’ll post one every Tuesday until I run out of good ones.]

Talk show host Stephen Colbert sometimes asks his guests to take the “Colbert Questionert,” which he says is meant to reveal a person’s soul but is mostly for fun. Since Colbert’s “Late Show” ends on May 21, I’m giving it a go here. I answered half the questions last week; here are the rest. 

Favorite smell? Cinnamon rolls rising on Grandma's fireplace hearth.

Least favorite smell? Mercaptans, because if you can detect their sulfurous rotten-egg scent you’re probably near a dangerous gas leak. 

Flat or sparkling? Flat is fine, but I’ll take sparkling if offered.

Most used app on your phone? Texting and Facebook are my boring answers. My less-boring answer is Flightradar24. 

Window or aisle? Window. No matter how often I fly, soaring over the clouds is always a thrilling miracle. 

You get one song to listen to for the rest of your life, what is it? Beethoven’s 9th Symphony, all four movements. That counts as one song, right?

The one thing you own that you should really throw out? Artifacts we dug out of the ashes of our fire that have been sitting in bins we haven’t had the heart to open.

What number am I thinking of? 137.

Describe the rest of your life in five words? About the same but better.

I am a fan of Colbert’s, and I’d be sadder and angrier about his show’s cancellation if I weren’t sure he will soon be doing something even greater. Best wishes to him and his staff. 

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Comics 4 All Podcast

I had a great time Sunday afternoon doing a LIVE podcast for Jameson Rohrer's "Comics 4 All" show. Jameson is a librarian with a passion for comics in general and graphic medicine in particular, so we took some deep dives into those subjects plus pretty much my entire life as a cartoonist. 

Two notes: 

1. The Australian psychiatrist whose name I couldn't remember at 24:40 is Neil Phillips. To be fair to me, I haven't seen him in nine years. To be critical of me, I bought two pieces of artwork from him, so I probably should have been able to conjure his name.

2. I didn't realize until I watched some of the replay that I was blinking weird. I just want to reassure viewers that my twitchiness is not due to an undiagnosed neurological condition, but because I have terrible hay fever irritating my eyes right now and my choice was to either blink weird or claw at my corneas with my fingernails. I think I chose wisely.

Thanks to Jameson for the invitation and his time, I appreciate it!

No Kings Day 2026

Karen and I getting into position for the start of the march. My "Antifa" sign got some attention from people who said they'd also had relatives who served in World War II and had partly come to honor them, as I did. Grandpa fought fascism; I figure I owe it to him to do the same.

Karen and I made a little good trouble in Santa Rosa, Calif. this afternoon. Our daughters were also with us, but I only post photos of them (as adults) with their permission, which I definitely didn't have. Demonstrators gathered in two areas and then converged on Old Courthouse Square in the center of the city. 

Police estimate attendance at 6,000; the local newspaper says 12,000. I honestly lean toward the lower end of that range, but will say that I've been in that square for a lot of events, including a past demonstration that drew about 5,000 people, and it was much more packed than I've ever seen it. Like a summer Saturday at Disneyland. 

This stream of demonstrators, which included us, approached from the south. Another stream approached from the north. We converged in the heart of the city.

A giant bird marionette in Santa Rosa's Old Courthouse Square. Contrary to common belief, the building with the clock tower in the background is NOT the old courthouse, which was razed decades ago. However, that building, which is called the Empire Building, does make a cameo in Hitchcock's "Shadow of a Doubt," so I like to include it as a landmark when I can.

As always, demonstrators were good-natured good citizens. Karen and I both thought that the march wasn't as well organized or policed as past marches. There was some poor traffic control and confusion. Organizers needed more people shepherding the crowd.

Quibbles. As our family discussed afterward, the real value of these things isn't imagining that the four of us made a real difference. It's being part of a community. Letting each other know we're not alone. Being a pebble in an avalanche, a snowflake in a blizzard. 

That's worthwhile--at least it's worth a couple of hours on a nice Saturday afternoon.

I ran into two good old friends, Jana and Bill. Nearly forty years ago we were all chemists working in the same lab. Bill in particular was sort of a mentor to me. Now none of us is still a chemist and we meet up at demonstrations. Two of the smarter and better people I know.

I liked this.

A slightly higher, standing-on-a-planter-box angle on Old Courthouse Square as it filled up.

Mom's Cancer in the Press Democrat

My hometown newspaper, the Santa Rosa Press Democrat, published a feature today about me and the Mom's Cancer Anniversary Edition. Writer Dan Taylor has been a real champion of local arts in general and comics in particular, and it was good to talk to him again.

Dan also interviewed my friend MK Czerwiec, who did me the favor of writing a new foreword for my book. I wasn't surprised that Dan quoted MK, since I asked her permission to give Dan her contact info, but I was surprised he also reached out to librarian, teacher, and graphic medicine wrangler Matthew Noe, who luckily for me also said nice things. Thanks to them both!

Two quick stories about the photo. Photographer John Burgess, who is a pro's pro, came to my studio and tried to wring some liveliness out of me. He was joking "Work it, work it!" and got me laughing, until I said to him, "Here's the thing. I don't want to look like I'm yucking it up promoting a book about my mother's cancer." John immediately switched gears. "Got it. Mona Lisa smile." Click.

Second story about the photo is that in the top left corner you can see an out-of-focus stained-glass hummingbird hanging in my studio window. Mom made that, and my sisters graciously gave it to me after the fire. If you'd like to interpret that as Mom literally watching over my shoulder, be my guest.

PNW

Karen and I are home from a vacation in the Pacific Northwest to celebrate our anniversary. We spent three days in Seattle and two in Victoria B.C. I figure you don't really want to hear a long travelogue or see my 200-photo slide show, so just assume we saw and did all the things, got lucky with the weather, and had a great time.

Instead, I'll tell three stories in two photos. First is a spray of glass flowers by Dale Chihuly at the base of the Space Needle. Karen and I agree that the Chihuly Garden was a breathtaking highlight of our trip, a guaranteed must-see. 

Second is two stories in one photo. Story 1: there's a great bookstore in Victoria called Munro's that had one copy of the "Mom's Cancer Anniversary Edition." So if any readers in the vicinity want an autographed copy of the book, Munro's has one. I didn't stealth-sign it; I asked a clerk (I'm always astonished that when I say "I wrote this book, do you want me to sign it?" nobody ever asks for I.D.) and they put a sticker on it, so it's official. 

Story 2: We discovered a neat little hat shop in Victoria called Roberta's, where I finally found a hat I like. I've been looking for one for a long time, but choosing a hat is no simple chore. It's more like the hat has to choose you. So I explained to the clerk that I used to have a fedora-like hat I loved but lost years ago, and I've been looking for one since. I tried on the one I'm wearing in the photo and said, "I like it, but I don't want to look like Indiana Jones."

She replied, "Oh, I don't think you could ever look like Indiana Jones."

To which I said, "Thanks, that's very nice--HEY!!"

But she was good-natured about it so, despite the insult, I bought the hat. 

Good trip.

250 Words on the Colbert Questionert: Part One

[I try to start my day writing 250 words on anything. I’ll post one every Tuesday until I run out of good ones.]

Talk show host Stephen Colbert sometimes challenges his guests to take the “Colbert Questionert,” which he says is meant to reveal a person’s soul but is mostly for fun. Since Colbert’s final “Late Show” episode airs May 21, I will never get the opportunity to have him quiz me (as if I had a chance otherwise), so I’ll share my answers here. 

His questions vary, but have included: 

Best sandwich? Reuben, although I could make a case for classic grilled cheese.

First concert? In high school, I took my friend Andrea to see Victor Borge. We were nerds. He was great.

Scariest animal? The spiny candiru fish of the Amazon, which reputedly swims upstream into human urethras, although scientists say those claims are exaggerated. 

Apples or oranges? I like both but if forced to choose: apples.

Cats or dogs? I have loved both but if forced to choose: dogs. 

Earliest memory? I remember climbing out of my crib.

Exercise: worth it? Absolutely! That doesn’t mean I will do it.

Have you ever asked someone for their autograph? Apollo astronaut Dick Gordon signed a model of his command module for me. Generally, autographs don’t mean much to me. I’d rather have a conversation. 

What happens when we die? I think we are the sum of the thoughts, personality, knowledge, and memories contained in our brains, and when our brains are gone, so are we. There's beauty in that. 

Favorite action movie? “Raiders of the Lost Ark.”

More Colbert Questionert next week!

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250 Words on Reframing

[I try to start my day writing 250 words on anything. I’ll post one every Tuesday until I run out of good ones.]

I once read about a foreign diplomat who met with the elders of a remote village and was offered a cup of tea. The tea was a revolting, nearly undrinkable sludge, but it would have been a grievous insult to refuse. 

“Then,” he said something like, “I found that if I didn’t think of it as tea but rather as soup, it was actually pretty good.”

That stayed with me. Adjusting your perception of a situation can entirely change your feelings about it.

For example, we’ve all had a driver speed past us, weaving dangerously through traffic just to get a minute ahead. “They must be a surgeon on their way to an emergency operation,” I joke to anyone in the car, but I’m half-serious. I remember driving through the city at 2 a.m. to get to my wife in the hospital before my daughters were born, and strictly following traffic laws was not my top priority. 

Yes, the driver in that careening car is probably an angry, rude, arrogant idiot. But I don’t know that, or them, or what’s going on in their life. I might have looked exactly like them racing to the hospital in the middle of the night. Since I can’t do anything about it anyway, reframing the situation is a good way to get on with my day a bit less stressfully. 

I don’t know you. You don’t know me. Nobody’s always at their best. Let’s try to afford each other a bit of grace. 

* * * 

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Book Launch by the Bay

Evidence of how beautiful a day on the Bay it was. This was on the ferry to San Francisco (if you're not familiar with the geography, the skyline of S.F. is just out of frame to the left). Alcatraz is on the right and the Golden Gate Bridge is in the background. Clear skies to the horizon.

Had a pretty good event at the Book Passage Bookstore in the San Francisco Ferry Building yesterday. Turnout was light--fewer than a dozen--which the store manager warned me might happen. It was a beautiful, warm, sunny day in the City, and she explained that in her experience people would rather enjoy a blue-sky afternoon on the Bay than in a bookstore. 

Still, I got to take my new Mom's Cancer: Anniversary Edition talk for a spin (verdict: solid!), sold a few books, and met some good people. In addition, as my friends and readers may recall, yesterday was my daughters' birthday so we made a whole family day out of it.

Stack of books by the door. Book Passage actually stocked copies of ALL my books for people to buy, which is unusual. They went the extra mile.

My introduction. Most photos by my wife, Karen (thanks!).

Cartoonist/teacher/fellow-Abrams-author Justin Hall showed up to interview me as part of the program. I’ve met Justin a few times but don’t really know him, but his questions were so good and thoughtful, and our discussion so lively, it was like we’d planned and rehearsed it for weeks. I wish I could take him everywhere. Thanks so much, Justin! I owe you.

Justin Hall really did a fantastic job with this Q&A. As a cartoonist himself, he asked all the right questions and built thoughtfully on my answers without getting too deep in the weeds for "civilians." I could have talked with him for hours, and wouldn't mind a chance to do that sometime.

Book Passage had a nice display of Abrams books, which I was happy to see.

When you write a book like Mom's Cancer (or A Fire Story), you meet some extraordinary people in the signing line, and yesterday was no exception. My last was an older woman who’d just happened into the store while waiting for her ferry, and explained that her daughter had died of cancer three months ago and left her to care for her two grandsons. She cried, I almost cried, and she bought the book to help explain to the kids what had happened to their mother. 

Other graphic novelists don’t make those connections.

Thanks to Book Passage and Justin for a good launch on a great day.

The Book Passage store is inside San Francisco's historic ferry building, which for several months has been guarded by a giant woman made of steel and chicken wire. This sculpture was controversial when it was installed but I think people have come to appreciate her. I do.

Here's how hard my day's transportation was: the ferry that we took from Larkspur Landing to San Francisco, the "Mendocino," is on the right. The Book Passage store, as shown by the sign above the pedestrian walkway, is on the left. That's a short commute. When we were done we had dinner nearby and then caught the same ferry back toward home.

Happy Birthday, Pooters

Their first birthday party. More parties followed,
including one later today. They're neater eaters now. 

The Ides of March have had a bad reputation since 44 B.C.--thanks, Caesar!--but at least for me the date was redeemed when my daughters were born on it. Happy Birthday, Laura and Robin. Thank you for making me a Dad!

See You at S.F. Book Passage, Sunday at 2 p.m.

S.F. Bay Area Friends! If you find yourself near the San Francisco Ferry Building this Sunday, March 15 at 2 p.m., I'd sure appreciate it if you'd drop by the Book Passage Bookstore, listen to me talk, and maybe even buy a copy of Mom's Cancer: Anniversary Edition. I can think of worse ways to spend a beautiful day in a beautiful city! Thanks.

https://www.bookpassage.com/event/brian-fies-mom%E2%80%99s-cancer-anniversary-edition-ferry-building-event

The Intellectual Life #28

A Peek into the Intimate Intellectual Life of a Long-Married Couple, Part 28:

Me: "Can this serving spoon go into the dishwasher?"

Karen: "Yes."

Me: "I never know which can and which can't."

Karen: "Two of them are stainless steel and can go in the dishwasher. One is silver-plate and shouldn't."

Me: "I can't tell them apart."

Karen: "They're very different."

Me: "Not when you're only looking at one of them."

Karen: "The sliver-plate spoon has a daffodil pattern."

Me: "Now I have to be a BOTANIST?!"

Karen: "It's pretty obvious."

Me: "I'll just keep asking to be sure."

This has been a peek into the intimate intellectual life of a long-married couple. 

Review: "I Felt Myself In It."

Here's an insightful review from writer Susan Palmer, shared with my thanks. Nobody's opinion of Mom's Cancer means more to me than that of someone who's been through it themselves. 

"I didn’t understand until I read Fies’s book the kind of deep skill it takes to bring the right words and the right images together. His mother’s journey was quite different than mine. Yet I felt myself in it. For anyone in any stage of that landscape, I imagine the book may have that effect."

250 Words on the Next Guy

[I try to start my day writing 250 words on anything. I’ll post one every Tuesday until I run out of good ones.]

Rebuilding my home taught me one nearly universal constant: no matter what trade you’re dealing with—concrete, framing, electrical, HVAC, tile, flooring, painting—the next guy you call in will tell you that the previous guy didn’t know what he was doing.

(I’m using “guy” generically, recognizing that both men and women can be skilled professional tradespeople, although my experience is limited to men.)

“Who put in this 20-amp circuit breaker?” asks the first guy. “Were they trying to burn down your house?” He puts in a 30-amp breaker.

“Who put in this 30-amp circuit breaker?” demands the next guy. “Were they trying to burn down your house?”

You seldom find such staggering levels of confident incompetence as you do when building a home. We did have a good prime contractor, and what made them good was that they recognized the work of bad subcontractors and corrected it fast. We also learned quickly ourselves.

It’s hard not to conclude that documents like the National Electrical Code or state Building Code, which to a layperson seem like detailed engineering manuals with explicit regulations for every situation and contingency, are matters of opinion and debate. More guidelines than rules, really.

I’ve mentioned my observation to a couple of tradespeople we've hired to do work for us, and every time they seem unamused and deeply insulted. And then they take a look at whatever the project is and say, “Whoever did this didn’t know what they were doing! Good thing you hired me!”

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BOOK EVENTS AHOY!

I wanted to announce three upcoming book talks and signings for the release of the Mom's Cancer: Anniversary Edition so you can put them on your calendars. Heck, why not attend all three? (Nobody but me should do that.)

March 15 at 2 p.m. I will be at Book Passage in the San Francisco Ferry Building. That's next Sunday already! Book Passage is one of the great West Coast independent bookstores that big-time authors make sure to hit when they're in the Bay Area, and they've always been good to me. 

April 9 at 7 p.m. I will be at the Copperfield's Books store in Montgomery Village, Santa Rosa, Calif. Copperfield's is another great indie chain whose support has meant a lot over the years. They're a real champion of local authors, with terrific managers and staff. 

May 16 at 2 p.m. I will be at the Charles M. Schulz Museum, also in Santa Rosa, Calif. I've attended and participated in so many events at the Schulz Museum that it feels like my home away from home, and the ones they held after the 2017 wildfires are personal and professional highlights for me. 

The last two events are not yet on their respective hosts' event calendars, but trust me: I'm booked.

I have other podcasts and interviews in the hopper, which I'll be sure to announce as they emerge. I have no real book tour planned. Those are a lot harder to come by these days. However, if any bookstore within the sound of my electrons is interested in hosting a talk and signing, please let me know!

Career Fair Day

I just spent four hours at a local high school's Career Fair with my pal, cartoonist Lex Fajardo, who is the creator of the Kid Beowulf comics series and editor at the Schulz Studio. Here's why I think that was a good use of my time:

1. Talking shop with Lex. 

2. Offering an alternative. We were surrounded by cops, firefighters, soldiers, engineers, grocery store managers, and many other career choices that there is nothing wrong with except they aren't cartoonists. We had several students and even a couple of teachers who thanked us just for being so different.

3. Approximately 37 out of 38 students couldn't have cared less that we were there, but that one out of 38 lit up like a sun. I would move mountains for the 38th kid.

4. Related: Lex and I agreed that if two people like us has been at OUR high school career fairs, we would have rooted to the spot and absorbed all we could. When I was a kid, I met people who did things I dreamed of doing, and realized that it wasn't magic; they just worked hard and did the things. If they could, then I could. Now I get to be one of those people for someone else. 

5. Free cookies.

That's a good afternoon. 

Review: Near Mint Condition

Here's an extraordinary take on the new edition by a YouTuber who reviews comics under the banner "Near Mint Condition" (I know his name but am not sure he wants it public). 

In more than 20 years of having my work scrutinized, I don't know if I've received a review this detailed, thoughtful, and compassionate. The reviewer read the story closely and brought his own life experience to it. That connection is what writing and reading is all about.

Thanks to my friend Chris Sparks for bringing it to my attention. If you have 13 minutes and are interested, I think it's worth a look! 

A Book Launch Q&A

Timed nicely with yesterday's launch of my new anniversary edition of Mom's Cancer, here's an interview with the Substack pub Autobiographix. This was a Q&A I did a few weeks ago with Amaris Ketcham, who I thought asked some good questions on topics I don't usually get asked about, such as my origin story and stylistic development. For being relatively brief, it goes pretty deep!

Thanks to Amaris and Autobiographix! It's a nice way to mark the occasion of putting a new (or at least updated) book into the world. 

250 Words on Paths

[I try to start my day writing 250 words on anything. I’ll post one every Tuesday until I run out of good ones.]

Countless stories explore the idea of paths not taken, and how different some other direction might have been. Life can turn on a single choice, particularly when it eliminates other choices. You can’t help but wonder.

Existence only seems like an inevitable chain of events leading to Now in retrospect. At the time, it’s chaos. I can recall many seemingly trivial moments that changed the course of my life in ways I didn’t understand until much later.

Once, when I was a newspaper reporter, my editor bellowed across the newsroom asking if anyone wanted to take a weekend junket to cover an electric utility launching a high-tech energy storage project. Nobody else spoke up so I volunteered, and wrote a full-page feature on it. No big deal. Many years later, I applied for work as a science writer, and that article was the only thing I’d published that was relevant to the job. That began a new career for me, which led to freelance writing, which led to full-time cartooning. 

If I hadn’t been in the newsroom just then, or if someone else had spoken first, or if I’d made other plans for that weekend, I might have had an entirely different life. 

It’s natural to speculate on where that untraveled path would have led. I wish I’d handled some choices differently. But the way I see it, I can’t regret anything before my daughters were born, because every decision led to them and any different path would not have. 

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T-Minus One Week and Counting

Friends, very rarely do I post for naked promotional purposes, but my new/old book--the 20th Anniversary Edition of Mom's Cancer--is being released in exactly one week, on March 3. If you have any interest in owning this update of my first graphic novel, now with 32 more pages of content including 22 pages of new art, this would be an excellent time to order it.

As always, I encourage everyone to support their local heroic independent bookseller. Failing that, it's also available from the usual multinational corporations, and I won't think less of you. Make sure you get the new one with the pink spine. 

By way of encouragement, I'll repeat my offer of mailing a free signed bookplate to anyone who asks. Just send me your postal address (brianfiesATgmailDOTcom should do it), tell me how/if you want it inscribed, and I'll pop it in the mail. Honestly, I haven't yet received the bookplates from my printer, but I will soon and they'll look like this. Meanwhile, I've started a list.

I have some book signings and podcast appearances coming up, and will be sure to mention them as they get closer. 

Many thanks!

250 Words on Squaring the Circle

[I try to start my day writing 250 words on anything. I’ll post one every Tuesday until I run out of good ones.]

“Squaring the circle” is a geometry problem so infamous that it became a metaphor for an unachievable task. The challenge: construct a square with the same area as a given circle using only a compass and straight edge. It’s impossible because the area of a circle is a multiple of π (3.14159265…), a number with an endless stream of digits that can’t be translated into a square with those tools.

Nevertheless, centuries of crackpots have tried to square the circle. Including me.

A similar problem is trisecting an angle: it has been proven impossible to divide an arbitrary angle into three equal parts using a compass and straight edge. 

I can’t tell you how much time and paper I wasted trying to trisect an angle until I satisfied myself that it was at least impossible for me. 

Perpetual motion is the ultimate futile challenge. No device, no matter how you arrange its weights, pulleys, magnets or gears, can run forever without putting energy into it. Friction and other thermodynamic waste grind every machine down until it stops. No system is 100 percent efficient.

I know that. I believe that.

And yet the number of times I’ve thought, “But what if . . .”

For as long as I can remember, whenever someone told me something was impossible, I set out to prove them wrong, or at least prove to myself they were right. At worst, it provides light mental exercise. At best, there’s a Nobel Prize in it for me.   

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Robert Duvall

I've seen many fine and touching testimonials to the late actor Robert Duvall, with mentions of his great performances in "The Godfather," "Apocalypse Now," "The Great Santini," and more. But very few have mentioned this, my favorite scene of his ever, from the movie "Secondhand Lions." 

If you haven't seen it, it's a good movie with a great cast, and even a bit of artwork by "Bloom County" cartoonist Berke Breathed. Recommended.

When I began my "Last Mechanical Monster" webcomic back in, oh, 2012 or 2013, I thought of two actors whom I'd love to portray my old mad scientist, Sparky, if anyone ever wanted to make a live-action movie of it. First was Christopher Plummer. Second was Robert Duvall. Both are gone now, and since nobody's clamoring to make that movie I guess I lost my chance. 

Sparky in action. See if you can imagine Duvall in the role.

250 Words on Stuff that Isn't for You

[I try to start my day writing 250 words on anything. I’ll post one every Tuesday until I run out of good ones.]

One of the milestones of maturity is realizing that not everything is made or meant for you. 

Other people can love music, literature, entertainment, food, or sports that you find inexplicable, confusing, repulsive, inane. It’s fine! Believing that is a big step in accepting you’re not the center of the universe. 

Too many argue the opposite: “I hate it, it’s bad, and anyone who likes it is stupid.” How small-minded. 

Take Taylor Swift.*

Early in her career, I was dismissive. Lightweight pop. But as her career grew, so did my appreciation for her work and work ethic.

Swift’s songs weren’t made for middle-aged men like me, and I wasn’t living the lives of kids to whom her lyrics spoke. She was an artist for them, not me, and while I’ve come to like some of her songs, I could never love her like they do.

She also seems like a decent person, a refutation of the axiom that there are no ethical billionaires. Millions pay money to hear her sing. I see no crime. 

I try not to judge any art as “good” or “bad.” De gustibus non est disputandum. I prefer Roger Ebert’s standard: Does the work achieve its intended purpose? If so, it’s a success. The strongest criticism I’ll level publicly is, “It’s not for me.”

Of course, the corollary of “Not all art is meant for you” is “Your art isn’t meant for everybody.” Accept some audience indifference and trust that the right people will find you.

*Or Bad Bunny.

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Lost and Found on the USS Hornet

Here's a neat TV news story from my daughter Laura's aircraft carrier, the USS Hornet Sea, Air and Space Museum: a museum volunteer poking around some compartments of the ship that have been locked up since the Hornet was decommissioned in 1970 found a sailor's old high school class ring. The ring provided enough clues to identify the sailor and locate his family! 

Aside from the heartwarming story, I love the idea that there are still deep recesses of the ship that have yet to be fully explored. An aircraft carrier, even an old one like the Hornet, really is like a small city at sea.

250 Words on Thunder and Lightning

[I try to start my day writing 250 words on anything. I’ll post one every Tuesday until I run out of good ones.]

Thunderstorms are my favorite meteorological phenomenon. The flash, the boom, the gut-thrumming rumble. The familiar world is transformed into something alien and frightening. You are small and nature is immense, but indoors you’re reasonably safe and can enjoy the show. 

Thunderstorms are rare where I live now, in northern California not far from the Pacific. We don’t have the violently colliding air masses and geography to create them. But I grew up in South Dakota, where the smell of ozone in the wind was a herald announcing their imminent arrival. You could see the front advancing toward you, black clouds gathering over the horizon, lit from within by arcing sparks. 

Ball lightning is an unusual phenomenon that scientists aren’t even sure is real, but my grandparents always swore they saw a cloud of sparkling light float down their chimney and dance around the living room before evanescing into the air. I’d pay good money to witness that.

Probably the most awe-inspiring natural phenomenon I ever saw happened one night I was flying out of Dallas during a thunderstorm. Our plane broke through a deck of clouds to find another deck above us, with rain filling the gap between them. Every few seconds, lightning flashed between the decks, illuminating distant funnel clouds connecting the layers above and below us, like pillars in a vast and empty warehouse. 

We quickly broke through the top deck into clear skies, but I’ll never forget that vision of Hell or Heaven, I wasn’t sure which.

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Viva Bad Bunny!

Bad Bunny with Lady Gaga

So I guess I'm a Bad Bunny fan now.

I'm not compelled to speak out on all the passing controversies of the day, but I had some thoughts on Mr. Bunny's Super Bowl performance I haven't seen anyone else express.

First, no, I don't speak Spanish. That's not a deal-breaker for me. I don't speak Italian, either, but I'd still go to an opera. Plus, the sound quality in Levi's Stadium was such that I doubt even native Spanish speakers understood many of his lyrics unless they already knew the songs. 

I was impressed by three things. First, the propulsive energy of Mr. Bunny's performance. It reminded me of Bruno Mars's Super Bowl show in 2014. Before that I was aware of Mars, of course, but he attacked that performance with such joyful intensity that I instantly became a fan. Same with Mr. Bunny yesterday.

Second was the stagecraft. He and his team built and then disassembled a Puerto Rican cane field, a casita, a bodega, an entire community of musicians and dancers and street vendors and power poles, in the middle of a football field during a break in the game. The choreography was astounding--everyone had to be in exactly the right spot at the right time, from a bartender who handed Mr. Bunny a shot glass to a kid sleeping on a bench (who a lot of people are saying was Liam Conejo Ramos, the boy in the blue knit cap who was kidnapped by ICE, but it wasn't him). 

Third was the storytelling. I didn't know the words but I certainly understood the story Mr. Bunny told of community, tradition, hard work, family celebration--you know, all the classic American values. The entire show was as wholesome and, dare I say, as conservative as could be, right down to the real wedding performed in the middle of it and his "God Bless America" (in English) at the end of it. 

I found it all much more interesting and entertaining than the usual band standing on a stage singing their greatest hits. As a storyteller myself I admire and appreciate masterful storytelling from others, and Mr. Bunny delivered for me. Your mileage may vary.

250 Words on the Secret

[I try to start my day writing 250 words on anything. I’ll post one every Tuesday until I run out of good ones.]

Occasionally I’m asked to critique someone’s writing or cartooning, and give them advice on how to build a career.

I’ve learned to be wary.

First, nine out of ten people who ask my opinion don’t really want it. They want to be told their work is fantastic and they don’t need to change a jot. So the first thing I try to figure out is whether I’m talking to one of those folks, or to the one out of ten who genuinely wants feedback and is professional enough to take it.

Sometimes people want to know “the secret”: the password, the trick, the right person to approach with the right pitch. Once in a while, they’ll even ask me to do it for them—make the connection, grease the wheels, get them in the door to make a deal.

Of course the real secret is that there isn’t one, and I don’t have the influence they think I do. Even if I wanted to, there is nobody I can call who would offer them the “Standard Rich and Famous Contract” that Orson Welles gave Kermit the Frog. 

Every successful creative person I know has a different story about how they made it. Their way probably won’t work for you. Sit down, do the work, and put it out into the world however you can. If anyone likes something you did, do more of that. Get rejected. Get experience. Get better. Get noticed. Get paid. 

That’s the only secret I know. 

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LumaCon 2026

An overview of the main room at the Petaluma Recreation Center. Other vendors and events were set up in surrounding rooms and outdoor spaces.

I had to take a quick spin through my favorite little comics convention in the world this morning, even though I couldn't commit to tabling this year. Librarians put on the LumaCon Comic Convention for Youth in Petaluma, Calif. to support kids' creativity, promote reading, and give young creators a chance to mingle and mix with professionals. It's free and has a bake sale. What's not to love?

I did a lap, said Hello to lots of friends, bought some books, and then headed out to the rest of my busy day. I'm glad I made the effort. It's a great event run by great people for all the right reasons.

Cartoonist Tom Beland greeted me as I entered the big room.

Nearby, Andrew Farago from the Cartoon Art Museum, his wife cartoonist Shaenon Garrity, and their son Robin.

Comic book artist extraordinaire Brent Anderson.

Cartoonist and Schulz Studio staffer Denis St. John, autographing a book I bought from him.

Another Schulz staffer, editor and "Kid Beowulf" cartoonist Lex Fajardo.

Maia Kobabe, author of one of the most banned books in the U.S., "GenderQueer." We had a nice conversation about graphic medicine.

I also ran into Schulz Studio head and cartoonist Paige Braddock, best known for the comic strip "Jane's World" and her new series for kids, "Peanut, Butter & Crackers."

Down a hall from the big room was space set aside for people who just wanted to sit quietly and draw. It was full. Another example of why I love this event.