Item! Diana Tamblyn posts the first review temporarily posted and then removed a scan of the first review of Chester Brown’s Paying for It I’ve seen, written by Quill and Quire columnist James Grainger. (The hatchet job review is currently only available in the March print edition of the mag.) Grainger first castigates Joe Ollman’s Mid-Life for a lack of profundity before tackling Brown’s book: “a tedious work … the drawings are monotonous, the dialogue stilted…” Harsh! Maybe not a comics fan?

Update: Quill and Quire do have online an insider’s look at the bankruptcy of H.B. Fenn book distributor, originally published in their latest issue.
Item! The excellent Squidface & The Meddler website is soliciting donations so it can continue presenting its very comics-friendly arts and culture content.
Item! Did someone say hockey comics? Courtesy of Tom Spurgeon, here’s Rob Ullman’s The Backstop Behind the Bench, a story that the Virginia-based cartoonist plans to include in issue #2 of his comic book series, Old-Timey Hockey Tales.
Item! Big publishing news: Cartoonist-turned-publisher Hope Larson has tweeted that the wonderful Rebecca Kraatz will finally be releasing her follow-up to the award-winning House of Sugar, just in time for TCAF.
Item! The Vancouver-based F-Word podcast features Alzheimers graphic memoir creator Sarah Leavitt (Tangles) in a feminist-friendly discussion of graphic novels hosted on rabble.ca.
Item! I missed this final go-round of reviews of the Toronto Wizard con from the Tdot Comics crew of Alice and Alex. You know it was a lame con when the reactions range from “it wasn’t that bad” to “it was really bad.”
Item! Happy One Year Anniversary to Ty Templeton’s weekly Bun Toons strip!
Item! The Canadian Press interviews the director of a new documentary, The Comic Books Go to War, about cartoonist journalists from around the world.
Item! I wonder how many frustrated cartoonists and comic book artists are working as tattoo artists?
Item! Canadian-Iranian policart Nik Kowsar has a new site that helps people create cartoons. (via Comics Reporter)
Item! Writer/cartoonist Ray Fawkes has a new book coming out from Oni. One Soul, “the most ambitious book Oni Press has ever published,” debuts in July.
Item! My local comic shop, The Dragon, hosts a weekly podcast. The latest ep dissects some of the big nominations for the Shuster Awards.
Item! Speaking of the Dragon, manager Amy Chop hipped me to the news that La Pastèque will be translating Scott Chantler’s Two Generals graphic novel.
Item! Lorenzo Mattotti’s The Raven to debut at TCAF? Plus, TCAF and Beguiling ad in Owl kids magazine.
Item! Ariel Schrag coming to Toronto