Tall Guy Investigates

Four Reviews of Science Tales

Sun, 20 May 2012 21:24:31 GMT

Various reviews of Science Tales. Check out the first review I saw which was in New Scientist.

Here's the text from the two page spread that appeared in The Observer.

On the science\tech blog Boing Boing.

And on the blog Headline Environment.

Review of Science Tales in The Pulse

Sat, 19 May 2012 13:58:56 GMT

A very nice review of Science Tales in the GP magazine, The Pulse.

"Darryl Cunningham has given us a truly lovely book! Essentially, it contains a series of clever cartoons which tackle important issues with lots of humour. They skilfully direct us to the heart of the matter, stimulate critical thinking and debunk common myths, many of which are related to healthcare. Most importantly, they amuse us and thus make potentially boring subjects enjoyable.

In this book, Cunningham's cartoons tell us 8 stories: electroconvulsive therapy; homeopathy; the facts on the case of Dr Wakefield; the moon hoax; climate change; evolutions; chiropractic; and science denial. Each story is only about 20 pages long and explains complex issues simply but accurately. Cunningham takes a "no nonsense approach" and has a refreshing pro-science attitude. The best weapon against quackery, he seems to think, it is poke fun at it.

I predict that homeopaths and chiropractors will not like this book. Everyone else, however, should have a good look at it – chances are, you will love it, simply because it is lovely."

Comica Comiket in London

Fri, 20 Apr 2012 00:20:24 GMT

On Saturday I'll be at the Comica Comiket. at the Bishopsgate Institute near Liverpool Street station in London. I'll be taking part in the Comica Drawing Parade along with other artists. We'll be drawing live while our artwork is projected above us on a giant screen.There should be a few copies of Science Tales at the Myriad Editions table available to buy ahead of the official launch on Tuesday at Gosh Comics.

Also, This Sunday's Observer will feature an interview they did with me, along with artwork from the book. So do check that out.

Science Tales Launch

Thu, 12 Apr 2012 12:47:23 GMT

Science Tales book launch. I'll be there.

A signed bookplate edition of Science Tales will be available at the launch, featuring this illustration.

Mary Celeste

Mon, 26 Mar 2012 08:57:15 GMT

This is the first page of my strip on the mystery of the Mary Celeste and also the first page of the new book I'm working on, History Tales. Sadly the proposed Psychiatric Tales 2 volume has had to be scrapped due to personal reasons.

Science Tales Now Availble To Pre-Order

Tue, 07 Feb 2012 19:55:13 GMT

Hey everyone! Science Tale is now available to pre-order from Myriad Edtions. Check out this link here.

Nice to see Psychiatric Tales prominently displayed in Gosh Comic shop in London's Soho district. There it is, right next to Guy Delisle's travel book on Burma. I was at the shop on Saturday, signing copies for them to sell. Go pick one up if you're in the vicinity.

A panel from The Fist, presented here in black and white. You'll see this image in colour when the strip begins its run in a few weeks time.

Thu, 02 Feb 2012 17:08:26 GMT

A redraw of a strip I first did way back in the 90s in black and white.

Bozo and Boggs

Thu, 19 Jan 2012 17:22:16 GMT

Here's the first page of a redraw, I'm doing, of a piece I did way back in the mid-90s, originally in black and white.

Science Tales Stats

Thu, 05 Jan 2012 16:28:37 GMT

The stats for my blog, clearly show just how popular the various chapters of Science Tales have been, with the Evolution chapter a clear winner, with 259, 263 page views, and it's still getting a respectable 200 hits a day. Although Psychiatric Tales sold well enough, the chapters of that book I placed on my blog barely feature compared to Science Tales. Even if you subtract all the hostile traffic Science Tales has generated, there's still a huge level of potential interest for this book.

It shows, I think, that the comic strip medium has a huge audience waiting out there beyond the tiny bubble of fandom. Readers coming to my blog to read these chapters were not the usual comic book crowd. They were drawn to to read these comics because of the subject, not because of the medium. Many noters commented that they didn't usually read comics at all. Teachers wrote to me, wishing they had individual chapters printed out so they could hand them around the classroom.

The book will be out in the UK in April and It'll be interesting to see whether these stats convert into sales. I think they will.

I didn't sit down and think "I wonder what subjects will really capture a lot of attention?" I wrote these strips because I felt passionately about the subjects. I strongly urge comic book community, especially those working in the so-called mainstream, to think about what they feel passionately about. There's no area that comics can't cover: music, sports, movies, politics. All are fair game as subjects, and if you're passionate about it, then there's a good chance huge numbers of other people will be as well.

So get to it.

New Work

Tue, 20 Dec 2011 13:54:16 GMT

New work from me coming in 2012.

A page from The Fist, which should give you a clue where I'm going with this story. Extreme violence ahead.

A page from the types of dementia chapter of Psychiatric Tales 2.

The Fist

Thu, 15 Dec 2011 21:03:18 GMT

New work from me which will probably debut on Act-i-vate.com next year. Satire and fisticuffs.

Psychiatric Tales 2 Artwork

Sat, 03 Dec 2011 00:08:29 GMT

A page and a bit of artwork from the Types of Dementia chapter of Psychiatric Tales 2. These are redrawn pages. I don't usually go back and rework strips, but in this case I felt that the chapter had got into something of a muddle and wasn't visually interesting enough, so I was obliged to redo all but one page. Tiresome, but I feel much better for it.

The book should be out next autumn.

Uncle Bob Adventures Cover

Mon, 28 Nov 2011 20:38:28 GMT

Possible cover from Uncle Bob Adventures. Lettering by Jonathan Edwards. Out April 2012.

Thoughtbubble and Nelson

Mon, 21 Nov 2011 17:05:15 GMT

Last week was an extremely busy one. On Monday I was invited to do a talk at York University's sociological society. This went well. A young very receptive audience. I got a day out in York and sold a few books too. Thanks to Will Patterson for the invite.

On Thursday I was the keynote speaker at the Graphic Medicine conference at the Leeds City Art Gallery. I was somewhat nervous about this on the days leading up to it, but of course it was fine. The talk went down well with the crowd, with only one person being negative about it. You can't please everyone.

Then, over the weekend, it was time once more for the annual Thought Bubble comic book convention in Leeds. A huge whirl of an event that gets bigger every year. Both my publishers, Blank Slate books and Myriad Editions had tables. It seemed like nearly everybody I knew connected with the comic book industry was there. I couldn't walk five yards without bumping into someone familiar. Good to see so many friends at once. Well done to the ThoughtBubble organisers for doing such a staggeringly good job. I had an amazing couple of days.

The big event at ThoughtBubble, for me, was the launch of the huge British comics anthology Nelson. A very impressive and handsome looking volume, containing 54 British based cartoonists, including me. Each chapter written by a different cartoonist. My thoughts in advance of seeing a copy were that such an experimental concept, one story written in an exquisite corpse style, couldn't possibly work as a whole and that it would be bitty at best. How wrong I was. The book works as a powerful, heartfelt story about the strange randomness of life, the ebb and flow of friendships, and the importance of identity. No single author could have written the fractured pattern of Nel's life without it seeming contrived, but here the multiple voices and art styles give it a sense of reality, and of a life actually lived, as if Nel was a real person who could actually step out of the pages at the end of the book and greet you in person. No bigger compliment can be given to a work of fiction than that.

Nelson

Wed, 16 Nov 2011 10:05:36 GMT

A couple of panels from my chapter of the huge British comics anthology known asNelson.

Nelson

Wed, 02 Nov 2011 14:33:54 GMT

I've a chapter in this book.

Nelson is a 250-page collaboration between 54 of the UK’s most exciting comic creators. It is an unprecedented experiment to create one complete story – a collective graphic novel.

London, 1968. A daughter is born to Jim and Rita Baker. Her name is Nel. This is her story, told in yearly snapshots. Each chapter records the events of a single day, weaving one continuous ribbon of pictures and text that takes us on a 43- year journey from Nel Baker’s birth to 2011.

Based on an original idea by Rob Davis and co-edited by Davis and Woodrow Phoenix, Nelson celebrates the incredible diversity of talent in British comics today. Creators known for their editorial and national newspaper strips unite with those from humour comics such as the Beano, The Dandy, and MAD Magazine joining a wealth of talent from children’s books, indie publishing and webcomics, with the science fiction and superhero worlds of 2000AD, Marvel, DC, and Dark Horse.

Part exquisite corpse and part relay race, Nelson spans decades of British history and a myriad of stylistic approaches in telling the story of one woman’s life by 54 creators, in 54 episodes, detailing 54 days. The result is a surprising and compellingly readable book that is sad, funny, moving, poignant, ridiculous, heartfelt, and real. This is a story like none you have seen before.

Now available to buy.

Uncle Bob Adventures

Thu, 27 Oct 2011 12:53:18 GMT

Various characters from from my all ages book Uncle Bob Adventures, out spring 2012, from Blank Slate in the UK.

A Few Thoughts About The UK Economy

Tue, 25 Oct 2011 13:54:58 GMT

We don't have left-wing parties in the UK. What we have instead are three right-wing parties, one of which has a radical ultra-right arm, who are obsessed with free-market monetarist policies beyond the point of common sense. Their ideals are profoundly undemocratic and utterly opposed to liberal values. They believe in a Darwinian world where the strong have every right to dominate and exploit the weak. They are militantly capitalistic and against the common good. They put strength above morality and despise the common man. There is no society in their philosophy, just a collection of individuals competing against one another.

You might think that David Cameron's coalition is right-wing, but to to hard-right in the conservative party, poor Dave is seen as a feeble wet: an appeaser to the spineless liberal-democrat section of the coalition. If it was up to the hard Tory right, Britain would be suffering a far more brutal austerity programme than we're seeing now. And as it is, things are bad enough.

I'm not against capitalism. Capitalism has given us the technological world we live in, without which, our lives would be shorter and harder. What I'm against is an unrestrained capitalism that benefits a tiny elite group at the expense of everybody else.

Britain's economy has barely grown since the austerity measures began. We have the highest level of unemployment in fifteen years. The government has slashed public-sector jobs, putting more than 100, 000 people out of work. These deficit-reduction policies have failed to revive the business confidence that was supposed to encourage private-sector hiring. No effort has been made to stimulate growth by spending, because this runs counter to the right's myth that all government spending is wasteful and harmful.

This is blundering idiocy. Any fool can see that these policies are driving the country into the ground, but our glorious leaders are so wrapped up in their dogma, that they'd rather destroy the economy for a generation, than admit they're wrong.

Stan's Piano

Mon, 10 Oct 2011 13:49:45 GMT

It's nice to be able to do something completely un-serious for a change.

Science Tales Cover

Mon, 03 Oct 2011 20:26:47 GMT

Possible cover of Science Tales. More details here.

Science Denial

Thu, 22 Sep 2011 09:34:04 GMT

Last chapter of Science Tales. The summing-up chapter. This is the beta version, so feel free to add comments and corrections.

Super-Sam and John Of The Night

Fri, 09 Sep 2011 10:36:09 GMT

A few pages featuring Super-Sam and John Of The Night. A strip which originally ran on the Forbidden Planet blog. There are two long stories featuring these characters: The Mystery of the Seven Faces (which includes the pages you see here), and The Streets of San Diablo (which ran on Activate.com). I'm still looking for a publisher for these stories if anyone is interested? One day I hope to do a third story in this series: The Throne of God.

Chiropractic

Fri, 19 Aug 2011 16:48:53 GMT

Here is the beta version of my strip on chiropractic therapy. It's a little rough and will need proofreading from those of you with eyes sharper than mine. All comments welcome. This is, of course, a chapter of my upcoming Science Tales book, which will be out from Myriad Editions next year. Each chapter of the book will come complete with references and acknowledgements, including this one.

Health

Wed, 17 Aug 2011 12:31:42 GMT

Health

The old people's residential home, where I work two days a week, is under severe pressure from the squeeze on funding, caused by the government's cuts. It's one of a dwindling number of homes run by the council in this area. Many council run homes have been shut down already and more are planned to be closed as the government's cuts bite deep.

This particular home has had to shed staff already to save money, which has increased pressure on the remaining people who work there in what is an extremely demanding job to begin with. Working with elderly people who are all in various states of dementia is not an easy task. It is work that tests you both physically and mentally. Many of the residents are unable to feed themselves and therefore have to be assisted. This feeding process takes time and patience. Time, which I fear, is not always available to staff when there are not enough people around to do the work. These days office staff and management, and even the cleaners are having to chip in and help at meal times.

The knock-on effect of the added pressure of an overworked care staff has had a disastrous result. Currently there are six members of staff off sick. An unheard of number to be ill simultaneously. Do I think that these people are ill because they're overworked and exhausted? You bet I do.

I'm lucky, because I'm agency staff, and therefore get to pick and choose when I work and how many shifts I do. But the regular staff don't have this option. Care-workers get paid not much above the minimum wage. That's how much both residents and workers are valued in this society.

The government are desperate, of course, to ultimately shove all health care into the private sector. A state run health care sector is anathema to the free-market fundamentalists who are currently in power. They degrade public health sector deliberately so they can point to its failings and have the excuse to shut it down.

This would be all well and good if we could trust private health care to be run in our interests, but it won't be. The disastrous US model of private health insurance is not something we in the UK should be moving towards. As imperfect as the NHS is in this country, it does at the very least put patient care first, and not profit.

A Moderate Success

Thu, 11 Aug 2011 11:04:33 GMT

History is moving forward at breakneck speed. We live in tumultuous times. The Euro crisis, the US debt crisis, the News International phone hacking scandal, the Arab spring, the UK riots, and an impending second financial crash.

Meanwhile, I'm having an excellent year. I've been to New York where I had a meeting with a publisher in the Flatiron Building, I spoke about my work, along with other cartoonists, at the Latitude music festival in front of hundreds of people, and I was interviewed on radio four's All In The Mind programme (which caused Psychiatric Tales to be a best seller on Amazon).

Assuming society hasn't completely broken down, and we don't find our selves living in bands of roving cannibals, then I will have two further books out next year: Uncle Bob Adventures, (from Blank Slate), and Science Tales (from Myriad Editions).

Not bad for someone who, only a few years ago, was unemployed, on the verge of homelessness, had crippling debts, and was suicidal. At the time I could see no way out. Yet somehow I've blundered on to create this new and very interesting life. I wouldn't have thought it possible, but it has happened anyway.

I'm very grateful to all the people who supported through that time. Thanks everyone.

Here's a little stop-motion piece I made, using a set of Russian dolls.