Blog Archives - Alison Garwood-Jones Alison Garwood-Jones

How I Learned to Promote My Graphic Novel

July 10, 2024

I’ve had to learn how to promote my graphic novel to reach my audience. It’s like building a house from the ground up.

Today I wanted to share and promote the work of my best teachers.

Eleanor, Matt, Lauren and Joe are big believers in teaching writers to connect with their audiences by embracing a more entrepreneurial role in their careers.

If you are in the process of reimagining your writing career, this post might help.

How I learned to promote my graphic novel by Alison Garwood-Jones

How I learned to promote my graphic novel by Alison Garwood-Jones I Miss My Mommy is my new graphic novel from my imprint, PenJarProductions.com. I was the overall art director in charge of writing, illustrating, doing the initial layout, hiring more experienced book designers, and choosing the best possible copy editor. I set up the website to sell the book and I’m the one who’ll have to pay off the line of credit that financed it. This slideshow shows that my incentives for embracing entrepreneurship are real and exciting.

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Cutting Room Floor

July 4, 2024

Snoopy and Roz Chast drawing by Alison Garwood-Jones

This drawing never made it into my book, I Miss My Mommy: 150 Portraits of Orphaned Adults

CUTTING ROOM FLOOR

Like Kevin Costner in The Big Chill, this drawing never made it into I MISS MY MOMMY, my graphic novel about the long and winding grief journey of orphaned adults.

Copyright is the reason. Any dog that looks like Snoopy, like any mouse that looks like Mickey, won’t get past the bank of attorneys at Peanuts Worldwide.

So I redrew the dog, turned him into a more realistic spotted beagle, and still had him sitting on a green tufted sofa next to … you guessed it, Roz Chast. But, by then, the drawing had stopped working.

Despite that, I still wrote a handwritten note to Ms. Chast, asking for permission to use her likeness and pre-War Brooklyn apartment decor for a drawing meant to be a seriously deep genuflection before two of my favourite artists.

In one scenario, she glanced at the drawing and also determined it wasn’t working. More realistically, my letter is still sitting in her in-bin. Chast has been on the road promoting her latest book, I Must Be Dreaming, about the absurdities and fraught sequences that run through our minds at night.

It’s another splendid tour of the human condition.

Thank you, Roz, for everything.

And Happy (?) Fourth of July.

Alison xo

________________________________________

I MISS MY MOMMY: 150 Portraits of Orphaned Adults is available at PenJarProductions.com – link in bio.

This book takes you right to the heart of the five stages of grief through 150 portraits, some grim, some funny, but all relatable.

The stage you’re in may change by the hour, or even by the minute.

It helps readers struggling with grief sit with emotions they’d rather avoid but can’t stop feeling, but it does it through illustrations not case studies.

Because sometimes we need images to explain the language of loss. ~ Printed and shipped with care by @luludotcom

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What is your grief story?

June 27, 2024

My Mother Had Alzheimer's by Alison Garwood-Jones

I Miss My Mommy takes you right to the heart of the five stages of grief through 150 portraits, some grim, some funny, but all relatable.
The stage you’re in may change by the hour, or even by the minute.

This book helps readers struggling with grief sit with emotions they’d rather avoid but can’t stop feeling.

“You’ll find yourself in the company of many mourners as they experience all the stages. It’s a powerful reminder that you’re not alone.” ~ Ann Douglas, Navigating The Messy Middle

“I had been looking for validation for my need to grieve and I found it in I Miss My Mommy.” ~ Carla Lucchetta, producer, The Agenda With Steve Paikin

Available at PenJarProductions.com

Printed and shipped with care by @luludotcom

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Father’s Day

June 13, 2024

REMEMBERING DADS

My new book is called I Miss My Mommy, but fathers are just as integral to the story for orphaned adults.

For Father’s Day, here’s a preview of how dads, now gone, weave in and out of the stories of their adult kids’ lives.

Because sometimes we need images to explain the language of loss.

Pete refuses to get rid of his dad’s Birkenstocks. They’re proof that he was on this earth. ~ P. 174
“My dad once said to me, ‘I’m giving you the greatest gift a father could ever give a son: I’m not very successful.’” ~ David Duchovny~ P. 103 –
“Hi Daddy! Hi Mommy!” is the first thing Tammy says every morning. She can feel the dopamine hit when she speaks their names.~ P. 260
After her mom and dad died, Melissa got a letter from her dad’s first boyfriend. ~P. 238
Russell was adopted at birth. His white parents didn’t know they were supposed to have the “police talk” with him. He learned that on his own. ~P. 234
What kind of father tells his sons “You’re either a killer or a loser”? ~ P. 111
Bill anticipated the squabbling between his middle-aged kids. ~P. 107
Gord’s father was never convicted. Now it’s too late. ~P. 80
Basil inherited his mother’s depression and his dad’s knitted ties. ~ p. 73
When Tamara gets a piece of good news, she still picks up the phone to tell her dad. ~P. 51

I Miss My Mommy is the picture book for big people without parents.

It’s available at PenJarProductions.com ~ Printed and shipped with care by Lulu.com

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Summer Giveaway

June 7, 2024

Book giveaway for I Miss My Mommy, the graphic novel for orphaned adults

GIVEAWAY
Thank you to my readers from Toronto to San Francisco to New York and back for letting me know that your copy of I MISS MY MOMMY has landed on your doorstep (h/t @luludotcom) 📚

YOUR TURN
Let’s start a conversation about grief. I’d love a short social media review of my book (up to 150 words written or filmed) from you:
• How did the book make you feel?
• Did it validate your need to grieve? Briefly explain.
• Which character in the book did you relate to the most?
• Why would you recommend I MISS MY MOMMY to someone else?

INSTRUCTIONS
Please tag me @AlisonGJ and my tiny imprint @PenJarProductions in your review. Then tag a friend who may need this book. Lastly, take a picture of you holding the book! Recommended platforms: FB, IG and TikTok.

Hashtags you can use: #OrphanedAdults #BooksOnGrief #FiveStagesOfGrief #GriefResources

YOUR PRIZE
Reviewers will receive a free high-res copy of their favourite drawing from the book to print, frame and hang in their home! (Frame not included. Filters may vary. Mock-ups are fictional – FrameIt app).

To receive your drawing, email me at Alison.GarwoodJones(at)gmail(dot)com
— Please include a link to your review(s), then state the page number of the drawing you would like.

GIVEAWAY ENDS: July 6th, 2024.

I MISS MY MOMMY is the world’s first picture book for big people without parents.

** The book takes readers right to the heart of the five stages of grief through 150 portraits, some grim, some funny, but all relatable. The stage you’re in may change by the hour, or even the minute. I hope my book helps readers struggling with grief sit with emotions they’d rather avoid but can’t stop feeling.**

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Press for I Miss My Mommy

June 7, 2024

Anne Bokma’s compelling Mother’s Day column in today’s Hamilton Spectator shows how fraught Mother’s Day can be for adult orphans, particularly women. For others, it’s liberating, especially if their grief is complicated.

Thank you, Anne, for being such an astute interviewer (boy, can she write!) and for making my new book, I MISS MY MOMMY, a part of your story. The headline may be blunt, but so is death. So, make haste.

Press from The Hamilton Spectator for I Miss My Mommy by Alison Garwood-Jones

Addendum: Catherine Garwood-Jones worked full-time outside the home as the manager and accountant at Trevor Garwood-Jones Architects. She also gave her energy to organizations and causes she cared about (The Hamilton Philharmonic) and mental health (Hamilton Health Sciences). In one memorable scene in the early 1980s, she marched up the steps of Queen’s Park (Ontario’s legislature) and pitched the provincial health minister in his office on the importance of providing more funding for research into schizophrenia. It worked.

My book is printed and shipped with care by @luludotcom

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The Queen of Death

June 7, 2024

Alison Garwood-Jones author page for I Miss My Mommy: 150 Portraits of Orphaned Adults

I didn’t set out to create a book on grief …

Hi, I’m Alison. As a magazine writer, I’ve interviewed:
• Olympic boxers
• Presidential candidates*
• Mayoral candidates**
• Legendary art directors***
• Famous because they’re famous types****
• TV stars
• PhDs
• Scientists
• CEOs
• Age-defying dermatologists
• Starchitects
• Bro-ey Chefs
• Prima Ballerinas

I could have kept adding to this list, but grief felt more insistent than the voices of all of the above combined.

Just before the pandemic, I started drawing fictional portraits of people in different stages of grief and organizing them into a narrative arc.

When I realized what I was doing, I opened a Google Doc and asked myself: “Alison, do you really want to lead a discussion on grief?”

The answer was: NOOOOOOOOOO!!!! All-capped and bolded for emphasis. Then underlined twice. I am not the Queen of Death, I thought. My feet are sheathed in ballet flats and my earlobes have tiny pearl drops on display. Let’s stick to that.

And, yet, here I am.

I consider I MISS MY MOMMY, my new graphic novel on grief, to be the ultimate act of leaning into your fear. In the morning the thought of what I am doing drags me down. But when I connect with my readers, or one-on-one IRL (like I did last night in the park next to my house), it buoys me and I float home like a big red balloon.

If your grief is looking for a safe place to land, perhaps my book will help you.

Alison Garwood-Jones

* Robert Kennedy Jr. when he was still fighting for the environment.
** Rob Ford (it’s true, he did call everyone back).
*** George Lois. Legend. (I emailed him when Muhammad Ali died and he tapped out such an emotional response).
**** Paris Hilton (at the height of her perfume empire).

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Four Books That Inspired Me

May 30, 2024

These are the books that inspired me when I was writing and drawing I Miss My Mommy, my new graphic novel for orphaned adults:

• Happiness Is a Warm Puppy, by Charles M. Schultz’s
• Can We Talk About Something More Pleasant? by Roz Chast
• Tantrum by Jules Feiffer
• Are You My Mother? by PD Eastman

You’ll find hints of all of them in I Miss My Mommy — The world’s first picture book for big people without parents.