Book Tour!
come get a book signed by me + three ideas about straight lines.
Dear reader,
“What if, whenever you had a free moment, you reached for a tiny sketchbook instead of your phone?”
In just three weeks, Make (Sneaky) Art will be out in the world. It will sit on bookshelves in bookstores, lie in boxes waiting to be unpacked, be picked up and flipped through, and put back, or checked out.
The book I wrote was singular - floating inside my mind, taking different forms, but always entirely mine. My book then became scraps of paper, then a thing on the cloud, then the subject of dozens of emails. It was polished, cleaned, and dressed for the occasion. And now, it is no longer just mine. It will be whatever other people decide it is. It will live a thousand different lives.
Reader, will it have a life in your world too? If you have not yet preordered your copy, tap below to do so. Or, if pre-ordering is not your thing, make your way to one of the events in my book-tour, and grab a copy for me to sign.
For those who have preordered already, fill this form to enter a special giveaway.
In today’s post, the Make (Sneaky) Art book tour, and three ideas about straight lines.
The Book Tour Begins
🎟️ Fri 26 Sep | Nooroongji Books, Vancouver, BC [ticket]
🎟️ Sun 28 Sep | Book Passage, San Francisco, CA [ticket]
🎟️ Mon 13 Oct | Book Club Bar, New York, NY [ticket]
🎟️ Sat 25 Oct | OPUS Art Supplies, Victoria, BC [ticket]
🎟️ Sat 8 Nov | OPUS Art Supplies, Vancouver, BC [ticket]
🎟️ Thu 13 Nov | Broadway Books, Portland, OR [TBA]
At each location, I will spend time speaking about the book, drawing a bit, and signing copies. Reader, I hope to meet you there.
If you have questions or concerns about these events, tell me in the comments or by email.
Three Ideas about Straight Lines
Last week, on an island at the edge of the world, I picked up the straightest twig I could find. But after tracing it on my page, I discovered it was not very straight after all. I spent that week really looking at nature, at its lines and shapes and colours and shadows. And I discovered … no straight lines.
It reminded me of a common refrain I hear from many people who see me draw:
“Me, I couldn’t even draw a straight line!” they will say, laughing.
It made me think that maybe straight lines are overrated.
Your line is your line. If you let it, it will tell the story of you in this time and space. Drawing on the Amtrak Cascades train from Seattle to Vancouver, my lines told the story of old trains plying on old tracks built for heavy goods transportation - like oil and wood - not people with ink trying to make drawings. Every line I drew tells the story of me, travelling through time and space.
To end the handbound journal I had made for my nature journaling retreat to Bainbridge Island, I noted the metronome of the train. Going slow, I pulled some lines vertically down, letting the movements of the train take them where they would go. What does this ECG of the train tell us?
Life is no straight line either, no matter how much I try. I was an engineer, until I decided to become a writer. Big change. I thought I would go straight toward this goal, but I kept hitting one block after another. Reader, I maneuvered as best as I could. Detours and side-quests brought me to Sneaky Art. I am sharing my world in a way I never thought possible. I am saying things I never thought I would say. I am reading and thinking of ideas I did not know existed. None of this was part of the plan.
Maybe good journeys should never be straight lines.
The SneakyArt Post is a newsletter of secretly drawn art of the world. If you liked this post, share it with someone who might like it too.
Thank you for reading.
My fav anthropologist Tim Ingold has this book simply called “Lines” which is exactly about that: lines that are wobbly, ghostly, dash-y never quite straight and how modernity is actually what led us to think of lines as direct links from A to B. I think you would love it!
I've got my ticket. Looking forward to seeing you at Nooroongji books.