Von Allan Graphic Novels for the Holiday Season

With the holidays fast approaching, I thought I should do a quick post regarding my comics and graphic novels. If you are looking for a gift for friends and family or even for yourself, my comics and graphic novels do make lovely treats! For those who are relatively new to my work, the following serves as a quick breakdown of my work.

Key Information

As most people reading this know, my main longform comics project is WOLF’S HEAD, an action-adventure comic book series with a dash of sci-fi, crime, and mystery thrown in for good measure.

WOLF’S HEAD is certainly not alone, though, and both my earlier black and white two volume graphic novel series STARGAZER as well as the hardcover short story collection LOVE, LAUGHTER, AND LOSS: A COMICS COLLECTION.

Buying Von Allan’s Graphic Novels

All of my graphic novels are widely available all over the world. That said, I am a small press creator so book shops and comic book stores often don’t stock my work in depth. I wish that wasn’t the case, but it is.¹ In other words, you are almost certainly going to have to ask your local retailer for a copy. If they don’t currently have a copy in, then it’s super easy for them to order a copy for you. It really really is.

Fortunately for a creator like me, the world of online retail has dramatically changed the distribution side of things since the early days of the Direct Market. Back then a creator and/or publisher really needed comic book shops onside to reach an audience. Nowadays, with the rise of the internet, everything has changed.


There are so many online options that I can’t possibly list them all, but here are a few to get started:

• In the United States: Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Books-A-Million, Powell’s Books, Bookshop.org, and so on!
  
  

• In England, Ireland, Scotland, and Wales: Amazon.co.uk, Waterstones, The Portobello Bookshop, and so on!
  
  

• In Europe: Amazon.de, Amazon.es, , and so on!
  
  

• In Asia: Amazon.co.jp, DangDang.com, and so! American Book Center
  
  

• Online: AbeBooks, Alibris, Biblio — While many think that these stores only sell used books, that is actually not true. Each of these platforms are actually book marketplaces, so you can find stores that carry new books as well as used.
  
  

• In Canada: For Canadians, it’s a little trickier. Currently I’m having a great deal of difficulty with Amazon.ca as well as Indigo. The former is apparently refusing to regularly stock my work, which is not the case for Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk. I don’t understand why this is, but I know that it is. Indigo is stocking some of my work, but only the first four volumes of WOLF’S HEAD. I have no idea why this is, either, but this is fairly typical for an independent artist like me.

  
  
  So, for Canadians, what to do? The best option is to order through an independent Canadian bookstore. That way you can order Volume 8 and support an indy bookshop at the same time. Most of these indy stores use a Point-of-Sale system called BookManager. That program also doubles as a quasi “Books in Print” database. In other words, they will be able to order it for you very easily. I realize that this is not ideal, but it is what it is right now. Hopefully this will change in the not too distant future.

More About Love, Laughter, and Loss

This is a premium hardcover edition with beautiful printing, collecting nine of my short stories (including the currently out of print WIZARDS FOR HIRE — CHEAP! Collection that you can read online for free here). Please visit https://www.vonallan.com/2021/05/Love-Laughter-Loss-Comics-Collection-by-Von-Allan.html for more information about the book!

More About Stargazer

STARGAZER is a two volume all-ages graphic novel series featuring three young girls who find themselves transported to a completely different planet! There’s a dedicated website at https://stargazer.vonallan.com/. And I also received my favourite piece of fan mail ever for STARGAZER. This from a young girl in Florida who loved the series and wanted to tell me!

More about Wolf’s Head

WHICH VOLUME DO I START WITH?

Since WOLF’S HEAD is a multi-volume graphic novel, it can be a little daunting to start right from the beginning with volume 1. Fortunately, you don’t have to do that if you don’t want to! I strive to ensure that my work is approachable no matter what volume someone starts reading at.

           

           

           

           

STORY ARCS

Even better, the series is organized into so-called “story arcs” to make this even easier. The graphics below explain that clearly:

In other words, you can start reading at any volume or, if you really want to start at the beginning of a new story arc, then volumes 1, 4, 6, or 8 is the way to go! See? Easy!

REVIEWS!

The Slings & Arrows Graphic Novel Guide noted the following on their Facebook page about the series, “We can’t understand how Wolf’s Head by Von Allan Studio slips so low on the public radar. It’s an intelligent, well-drawn character-based crime story with an appealing lead, and a creative touch of quirkiness. Six volumes out to date revealing the strange path Lauren Greene’s life has taken since quitting the police.”

And Frank Plowright, writing on the same website, noted the following about both Volume 6 and the series overall: “Try Wolf’s Head and become captivated.”

That is one of the best things anyone has ever said about my work!

WHAT IF YOU’RE ALREADY A REGULAR READER?

If you’re reading the series in digital format, either in the original ComiXology/Kindle versions or now over on the Internet Archive, and you would like to support me, please do consider purchasing physical copies. That really does help!

The other thing you can do is simple: tell people about the series! Share the love! Do you know someone who likes comics but has never heard of me or my work? TELL them!

ANYTHING ELSE?

Please do consider reviewing any of the volumes you’ve bought. You usually can do that on any online platform (like Amazon), but there are many review sites out there that you can also post reviews to. Sites like GoodReads definitely help. Even a short review, a sentence or two, helps!

Lastly

For those who have read and loved my work as well as those who are trying my work for the first time, thank you!

All my best to you and yours for the holidays!

1  For those wondering, the comic book store side of things has been especially difficult. For some thoughts on why, please read this: https://www.vonallan.com/2025/01/Diamond-Comic-Distributors-Wolfs-Head-and-Me.html. This situation was made worse by Diamond’s bankruptcy and the ongoing changes to the so-called “Direct Market” (the comic book store “channel” when it comes to distribution). It doesn’t help that so much of what counts for comics “journalism” is pretty weak, as recently detailed on the Four Color Sinners blog. In the interest of full disclosure, the blog’s author Mr. Four Color Sinners himself shares excerpts from a conversation we had and then discusses it. That lead to a fairly robust exchange in the comments that are worth a read. Hell, even I pop up there, too!

This a milestone! Due to more challenges than I can shake a stick at,¹ the long-awaited Volume 8 of WOLF’S HEAD is now finally available! This volume features one of the most emotional twists I’ve done in the series so far, but one I think makes perfect sense.

As I previously noted, the first seven WOLF’S HEAD trade paperbacks are back in print in new editions, but with today’s release of Volume 8 (collecting issues 15 and 16 of the ongoing digital series) we are on brand new ground! As always, this is a full colour edition and is 60 pages in length. Haunted by loss, Lauren Greene and her loyal dog Sankō embark on a perilous road trip from Alaska to Detroit, outwitting ruthless corporate agents to protect a sentient AI child. Hunted at every turn, Lauren risks everything to keep the extraordinary life-form from becoming a weapon—and to safeguard the future of a new kind of intelligence.

Volume 8, as well as all of the other volumes in this series, are available in better bookstores and comic shops worldwide (and for why I say “better,” please read this commentary). Volume 8’s ISBN is 978-1-989885-30-7. If you don’t see it at your local store, then you can easily order it using that ISBN. Additionally, it is already starting to show up at various online retailers, too. For example:

• Amazon.com
• Amazon.ca
• Canadian Independent Bookstores (via BookManager)
• Amazon.co.uk
• Barnes & Noble
• Bookshop.org (and IndieBound)
• And on and on! Germany? You bet! What about Waterstones? Definitely! Again, you may need to ask your local bookstore and comic shop, but it is easily available everywhere!

As always, remember that I can’t control exactly when and where this volume will become available, but hopefully the above links are a good start. Be patient and don’t be afraid to ask your retailer for help! Volume 9 will be released shortly, either at the tail-end of 2025 or early 2026.

There is a dedicated website for WOLF’S HEAD at https://wolfs-head.vonallan.com/p/wolfs-head-landing-page.html with all kinds of additional information!

The Elevator Pitch

Lauren Greene’s world is turned upside down when her mother rescues a newborn artificial intelligence from the powerful and secretive Advanced Research Projects Corporation (ARPC) — a shadowy organization determined to weaponize the sentient life-form. After her mother’s sudden death, Lauren is left alone, struggling to survive and protect the extraordinary AI now in her care.

Desperate to escape ARPC’s relentless pursuit, Lauren flees her home of Detroit and disappears into the wilds of Alaska with her loyal dog, Sankō, and the young and vulnerable AI. She soon realizes, however, that running away won’t solve her problems. Determined to take control of her fate, Lauren sets out on a perilous road trip back to Detroit, hoping to find a way to secure the AI’s safety once and for all.

On the long journey home, Lauren and her companions are relentlessly hunted by ARPC agents, forcing her to risk everything to keep the AI from becoming a weapon. Outmatched and outnumbered, Lauren must summon all her courage, outwit her pursuers, and teach her unlikely companion what it means to fight for survival. If she fails, she risks losing not just her own life, but the future of a new kind of intelligence.

The WOLF'S HEAD Trade Paperback Series

Below is a listing of all the volumes of the series so far! If you click on the cover, it will bring you to a dedicated page for that volume on the WOLF’S HEAD subdomain. Again, most online retailers regularly stock and carry WOLF'S HEAD. However, occassionaly there are hiccups with this from time to time (typically because the retailer has had a little rush on sales!). So, if you were shopping on Amazon (for example) and discovered that a particular volume is out of stock, there are many alternatives. These include Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org, Indigo, McNally Robinson, The American Book Center, Waterstones, and so on.

           

           

Read for Free

As many of you know, I’ve also begun serializing the comic book series for free on the Internet Archive (https://www.archive.org) as part of my “Pirate Von” initiative. As I mentioned above, WOLF’S HEAD Volume 8 consists of issues 15 and 16 of the ongoing series. While you can find the links to both on the Internet Archive as well as the “Pirate Von” section of this very website, to make it easier the links to both issues 15 and 16 are below.

Remember! If you enjoy them and would like a physical copy, you can purchase Volume 8 in stores — both online and off — around the world!

   

   

TEASER FOR WOLF’S HEAD Volume 8

And here’s a little teaser image to help cement the idea. Two digital comics inside one trade paperback volume!

Other Links

• Overview of my Comics: http://www.vonallan.com/p/comics.html

• Wolf’s Head (My Ongoing Comic Book Series): https://wolfs-head.vonallan.com/p/wolfs-head-landing-page.html

• Von Allan Studio Shop Page: http://www.vonallan.com/p/von-allan-studio-shop.html

• RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/Von_Allan_Homepage

• An explanation for why you never saw WOLF’S HEAD in Diamond's PREVIEWS: https://www.vonallan.com/2025/01/Diamond-Comic-Distributors-Wolfs-Head-and-Me.html

1  But what the hell! Let’s enumerate! Here goes: The pandemic (well, duh), Diamond Comic Distributors and their intransigence, Amazon’s decision to end ComiXology as a separate platform, rolling it into Kindle platform instead, the death of a dear beloved friend, health scares from other loved ones (and family drama), the utter collapse of Diamond and the resulting upheavels in the so-called Direct Market, Ingram Content Group’s apparent difficulties with “EDI” or Electronic Data Interchange and various retailers, not to mention the normal day-to-day challenges of life. Whew!

Diamond Comic Distributors, Wolf's Head, and Me

As those of you who follow the Direct Market know, Diamond Comic Distributors has filed for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy protection. Long time watchers of the comic book industry will understand just how surprising of a development this is. For those that don’t, I’ll try and explain.

Once upon a time, Diamond was the distributor for comics in North America and the United Kingdom. That was after the distribution market consolidated around Diamond in the 1980s; prior to that, there was a great deal of regional distribution with comics. Distributors such as Sea Gate, Pacific Comics (both as a publisher and a distributor), Capital City, and — here in Canada — Styx, Andromeda, and Multi-Book among others. Even when Diamond had a quasi-monopoly (and they were actually investigated back in 2000!), other distributors still tried to come and go. My personal favourite was Cold Cut, who I ordered from pretty regularly back in my bookstore days. Another was FM International. Both Cold Cut and FM International were pretty quirky, distributing indy and small press titles that Diamond either didn’t distribute or tended to disappear in their cavernous catalogues. And both are long gone now.

Due to Diamond’s Chapter 11 situation, a number of writers have written extensively on what Diamond was and what the changes in Direct Market distribution since June 2020 have wrought with the company. I don’t want to retread that ground. Instead, I wanted to discuss my own experiences with Diamond, partially because I think it shows some of the problems that Diamond had with small accounts and partially because some of these issues go back prior to 2020.

As a publisher, I have an account with Diamond and have had one since 2010. My Purchasing Brand Manager at that time was Jay Spence. Jay was awesome and quite supportive; with his help I was able to get my two-book graphic novel series, STARGAZER, into Diamond’s catalogue Previews. (Book 1 in the November 2010 issue with item code NOV101057 and Book 2 in the August 2011 issue with item code AUG111259).

While these two books were admittedly pretty rough, though not quite as rough as first graphic novel “the road to god knows…” was, Jay’s encouragement and Diamond’s support led to decent sales for my little black and white graphic novel series. And STARGAZER is still in print and continues to sell to this day, something I’m always a little surprised about.

It would have been ideal to follow-up STARGAZER with something else lickety-split, but I knew that I needed to become stronger. And life sometimes takes us in odd and surprising directions, and some of that happened to. At any rate, time passed and when I was finally ready to approach Diamond again, this time in 2018 with my ongoing series full colour series WOLF’S HEAD, I ran into problems.

The first is that Jay had left Diamond to join Dynamite. All well and good. What was less good was that I was having trouble reaching folks at Diamond. Any folks. Emails went unanswered. I actually wound up tracking Jay down at Dynamite and he managed to connect me with the right person. That person was Leigh Tyberg and this is where things get interesting.

I’ve saved my email correspondence with Leigh, because the emails are a great example about how Diamond and their Purchasing Brand Managers worked. Or, in this case, failed to work, something you’ll see in a moment. To be very clear, the Purchasing Brand Manager acts as a Gate Keeper; they’re the ones who — presumably with discussion with other folks in the Purchasing Department — decide whether or not to carry a title. As I noted above, Jay Spence was incredibly supportive of both myself and STARGAZER, something I’m grateful for to this day. Leigh? Well, you’ll see.

When it came to presenting WOLF’S HEAD to Diamond for distribution, I had high hopes. I had grown a lot as both an artist and a writer and I thought the plan I presented to Diamond was fairly strong; WOLF’S HEAD would be published in 60 page graphic novel volumes, each volume having an ISBN and a spine. The inspiration for this approach, by the by, was actually a title from Dark Horse Comics, a retelling of CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON by Art Adams. At 52 pages, it was “meatier” then a normal saddle-stitched comic but still affordable. And I liked the format of that book quite a bit.

My decision was also influenced by how Diamond worked. Very quickly, comics and graphic novels distributed by Diamond have to meet a minimum sales threshold. This threshold, called the Purchase Order Benchmark, was originally set at $1,500.00 US but was raised to $2,500.00 US in 2009. Note that was not at retail price but at wholesale. As George Gene Gustines at the New York Times pointed out at the time, “a $2.95 comic book would have to receive a minimum order of 2,100 copies” (2,100 × $2.95 = $6,195.00; since Diamond takes a 60% cut of the retail price, 40% of $6,195.00 is $2,478.00, very close to the Purchase Order Benchmark). This sent shock waves through the industry (hell, so much so that the New York Times commented on it!). Part of the reason this was so monumental was that it marked a significant change from how the benchmark used to work. As Diamond noted back in 2007, “Diamond’s benchmark for comic books solicited through Previews is $2,500 retail.” The new benchmark was actually $6,250 (!) retail, because $6,250 × 40% = (you guessed it) $2,500! That’s a 150% increase, the main reason that small press publishers of saddle-stitched comics at the time were freaking out.

WOLF’S HEAD, as a trade paperback with a higher price point, would have to sell less copies per volume then a normal saddle-stitched comic to reach Diamond’s Purchase Order Benchmark. And having an ISBN for each volume would allow me to access online retailers like Amazon as well as “brick and mortar” bookstores. More venues matter. As it turns out, the online retailers have been a huge part of why I’ve managed to continue publishing WOLF’S HEAD to this day.

It’s important to remember that Direct Market retailers (aka “comic book shops”) have to buy their titles non-returnably. So they are always rolling the dice on small press titles, especially small press titles from unknown — or even lesser known — creators. That makes them understandably gun-shy, especially when they own their mistakes — literally. Unlike bookstores, they can’t return their titles for credit (and while there have been some changes in this regard more recently, this was the case I faced with both STARGAZER and WOLF’S HEAD). So comic shops are, broadly speaking, pretty reticent to buy small press titles, though obviously there are many individual exceptions to this. While it may seem that a lower price point helps here, it actually doesn’t. If a supportive retailer is going to purchase a title, they are probably only going to purchase it in low quantities regardless of what the price point is. They might waffle; maybe they’d buy four or five copies of a $2.99 US title and only two copies of a $9.99 US title, but it’s likely to be around that (obviously this is anecdotal, but I’m partially basing it on my own purchasing habits when I was buyer at the bookstore I managed).

At any rate, this is the situation I faced when I initially reached out to Leigh and Diamond. You can see my initial email to Jay below. Since his reply was from his Dynamite email address, prudence dictates that I probably shouldn’t replicate it here (that or redact it heavily!). The key point is that he did manage to connect me to the correct person, as you will see in a moment. Oh, and as always I should add that Von Allan is my pen name; Eric is my real name. So when you see those references, you’ll know who is being spoken of.

What follows is my correspondence with Leigh Tyberg, my Purchasing Brand Manager. I’ll let that speak for itself. The only thing I’ll add is please note the dates of the various emails.

And that’s where it ended. Leigh (and Diamond) ghosted me. The key thing that’s amazing about this is that Leigh and Diamond never formally rejected WOLF’S HEAD. Obviously they never accepted it, either. Ghosting can be destructive behaviour when one experiences it personally. But when a business does it? When a business that has a stranglehold on the Direct Market — which Diamond had at the time — does it? Well, at least with a rejection you know where you stand. I’ve been rejected boatloads of times. It ain’t fun, but you pick yourself up, dust yourself off, and keep going. But the waiting, wondering if you’ll hear back? Wondering if the ghosting is just something else? That’s awful.

To this day I don’t know what happened. I debated pestering Leigh and Diamond again, but eventually COVID started and the distribution side of the industry exploded. And like many folks with COVID, I experienced a personal loss that put the brakes on a lot of things.

That said, I also don’t hold any animosity towards Leigh or even Diamond, though I’d be lying if I said that the experience wasn’t frustrating. Ghosting isn’t fun, but life goes on. I’m disappointed that Diamond — apparently — had no interest in distributing WOLF’S HEAD, but I’m also pleased that I’m in no way affected by their recent Chapter 11 Bankruptcy filing. Despite it all, Leigh is still listed at Diamond as a Purchasing Brand Manager.

The funny thing about the whole experience was that, in the intervening years, I kept working on WOLF’S HEAD and I kept growing. That led to receiving two separate $4,000.00 grants from the City of Ottawa for my work on the series, being shortlisted for a Peter Honeywell award for my work on it, and finding an audience despite the lack of access by Diamond. Despite it all, WOLF’S HEAD still continues and I’m having a helluva good time doing it.

Who knows, perhaps Diamond will rise like a phoenix and be reborn into something new. Or perhaps after consolidating so much of the distribution side of the Direct Market, they won’t rebound at all. If so, perhaps their fall will be a cautionary tale of what can happen when a company with so much going for it forgets that, at the end of the day, it’s human beings that make a difference. And it’s human beings, both inside Diamond and out, that matter.

Other Links

• Overview of my Comics: http://www.vonallan.com/p/comics.html

• Wolf’s Head (My Ongoing Comic Book Series): https://wolfs-head.vonallan.com/

• Von Allan Studio Shop Page: http://www.vonallan.com/p/von-allan-studio-shop.html

• RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/Von_Allan_Homepage

• Mailing List Sign-Up: https://vonallan.us14.list-manage.com/subscribe?u=f6d06612e90503db886a31a24&id=7642c19478