I haven’t talked about the PvP comic book for a while and there’s a reason for that: I’ve been avoiding the subject.

I made a lot of extra work for myself last year what with the animated series, moving into a new office, bringing my store in house, etc. Because of that, I got behind on the comic book. VERY behind. Ashamedly behind (is ashamedly a word? It is now). So I haven’t wanted to talk about the comic book at all because the truth is, I dropped the ball on it.

2008, for me, is all about refocusing on the basics with PvP. My whole business is built on some important pillars: the daily comic strip and the website, the comic book and the collections, the PvP store and the burgeoning “How to Make Webcomics empire”. This is where my focus is going to be honed this year.

Image Comics stands out as one of the most philosophically sound comic book publishers out there. To their detriment at times, they are pro-creator. PvP has the best home it can have at Image Comics and I’ve been lax on keeping my room tidy at the Image House. I’ve spent the last week catching up on late issues and collections.

The PvP Awesomology was due in November and now we’re looking early spring. We just tried to cram too much awesome into it. This is the first hardcover I’ve ever made and I want it to be perfect. My philosophy with the book is that every issue is going to be my last, so make it count. The Awesomology is almost 10 years of my life stuffed between two covers. I don’t want to look back on it and say “I should have done X,Y or Z differently.” So I guess I’ve been choking a bit on it. But we’re past that now and ready to get it off to the printer this week. I’ll keep you updated on it’s new ship date. We’ll be offering it here via the site as well so stay tuned.

The people who I’ve screwed over the most by being late are all the retailers who support PvP by keeping it in stock at their stores. So I wanted to try to make it up to them in some way. The best way to do that is to get on-time and stay on-time. But beyond that, I would also like to do something nice to say thank you. So help me out with this. If you buy PvP comics from your local shop, and you want to thank them for keeping you in fresh PvP, drop me an email with the name of the store you frequent, their address and the name of their owner/manager. I would like to send them a thank you package for keeping PvP in stock, despite my falling behind in 2007.

PvP is on it’s way to hit issue 50 this year. That’s unheard of for a black and white humor book. We’re not making millions off it but the book remains profitable. I know that sounds kind of bleak, but considering the market today, that’s awe-inspiring. It’s also something I’d be a fool to squander. Expect to hear more about the PvP comic book in 2008. And check out our cover gallery to see how far we’ve come since 2003.

Here’s a peek at an upcoming cover. I was pretty happy with the way it turned out. Sometimes the simplest covers are the most striking and iconic. Less always seems to end up being more with my art.