Hello, My Pretties!

Despite my penchant for writing about horror, depression, and misery, I actually quite like the “holiday season.” I find the aesthetics and traditions of Christmas charming, and Thanksgiving means I get to eat pie, so I see it as mostly a winning proposition.

Jeremiah Schiek and I have been busy getting pages together for Old Devils #2, which successfully funded on Kickstarter last month. He just sent me page 12, so we’re halfway there, and well on our way to our stated goal of shipping out by February 2026.

I’ve also received 75% of the art for Small Bites #2, which will come out sometime next year (after fulfillment of Old Devils #2), and I also look forward to a FREE HANDS announcement next month.

In the meantime, to whet your appetite for my new collection, here’s a story from Small Bites #1…

Children of the Ark

Written by Matthew Wilding | Art by Domenico Pagano | Letters by Toben Racicot

Originally appeared in Small Bites #1

Bleak, I know, but I’m very proud of this one.

Taking in some puppet theater, etc.

The 4th Witch

On the recommendation and generosity of a theater friend, my wife and I were able to see Manual Cinema’s production of The 4th Witch—a rather spooky and inventive take on Macbeth rendered almost entirely in shadow puppetry. If you’ve got a taste for Shakespeare, haunting string music, and very inventive masks, or an affinity for overhead projectors, I can’t recommend this show enough. It opened in Seattle this week, and has shows scheduled in Texas, California, and Illinois to wrap up the year.

Finding new music while reading

A few years ago, I started jotting down music that I saw referenced in whatever I was reading. I believe it started with magazines, but eventually it became anything—books, newspapers, blogs—and extended into references in movies and comic books as well.

While this habit has its drawbacks—it took me over three years to finish Bing Crosby: Swinging on a Star because there were so many records I stopped to listen to—it has also made me a late but grateful arrival to the works of Habibi funk legend Fadoul, TV on the Radio, and most recently The London Suede. I’m finding that spending time listening to records and digging through comic shop dollar bins is significantly better than doomscrolling and reading the news, and I’d encourage readers to join me (this newsletter notwithstanding). I’m also open to suggestions. Just hit the reply button.

Utilizing my pockets

I’ve written previously about using a bullet journal to keep myself in order. I’m a big fan, but there are times where pulling out a book is not wildly convenient. I started carrying around a Rhodia No. 12 notebook so that I have something to jot stuff down on the fly. The pages are vellum, so they take ink well and are less completely destroyed living in my jacket pocket than a lesser paper would be, and it’s so small that it doesn’t feel bulky on my person. It’s also not wildly expensive ($4-5), and feels like a thing that should be used, so I’m less precious with it than I have been with Leuchtturm A6s or even Field Notes. It helps immensely that the pages are designed to be pulled out and the the cover to be bent. Along with my beat-to-hell Kaweco Sport pen, it’s been a very effective way to keep track of every little thought without using my cellphone, which has been relegated to the front pouch of my bag for most of the day.

Appreciating Ron Garney

I’ve been reading the now-classic Mark Waid/Ron Garney run, Man Without A Country. This is a must-read for Cap fans, and a lot of the interesting stuff about Cap’s world that surfaces in the Marvel movies comes right out of this arc.

At the time of its release, Man Without a Country was a major revival of Captain America, which hadn’t been a top-tier book in the 1990s. Mark Waid’s writing, of course, does wonders for the character, but the art here is worth gushing about as well. Ron Garney seems unable to get through four pages without having Steve Rogers practically jump off the page. It makes the whole thing feel so big and action-packed, even when things are moving slowly.

While he’s gotten a lot of recent attention for his work on BRZKR, I didn’t have Garney’s name as lodged in my head as folks like Andy Kubert and Jim Lee, despite the similarities in style. I was surprised to realize that the last extended runs he’d done before this were Nightstalkers and Ghost Rider—some of my all-time favorite runs of those books, and I had never put together that he was the artist.

I read a good deal of Marvel books now, and while I appreciate that art style changes and there’s lots of good work coming out, I miss seeing these splashy 90s action pages that Ron Garney is such a master of.

Where to find me.

I’m trying to do more appearances. Turns out meeting you people in real life is much better (and more effective) than screaming into the internet void.

My next two appearances are with fine folks at Inebri-art. Going forward, I’m planning on doing at least one event a month. In my next newsletter I’ll have more confirmed dates, including a few comic conventions and a shop appearance or two. If you’re arranging something that you think I’d be a good addition at, shoot me an email. I’d love to table, and if it’s in New England, I almost definitely can.

Until then, you can check me out here:

Barrel House Z Holiday Marketplace
Saturday, November 15, 2025
95 Woodrock Road
Weymouth, MA
12pm-4pm | FREE

Castle Island Norwood Holiday Marketplace
Sunday, December 14, 2025
31 Astor Ave.
Norwood, MA
12pm-4pm | FREE

You can also, as always, buy my comics at my webstore.

That’s all for now.

Thanks for reading.

Best,
Matthew Wilding