The Complete Rainbow Orchid is back in stock in the online shop. Each copy will come signed and sketched-in, and is available worldwide (make sure you choose the correct delivery option).

I knew had a few somewhere, but had forgotten that it was actually 4 or 5 boxes, right at the back of the garage. They were double-boxed, so are in great condition, despite languishing there for nearly ten years!

Click here to visit the online shop.

An interview with me has just been published over at Down the Tubes. I was interviewed last year by Matthew Badham, and after a slight delay and a bit of an update, it now sees the light of day.

Many thanks indeed to Matt and to John Freeman. I will have more news on the '50'zine', mentioned at the end of the interview, very soon.

While consistency can be a problem, depending on my work schedule and other life stuff, I have been able return to drawing The Brambletye Box recently, so head over and read the latest strips if you haven't yet seen them.

The current auction scene is four pages long, so that's three done and one more to go, with the lastest strip seeing the reappearance of Lily Lawrence and her father, Lord Lawrence. Plus a somewhat unsubtle nod to one of my favourite Franco-Belgian creators.

Earlier in February I recorded an interview with Paulo Tirre from Eurocomics, which has just been released on their excellent channel today - you can see it here.

Eurocomics comes out to us from Brazil, and while much of their content is in Portuguese and French, my interview is in English. Hope you enjoy it!

Just in case you haven't checked for a while, there have been a few new Brambletye Box strips put up over Christmas and the new year.

Progress has not exactly been zooming along, but it is being made, even while I'm having a very busy January with other work (I'm doing a lovely project at the moment with the Museum of London - I'll show some when I can).

Don't forget you can help support and encourage such progress by joining my Julius Chancer Patreon page, if you're able to. Thank you!

A couple more Brambletye Box strips have gone up, and you may recognise this character from a previous meeting ...

It's Mr. Arthur Privett, a fellow historical researcher who made an appearance at the beginning of The Secret of the Samurai. He's not as impressive as he likes to think he is!

Here are a few character sketches for the current Brambletye Box scene (the Glinck's auction). If you want to see more behind the scenes work like this then please consider signing up to my Patreon page here - thank you!

Work on The Brambletye Box is proceeding nicely. I've just scripted the next scene and all the layout and roughs are completed, and drawing has begun (in fact the first strip is already up).

This scene sees the reintroduction of Lily Lawrence (learn more about her here), so I've been sketching and drawing her to get reacquainted. Here she is, announcing her up-coming appearance.

I've been blowing into the cooled ashes of the world of Julius Chancer, and a little flame has sprung up and started dancing around. Enough that I feel it's time to open up and get Julius out in front of you again. So here is the start of his next adventure - The Brambletye Box.

At the moment I'm just making the first 5 pages (19 web strips) available to read (start here). More will follow as and when I'm able to put them up. I'm not going to promise any consistency just yet as it will be at the mercy of my work schedule - but by publishing them now I am making a commitment to getting this done as best as I can.

You can help ensure more work gets done by joining my Patreon. This is all new to me, so I'm starting out with low expectations and asking for very little (if anything) - just to gauge support and see how it goes. Your feedback on whether this avenue is worth pursuing will be most welcome.

The Brambletye Box takes place immediately after the end of The Rainbow Orchid. I will publish as much as I can online, with the ultimate ambition of it eventually appearing in album format as a single volume. Here's the promo blurb ...

The theft of the mysterious Brambletye Box from a controversial auction sets in motion a race to discover, not only the thief, but the story of an ancient Sussex ruin, three powerful stones lost to history, and a fantastic island where legends of strange beasts and a magical meteorite originate. Julius Chancer returns in a quest to discover the truth and save the world ... if he can!

As ever, I am incredibly grateful for your support and your patience. Julius has another big adventure ahead of him, let's see where he ends up this time!

Late last week I received a box from my Belgian/French publisher, BD Must, containing several copies of a new Julius Chancer album, plus a stack of bookplates and prints to sign. The Secret of the Samurai has a publication date of 27 August 2020 and will be available from the same publisher in English, French, German, Dutch and Spanish.

Is this a brand new story? No - this is the same story that was serialised in The Phoenix Comic back in 2013 (issues 75-78), though I have re-edited a bit of the text, and re-written and re-drawn large parts of two pages (pages 17 and 22 in the book).

Is this a full-length album? The actual Secret of the Samurai story is 20 pages long, but the album also contains two other short stories I wrote and drew (both of which have been published before): The Sword of Truth (2004, 6 pages) and The Girdle of Polly Hipple (2005, 4 pages). The album is 36 pages in total.

What is the book's availability? I'm not sure on this yet - as I write the album is not currently on the BD Must site. The French language edition is listed on Amazon. A crowdfunder for the French edition was successfully funded back in May on Ulule. I do know the print-run is not large, and that it's smaller for the English language edition. I will update this when I know more.

What's the story about? Briefly it's a mystery about the hunt for a missing set of samurai armour, and it takes place before The Rainbow Orchid. For more details and notes you can see some of the blog posts I wrote at the time it was serialised in The Phoenix Comic (note - some of the info in these posts is no longer accurate!): The Secret of the Samurai FAQ, blog post for part 1, blog post for part 2, blog post for part 3, and blog post for part 4.

I'll end off on the other question I get all the time (and no, I'm not tired of it, it's lovely), Will there ever be a new Julius Chancer adventure? The answer to this is yes, as long as I don't get knocked down by a bus (or whatever the modern-day equivalent is ... an Amazon delivery robot?). I'm still very busy at the moment working on The Curious Expedition 2, but I haven't forgotten Julius Chancer - the new story is all-plotted, semi-scripted, and drawing started (extract below). I fully intend for this new story to happen ... I just don't want to promise when!

My artist and writer colleagues have really stepped up to the mark recently in terms of providing some wonderful content for children (and adults!) who are stuck at home for what looks likely to be a pretty lengthy duration. In that spirit, I've had a little rummage and dusted off a few bits and pieces that were created to accompany various Rainbow Orchid and Julius Chancer events.

You can do a Rainbow Orchid maze to find the Trembling Sword of Tybalt Stone (pdf) or to recover the statue of Idrimi, King of Atalah (pdf). Or you could try your hand at the snow leopard dot-to-dot (pdf). When you've done those, you can test yourself with the Rainbow Orchid word-search (pdf).

I also have three spot-the-difference scenes you can try your hand at (no.1, no.2, and no.3, all pdfs) and, finally, a make-your-own comic page, originally made as a feature for TBK Magazine (pdf).

(By the way, if you get really stuck, here are the spot-the-difference answers!)