Billie the Unicorn in Bloom!

As the saying goes April showers bring May flowers. However it rained today in San Francisco but our flowers were already in bloom!

Likewise, we're sharing a very beautiful flower this month. We can't help ourselves...take a gander at Billie the Unicorn!

The author Brianne Drouhard launched her debut storybook at WonderCon in San Francisco at the start of April, much to the delight of her appreciative fans.

At our booth #220, Brianne happily provided special Billie buttons, necklace charms, limited edition prints, and convention sketches. Plus she generously drew a cool picture of Billie inside each of her new books.

We quickly sold out of our 1st few cartons and surely needed more copies to satisfy eager (yet patient) readers who pre-ordered the story!

Today our breath was taken away when we received a batch of amazing "autographed" faceplates from Brianne. Going far beyond our wildest expectations, she drew and colored dozens of original sketches of Billie and her cousins Smudge and Rhubarb!

The sheets of 6 stickers were fantastic works of art in their own right. We managed to capture most of them for posterity and your viewing pleasure...before we started mailing them away!

Like Billie, each is unique and special in their own way and we are extremely proud to be sending these along (with Brianne's signature) to lucky readers from Alaska to Australia, and from Dover (New Hampshire) to Denmark.

We may have a few left, and who knows if we'll ever see such an amazing sight of dozens of Billie flowers in bloom again.

And who other than Brianne would make a plain mailer so very special by gracing it with a fleet unicorn?

We are lucky to collaborate with an artist who cares so much about her art! On behalf of our appreciative readers, we thank you very much!

Happy post-holidays & pre-New Year

Greetings from the "slowest week of the year" - as a pal recently reminded me. Driving back and forth from LA during the holi-daze, we racked up 800 miles on the old odometer (certainly we'd have preferred driving a Prius).

But more importantly, we provided our full line of illustrated books to Burbank's best comic book store - House of Secrets (1930 West Olive Avenue Burbank, CA 91506).

There we met owner Paul and manager Eric and enjoyed the lovely view of thousands of comics, old and new. We heard the store will benefit from a quick remodel that will soon devote more shelf space to children's books, so we were glad that our timing was just right!

Meanwhile we drove a frisbee toss away to drop off a case of our newest book at the nerve center of DKE Toys. Though we missed seeing the impresario Dov Kelemer, we did admire the endless cardboard mountains of vinyl toys and collectibles, such as colorful line up of Darth Vader helmets in various states of heady expression. These were a handful of representatives of a past gallery tour, aka The Vader Project.

Unfortunately couldn't stay in the valley long enough to redeem his generous invitation to attend a Korean cuisine theme Christmas Eve party (our stomachs are still wistful at the mere possibility of partaking). But we had more appointments to keep and relatives to meet.

We divvied up and delivered one of our last cartons of the aforementioned The Year of the Rabbit. But we're already expecting our 2nd printing to arrive any day now.

The first was soaked up by Barnes and Noble as they will imminently trot out a month long "Chinese New Year" book promotion nationwide in their +700 stores, starting next week.

So, it would be great if you'd be kind dears and spread the word to family and friends and complete strangers to check out the 6th story in our Tales from the Chinese Zodiac series at a nearby B&N, local bookstore, and elsewhere.

Octonauts on TV around the world

Well, shiver me timbers and blow me down. The Octonauts are now an animated TV show and it debuted this month in the United Kingdom, France, and South America!

They started in the King's English on the esteemed BBC in the UK, on the children's channel CBeebies, which also broadcasts worldwide. Though the web episode player is restricted from operating in non-sanctioned territories (i.e. the USA), you can enjoy some fun stuff.

We always imagined what Captain Barnacles would sound like if he became James Bond. Note, Sauci dog is now called "Dashi"!

Octonauts "sub" site:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/cbeebies/octonauts/

Listen to the Theme Tune!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/cbeebies/octonauts/songs/octonautsthemetune/

Dance to the Creature Report

http://www.bbc.co.uk/cbeebies/octonauts/watch/octonautsclips/

Play at the TV show's site

http://www.theoctonauts.com/

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On the continent, the home station in France is TF1. The title translation is very debonair, and we're confident that Dr. Shellington sounds very convincing in French.

Les Octonauts

http://videos.tf1.fr/octonauts/

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In South America, the team has found their headquarters on Discovery Kids. From the sound of it, the ocho amigos will give telenovelas on Telemundo a run for their pesos. Vegimals must be even more cute when they babble in Spanish.

Los Octonautas

http://www.tudiscoverykids.com/
http://www.discoverykidsbrasil.com/
"Os Octonautas e a Tempestade Submarina/Os Octonautas e a Lula Gigante"

All in all, many more adventures await. We're glad that the rest of the globe can learn not only how the Octonauts can be such a treat, but also help them learn more about the ocean and its creatures. Of course, there is no substitute to enjoy our original 4 missions - the Immedium books that started it all!

So turn in if you're travelling and let us know that your TV tube time was well spent!

Space Cadet Topo

Calling all you wanna be astonauts!

Next up is our 2nd new book of the fall season. Topo lives the dream of many a child - he monitors the universe from his rotating space station and helps out extra terrestrials in need.

Being a good space cadet, he wants to become space commander one day! That means, he is eager to undertake missions that would turn a regular terran's knees to jelly!

The following surprise assignment certainly qualifies...the sun has mysteriously turned off and needs to be turned back on before everything freezes forever! Ooops.

Well, that's not all. The only way to accomplish that impossible mission is to use the mythical "galactic torch"... and no one in eons has ever been able to do that.

Of course, Topo may be the right mole for the job. He is a cheery fellow and aided by his intrepid robot friends.

The Argentinian artists DGPH have created a colorful universe in Space Cadet Topo: the Day the Sun Turned Off. Bursting at the seams with life and wit, outer space has never seemed so much fun (let's forget about that dark matter for the moment). Kids will get a kick out of this brave astronaut's fantastic voyage, and parents can appreciate these entertaining adventures on the little printed screen.

Sid the Squid

New book alert! We're a little tardy in celebrating the annual Cephalopod Awareness Day (October 10), but here goes anyway.

Sid is no ordinary squid. Given the fact that he has 10 appendages (8 tentacles + 2 arms), he wants to use them all to the best of his ability. He's scoured the seas and had no luck. So he is willing to travel up to the human world on a rumor that he could find the perfect job there.

In that sense, Sid is the same as you and me. Everyone likes a little adventure. But certainly one is willing to travel the extra yard in the hope they could find some fulfilling work. Self-actualization is as important for a cephalopod as it is for a homo sapiens.

Sid the Squid and the Search for the Perfect Job is the first story by David Derrick, a story artist at Dreamworks. Dave recently contributed to the summer flick How to Train Your Dragon and the upcoming Megamind.

Take a gander at Sid's adventures, and you'll enjoy seeing not only how an everyman becomes emblematic of our age, but also how a lush world of color and whimsy is created which both kids and adults can simply savor.

Culture Camp in Colorado

We hope you had a good Labor Day Weekend. Immedium author Oliver Chin spent his holiday at the final summer Heritage camp of the year in Fraser, Colorado. There he shared his Asian American (Tales from the Chinese Zodiac, Julie Black Belt) and other story books with families nationwide.

A two hour drive from Denver, the YMCA Snow Mountain Ranch is nestled in the Rocky Mountains. The facility grounds cover a startlingly wide expanse. For the car-less, this made walking a necessary and good workout in the mile high air.

The camp's area seems even wider to those campers who remember how a forest used to blanket the terrain between the lodges. It was so thick that one couldn't even see the next cabin through the trees. After the arrival of the infamous pine beetle, the trees died in the thousands during the past few years. These multi-story matchsticks had to be chopped down (and sometimes are visible in big piles, looking like a stack of twigs in the distance), leaving the surroundings strangely barren to those who remember verdant green woods.

However this desolate contextual memory stands in startling contrast to the vibrant proceedings of the camp itself. This year the theme was "Folktales". Attendance was the highest ever in the camp's 14 year history. Dozens of programs for preschoolers to parents filled three days to the brim.

Oliver taught one hundred precocious 3rd, 4th, and 5th graders how to create their own "zodiac" animals stories as 4 page comic books. Plus he managed to sooth the savage beasts of "post lunch" preschoolers by drawing a big dragon and reading The Year of the Dog.

One of many culture camps held during the summer, this was the 2nd Chinese session. which is aimed at families who have adopted children from China. The program (staffed by local college students who act as counselors) offers many sessions for kids (mainly girls with a handful of boys and non-adopted children) to learn and participate in cultural traditions from a land they don't quite remember. Parents volunteer in a myriad of ways (from cooking to teaching), and learn some ways to help their children come to grips with their dual Asian and American-ness, while their families simultaneous cope with a spectrum of "adoption" issues.

This was a whirlwind weekend full of inspirational friendship that spanned age and geography. Immedium was privileged to be a part of it, and appreciated the opportunity to meet new people who are eager to learn about and proud of their Asian-American identity.

Artist at 2010 Anime Expo AX in LA

Animator Brianne Drouhard attends Anime Expo this weekend at the Los Angeles Convention Center.

Brianne (www.potatofarmgirl.blogspot.com) is a veteran artist who has contributed to popular Cartoon Network TV series such as Teen Titans, Batman Brave and the Bold, Class of 3000, and Transformers Animated, Brianne will dispense pearls of wisdom on a boffo panel:

Breaking In! Working in Animation!

(July 3rd, Saturday, 8pm, room lp2):

Giving tips on how to break into the domestic animation industry. Speakers will discuss how they got in and how anime influenced their work. Guest speakers will vary from writer, creator, director, character designer and production.

Brianne will hand out super cute buttons and postcards of her Spring 2011 children's adventure Billie the Unicorn (website www.billietheunicorn.com to come!).

Contest Alert! The first person who pre-orders Billie from us gets a special prize! Get free copy of Brianne's brand new "Girly Poo" sketchbook iPhone app (33 pages, $2.99, free with redeemable promo code for the iTunes store)! Take a peek and you will be happy!