Leif & Thorn

Five Recs: Throwback Webcomics of the 2000s

11 April, 2022 3 Comments

More Bookshop recs! This time, for webcomics I started reading more than a decade ago…and that have stood the test of time enough for me to keep recommending you buy the books.

It’s still a little dicey doing older recs, because time and social standards keep marching on. Sometimes you’ll get a joke about gender roles that wasn’t even malicious at the time, it just feels hopelessly backward a decade or two later. Other times you’ll get a Windows 95 reference. Those used to be funny, I promise.

I enjoyed these comics anyway! Here’s hoping some of you will too.

Webcomics I Read In The 2000s And Still Like

Bruno the Bandit: Sword and sorcery (and cell phones…and social satire) with a selfish mercenary and his put-upon microdragon sidekick. Their struggles include Lovecraftian horrors, fame vampires, and losing the TV remote.

Honestly, this is the series that most inspired the “off-color jokes that seem very dated” warning. But they usually come from characters that aren’t supposed to be guiding lights of moral clarity, and the comic’s best moments are timelessly on-point.

…it also has some surprisingly-direct inspiration for things I ended up putting in Leif & Thorn.

Dreamless: A romantic drama about two people on opposite sides of the world — he’s in Japan, she’s in the US — who see each other’s waking lives while they’re asleep. Then WWII breaks out.

The art in this one might not stand out in the modern-day webcomic scene, but when it launched? This level of painterly, realistic style — for an internet comic! — was kind of mind-blowing.

User Friendly: Misadventures of a bunch of geeks employed by a programming company. Like Dilbert, but in the good ways, not the “weird authorial MRA spiral” ways.

Honestly, I have no idea if this will be funny or relatable to new readers who weren’t around for the era of nerd culture it’s riffing on. But maybe it will! Give it a try, let me know.

Ozy and Millie: Two best friends, an introspective wolf and an energetic chaos-agent fox, have cute adventures. Some philosophy, some politics, one excellent dragon dad.

The artist got wildly popular later on for Phoebe And Her Unicorn. I wish that translated into more appreciation for her early work! It’s not like her skills were undercooked back when she drew this series — it absolutely shines.

Suburban Jungle: Furry sitcom adventures (with a dash of sci-fi) of model and would-be actress Tiffany Tiger, and her friends and colleagues around LA.

If you click with it, check out the sequel series too. (Maybe even check out the sequel if you don’t click with it! Same universe, but the artist tries new things.)

Reminder: A cut of Bookshop’s profits goes to local bookstores — you can even pick a specific favorite store to support. If you buy through one of these links, I get a cut as the referrer, so it supports this comic too.

Have a favorite classic webcomic that isn’t on this list? Got a request for a rec theme I should do next month? Drop a comment and share!

The paywalled content is not a glitch, I am trying to sell you things on purpose!

5 April, 2022 3 Comments

A belated FAQ for the Leif & Thorn: Off-Shoots bonus comics.

The current bonus arc involves paint swatches, overzealous fans, and a couple of familiar-looking home-wreckers. The next one will explore modified magic Roombas and the perils of United Islands ice cream sales.

After that? Haven’t decided yet. But I’m going to have fun with it.

Q. Why does Leif & Thorn have bonus comics that are only for paying supporters?

A. Capitalism.

Seriously, your artist has to cover the bills. That’s why I have ads on the site, why I sell books and other merchandise, and why I post exclusive content for supporters on Patreon.

None of these make a ton of profit! Which is why I’m always working on new things to sell, hoping to tempt readers who haven’t bought anything before, but who are interested in the new thing.

Leif & Thorn: Off-Shoots is the latest New Thing.

Q. Are you paywalling the entire comic/site/archive?

A. No. The only paywalled comics are the bonus comics that were exclusive when I posted them.

The main Leif & Thorn comic is still completely free to read, and I don’t plan on ever changing that.

Q. When do the Off-Shoots comics get posted?

A. Every other Wednesday! Since the start of 2022.

Off-Shoots comics are scheduled to go up at 10 PM (US Eastern time), which puts them on the front page of the site for 2 hours, before getting replaced by the regular Thursday comic.

Q. So the bonus comics are supposed to show up on the front page?

A. Well, yeah.

Look, I want readers to be excited and intrigued by the Off-Shoots comics. Kinda defeats the purpose if I don’t show you that they exist, you know?

Q. When a bonus comic is up, how do I find the regular comics?

A. Every Off-Shoots comic has links for “First in Regular Archives” and “Latest in Regular Archives” in the navigation!

You can also browse the main (free) comic archives on the Storyline Archive page, which is always linked in the main menu.

Q. If I only read regular Leif & Thorn, am I going to be missing essential plot stuff in the Off-Shoots comics?

A. No. I wouldn’t be that mean.

You’re going to be missing fun bonus storylines, with a spotlight on characters and settings that I don’t get to showcase in the main comic as much as I’d like to.

They have more of the same humor, worldbuilding, and fun character moments you already like in the regular Leif & Thorn comics! But they’re not plot-essential.

Q. What if I don’t pay to see the bonus comics online…but I do pay to get the Leif & Thorn books?

A. The Off-Shoots comics will be collected in the print volumes!

You’ll have to be patient, though. ~~They won’t start appearing until at least Volume 6, and we haven’t even crowdfunded Volume 5 yet.~~ ETA: The first print Off-Shoots arc will actually appear in Volume 5!

If you don’t want to wait, $5-and-up Patreon supporters get immediate access to the full archive of bonus comics, including the new ones as soon as they get posted.

The Brandon Sanderson crowdfunding campaign…

28 March, 2022 6 Comments

…is bringing the wildest takes out of the woodwork, I swear.

“Why does he need a million dollars?” Buddy, making each book costs money, and he knew a lot of people like his books. If one book is $10 to print and ship, and his readers preorder 100,000, there’s $1 million already. That’s just math.

As of this writing, he has almost 150,000 backers. Lots of them are getting multiple books! Some are getting merch! All of that has production costs.

“Why doesn’t he use a publishing company?” He’s been using publishing companies for 20 years. Now he OWNS a publishing company. That’s…probably how he knows how much books cost.

Find Your Heartsword Type: the official quiz!

24 March, 2022 23 Comments

If you lived in the Leif & Thorn universe, what kind of heartsword would your soul manifest as?

Take this extremely scientific quiz and find out!

Then come back and share your results. Let’s see if my worldbuilding about “which types are common” and “which types are possible but rare” pans out IRL.

Five Recs: Webcomic Omnibuses (Omnibi?) with Female Protagonists

15 March, 2022 No Comments

Check it out, it’s a new front for my “encouraging people to read more webcomics” campaign: I signed up as an affiliate with Bookshop.org!

One of my curated lists of webcomic print collections is supposed to be featured on their front page this month. There’s also a “storefront” where you can see all my reclists, any time, as I make them.

A cut of Bookshop’s profits goes to local bookstores — you can even pick a specific favorite store to support. If you buy through one of these links, I get a cut as the referrer, so it supports this comic too. And none of the money goes through Amazon. It’s a win-win-win.

I’m going to try to post a handful of recs here every month. Since this is Women’s History Month, let’s go with:

Complete Collections of Webcomics Starring Women

Wordpress Child Themes, Made Simple

11 February, 2022 No Comments

A guide for how to turn your WP site layout from “bland default” to “branded va-va-voom.”

(This is technically part of the “how do I webcomic?” series, but it’s not a webcomic-specific walkthrough! The same process works for any kind of Wordpress site.)

Note: I won’t go into detail about writing and editing CSS code, but it’s a skill you’ll need in the Making A Child Theme process. If you’re already familiar with it, awesome. If not, check out last week’s intro post about basic CSS troubleshooting and editing.

“Help, I don’t like how my webcomic site looks, how do I change it?”

2 February, 2022 2 Comments

One cool thing about having an independent site for your webcomic (as opposed to using a platform like Webtoon or Tapas) is, you can do whatever you want with the layout!

One less-cool thing about having an independent site for your webcomic is…nobody else is responsible for handling the layout.

(Unless you personally shell out the cash to hire a web developer — and, well, not a lot of us have that kind of money to spare. Especially when we’re already paying for the independent hosting.)

But, honestly? It’s free and surprisingly-easy to handle it yourself.

Thanks to all the backers who supported Leif & Thorn Volume 4

17 December, 2021 1 Comment

The ebook version is out, the print books are in production, and it’s high time I thanked everyone who helped make Volume 4 a reality.

Extra-special tips of the hat to:

Hela and gladdecease, who caught a couple of mixed-up strips in the ebook version, just in time for me to correct them in the version that went to the printer
The staff of Kickstarter, who were not consulted or even informed about the changes the board (?) is trying to make, all they’ve ever tried to do is make a good platform that works for their users

At this point, I don’t know where I’ll run the campaign to print Volume 5. But through the course of Volumes 1-4, Kickstarter provided functional code and valuable features for the creators who used it, and I appreciate everyone whose time and effort made that possible.

Kickstarter, blockchain, NFTs, trust, and what the fork is up with Bitcoin

12 December, 2021 38 Comments

So the Kickstarter site has made An Announcement, and the reaction from the creative community has been, uh…bad.

Just look at that ratio. Whoo boy.

Listen, I fully expect their plans to get some revision. But it brings home a broader point that Blockchain Stuff In General is getting more interest outside the crypto-insider community.

Which means Comics Fans In General should try to have some informed opinions about them, you know?

As a casual rubbernecker of crypto-community scandals, I’ve been picking up that information for a while now. Mostly in random chunks, based on what’s relevant to the latest scam.

For those of you who are not thirsty benches that live for drama, I’m going to try to organize the useful parts into a single post, which you can read and digest in one sitting.

(There will be lots of links. Reading all of those might take longer.)