Animation Scoop has the new American trailer and poster for the 2011 French animated feature Le Tableau (The Painting), due for May 24 release.

Recently released on DVD in North America, A Monster in Paris (trailer) is a CGI-animated kids' film that originally came out in France in October 2011 as Un monstre à Paris.

Taking place during the Parisian flood of 1910, the two main characters are Emile, a shy film projectionist and amateur cinematographer, and his friend Raoul, a tinkerer who likes to invent gadgets and operates a delivery service out of the back of his truck. During a late-night delivery to an absent scientist's laboratory, Raoul plays with chemicals, unaware that his tampering accidentally creates a giant flea with a beautiful singing voice.

The "monster" is quickly targeted by Maynot, the Commissioner of police, who becomes obsessed with capturing and killing it as part of his campaign to become mayor. He's also taken an interest in a cabaret singer named Lucille, who disguises and hides the flea after recognizing its musical talents.

Raoul is an old friend/enemy of Lucille's, and soon he and Emile are in on her secret, trying to find a way to protect the flea from the Commissioner.

When I announced that Lex Nakashima and I were going to bring you news of new French anthropomorphic bandes desinées, I wasn’t expecting to mix that with animation. But Kairos has its own animated trailer, by Studio La Cachette in Paris:

So the main character is human! There are still lots of anthropomorphic characters in the world that he goes to. Lex & I will have a review of tome 1 of Kairos, published April 25 by Ankama, as soon as we can. [Until then, check out this preview.]

Stephanie Gladden is a multi-talented artist and cartoonist, best known for her work on licensed properties like tie-in comics for The Simpsons, Ren & Stimpy, Looney Tunes, The Powerpuff Girls and Tom & Jerry. Furry fans, however, might know her best for her original creator-owned comic book series Hopster’s Tracks from the late 90′s. Well now, Stephanie has created her first on-line comic series, The Girls of Monster Paradise.  You know all those old Sci Fi and Horror movies where the monsters show up and grab a screaming pretty girl, then drag her off slung over their shoulder?  Just what do they do with those women? Do they eat them? Do they let them go? Neither! They take them to Monster Paradise, a tropical island where the party never ends — and where the girls stick around because they like their cool new monster friends! Find out all about it on-line here.

image c. 2013 by Stephanie Gladden

We’re fresh back from WonderCon in Anaheim, and me-oh-my is there a lot to talk about. Starting with…

Here’s one we somehow missed over the past couple of years, but we found out about it now, finally: Alex Walker and the Circus of Secrets, by Michael Mayo. “On the run from  his father’s deadly plans, Alex and his mother stumble upon a small traveling circus in a Kansas field. A strange accident awakens a hidden ability: He can speak to the animals — and they can speak to him. He meets an elderly cocker spaniel, a macaw, and a Siamese cat who tell Alex he is their long-prophesized savior. Alex must learn to fight for their lives — and his own.” This young adult novel is available now in paperback from Valstar Publishing, and also in a Kindle edition. Another bonus: Proceeds from the sale of the book go to various no-kill animal shelters.

image c. 2011 Valstar Publishing

We really can’t do better than the publisher’s notes at describing Raven Girl by Audrey Niffenegger. So here they are: “Once there was a Postman who fell in love with a Raven.  So begins the tale of a postman who encounters a fledgling raven while on the edge of his route and decides to bring her home. The unlikely couple falls in love and conceives a child—an extraordinary raven girl trapped in a human body. The raven girl feels imprisoned by her arms and legs and covets wings and the ability to fly. Betwixt and between, she reluctantly grows into a young woman, until one day she meets an unorthodox doctor who is willing to change her.” According to Amazon, this hardcover illustrated novel will be coming to bookshelves and the Internet from Abrams ComicArts this May.

image c. 2013 Abrams ComicArts

A Guy, a Girl, and Their Monster is a new puppet-based on-line video short series created by Jenn Daugherty. Here’s the description: “Henry is a monster, of the under-the-bed variety. Down on his luck he searches out the little girl he belonged to in the ’80s. He finds her in Los Angeles living with her fiancé. They take him in and the trio learns to live together in the big city.” The project is put together by students from the University of Southern California (USC) Graduate Film Program. The first episode is up on YouTube, and there’s also a Facebook page for the series.

image c. 2013 Jenn Daugherty

Well-known fantasy author Charles De Lint has teamed up with well-known illustrator Charles Vess to bring us The Cats of Tanglewood Forest, a new hardcover full-color graphic novel coming this March from Little Brown Books For Young Readers. “Lillian Kindred spends her days exploring the Tanglewood Forest, a magical, rolling wilderness that she imagines to be full of fairies. The trouble is, Lillian has never seen a wisp of magic in her hills–until the day the cats of the forest save her life by transforming her into a kitten. Now Lillian must set out on a perilous adventure that will lead her through untamed lands of fabled creatures–from Old Mother Possum to the fearsome Bear People–to find a way to make things right.” From the review at Amazon, of course.

image c. 2013 Little, Brown Books

And with that, we’ll say TTFN (ta ta for now!) until after Further Confusion in San Jose, California. Take care!

The modern era of talking animals in literature is generally believed to start with Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (July 1865). That is the oldest novel still commonly published today, and the earliest that people (both children and adults) read voluntarily for pleasure. Yet there were quite a few stories in the late 18^th century with talking animals.

Fabulous Histories. Designed for the Instruction of Children, Respecting Their Treatment of Animals, by Mrs. [Sarah] Trimmer. London, T. Longman, G. C. J. and J. Robinson, and J. Johnson, 1786, xi + 227 pages, 1/-.

First off: Merry Christmas! And thank you for making us part of your lives for another year ^^

Also over at Cartoon Brew there’s a teaser trailer for a new short animation project by world-famous animator Andreas Deja. Here’s what they say: “Andreas Deja is a modern-day animation legend. He worked for 30 years at Disney where he was responsible for classic characters such as Gaston in Beauty and the Beast, Jafar in Aladdin, Scar in The Lion King, and Lilo in Lilo and Stitch. He left the studio a couple years ago to focus on personal projects, including producing independent animated films. This morning, Andreas teased audiences with a preview from his short film Mushka, featuring a girl and tiger as the lead characters. The film, which will be animated in a colored pencil style, is ‘a story of love and sacrifice set in Russia.’ On his blog, which also includes development sketches of the characters, Deja pointed out that he still has a long road ahead of him. He’s been working on story and pre-production this year, and plans to animate the film in 2013.”

One of the most beloved Christmas animated TV half-hour specials, Britain’s Channel 4’s famous adaptation of Raymond Briggs’ The Snowman, directed by Jimmy Murakami and Dianne Jackson and animated by TVC London, with a live intro featuring David Bowie and the haunting song “Walking in the Air” (video) composed by Howard Blake, has been an annual fixture on British TV since 1982. The Cartoon Brew reports that, for its thirtieth anniversary, it is getting a Christmas Eve sequel, The Snowman and the Snowdog.

The CB announcement includes the trailer for The Snowman and the Snowdog (The Guardian has more), a 8’35” The Making of The Snowman and the Snowdog, and a link to the entire 26’09” The Snowman. Anthropomorphic snowmen at Christmastime are nothing new, but if you have never seen The Snowman, you have missed what is arguably the greatest of all.

The U.S. administration created We The People to provide a place for any of its citizens to petition the White House, which has promised to provide an official response to all petitions reaching 25 000 signatures within 30 days. While some cover serious political issues, it's doubtful that they expected Matthew H's petition for domestic cat girls. [Yahoo!]

Matthew contends that the War on Drugs is pointless, and that money would be better spent by genetically engineering cat girls for home services.

While reports by the Global Commission on Drug Policy suggest the war has been a dramatic and costly waste of money, lives and society, and has harmed the fight against HIV/AIDS, it is unlikely that the U.S. will abandon it any time soon. Both Colorado and Washington have legalised non-medicinal marijuana, but its possession is still a federal offence.

The lives of the Quorum cats are filled with paradoxes: Although feral and untamed, they live within sight of the Owners’ dwellings and feed off the scraps in the Keep; although peace-loving, too often the Quorum enforcers and bards are forced to protect and defend their territory from the ravages of invading gypsy cats from outside the territory. But the plight of the Quorum becomes desperate when the Owners attempt to demolish their territory and threaten the lives of the cats themselves. It is left to Solo to lead them to safety, as he tries to persuade them to abandon their homes and traditions and learn to survive beyond the Owners’ domain. Even as their dens go up in flames, Solo helps the Quorum cats execute their escape; slipping into the welcome cover of darkness, the feline exiles now begin their tortuous quest for a new land. (blurb)

Solo’s Journey is a talking-cat fantasy, in the tradition of Tad Williams’ Tailchaser’s Song and so many others (why are there almost no talking-dog fantasies?), going back ultimately to Richard Adams’ Watership Down for its “realistic” animal species with a detailed language.

G. P. Putnam’s Sons, November 1987, 255 pages, 0-399-13321-6, $17.95. Map by Scot Aiken.

This is labeled “The Third Book of Kherishdar”, following The Aphorisms of Kherishdar (reviewed in Anthro #18, July-August 2008) and The Admonishments of Kherishdar (Flayrah, April 4, 2012). Those two were slender “chapbooks” of less than 60 pages each, establishing the society and culture of the alien, ancient civilization of the Ai-Naidar of Kherishdar, in a series of parables of less than two pages each. Black Blossom is a full novel, telling of the culture shock that comes to the Ai-Naidar when a human comes to live among them.

See also: M.C.A. Hogarth's 'Black Blossom' tops $4600 on Kickstarter

“Black Blossom: A Fantasy of Manners Among Aliens”, by M.C.A. Hogarth.
CreateSpace, September 2012, trade paperback $18.95 (376 [+ 4] pages), Kindle/e-book $6.99.

It was the spring of 1998 when I first became a fan of Light on Shattered Water by Greg Howell, an era when stories were uploaded with hard line breaks. It was becoming increasingly evident that my interest in Lion King fandom had run its course and probably wouldn't stick with me much longer. But the interest wasn't so much dying off as morphing into an interest in furry fandom in general, particularly works of literature. I asked for suggestions of works of furry literature that would be good to read, both published and online. Light on Shattered Water, which at the time had recently been completed, came highly recommended to me. I began reading and quickly became immersed in this story.

And now, fourteen years later, Light on Shattered Water (Life of Riley, Book 1) is available in a Kindle edition. (June 2012, ASIN B008GASFDA, $4.99)

Michael Riley, a digital graphics specialist, was encouraged to spend some time away from his job. While hiking in the mountains near Montpelier, Vermont, he is knocked unconscious by a nearby lightning strike. Upon awakening, he finds all of his possessions intact, including most notably a laptop computer (with a solar recharging unit), but his GPS isn't working, many of the landmarks he had relied upon are mysteriously absent, and his maps seem to be wrong. After hiking for days, he finally discovers a village where everything appears to be oddly primitive. But the biggest shock of all comes when he first sees its inhabitants.