William Joyce

William Joyce
Biographical Information
Full Name	William Edward Joyce
Born	December 11, 1957
Nationality	American
Home	Shreveport, Louisiana
Spouse(s)	Frances Elizabeth Baucum (wife, deceased)
Children	Jackson Edward Joyce (son) Mary Katherine Joyce (daughter, deceased)
Status	Active (1981-present)
Occupation(s)	Writer Illustrator Filmmaker
Background Information
Link(s)	Official Website Twitter Instagram Tumblr

“	My characters are all devoted to a dream or a set of values and they stick with them against the tide.	”
—William Joyce

William Edward "Bill" Joyce is an American author, illustrator, and filmmaker. He is the creator of The Guardians of Childhood books and the executive producer of the movie Rise of the Guardians.

Children's literature

He has written and illustrated over fifty children's books including George Shrinks, Santa Calls, Dinosaur Bob and his Adventures with the Family Lazardo, Rolie Polie Olie, The Leaf Men and the Brave Good Bugs and A Day with Wilbur Robinson.

Joyce is currently working on a series of novels and picture books, The Guardians of Childhood, consisting of a total of 13 books.

Film and television

Joyce has received three Emmys for Rolie Polie Olie, an animated series based on his series of children's books that airs on the Disney Channel. His second television series, George Shrinks, airs daily on PBS stations.

Joyce created conceptual characters for Disney/Pixar's feature films Toy Story (1995) and A Bug's Life (1998).

In 2001, after Joyce and Ice Age director Chris Wedge failed to adapt one of Joyce's books to the screen, Santa Calls, they both came up with the idea for the animated film Robots (2005). Besides being one of the creators, Joyce also served as a producer and production designer.

In 2005 Joyce and Reel FX launched a joint venture, Aimesworth Amusements, to produce feature films, video games and books. The new company announced plans to make three feature films: The Guardians of Childhood, The Mischevians, and Dinosaur Bob and His Adventures With the Family Lazardo. The first of those projects, The Guardians of Childhood was developed by DreamWorks Animation into the feature film, Rise of the Guardians, based on Joyce's book series and the short film Man in the Moon, directed by Joyce.

In 2007, Disney released Meet the Robinsons, a movie based on his book A Day with Wilbur Robinson, to which Joyce served as one of the executive producers of the film along with John Lasseter and Clark Spencer. In the same year, he designed the opening title sequence for Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium.

In August 2009, Joyce and Reel FX co-founder Brandon Oldenburg founded a Shreveport-based animation and visual effects studio MOONBOT Studios. The studio produced an Oscar winning animated short film and an iPad app The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore. A book adaption is expected to be released in late 2012. The studio released in January 2012 another app, Numberlys, with a short film and a book announced to come later.

His book The Leaf Men is being adapted by Blue Sky Studios into a 2013 computer-animated feature film titled Epic, with Joyce as writer, producer and production designer.

Exhibitions

Saks Fifth Avenue

In both 1994 and 1995 Joyce designed the Christmas displays for Saks Fifth Avenue's original location.

The World of William Joyce

This exhibition is run by the National Center for Children's Illustrated Literature. It began in 1998 and is currently still traveling nationally.

Artspace

Artspace is a gallery located in Shreveport that is run under the guidance of the Shreveport Regional Arts Council. Joyce serves as the Artistic Director. He has helped bring a Peter Pan Centennial exhibit, an Art of Robots exhibit, and Faces of Katrina.

Community

Joyce has recently founded the Katrinarita Gras Foundation to raise money for victims of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. He is selling prints of his unpublished Mardi Gras The New Yorker cover through the foundation with all profit going to Louisiana artists and arts organizations.

Awards and accolades

Joyce received the 2008 Louisiana Writer Award for his enduring contribution to the "literary intellectual heritage of Louisiana." The award was presented to him on October 4, 2008, during a ceremony at the 2008 Louisiana Book Festival in Baton Rouge. On 26 February 2012, he won an Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film, "The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore."

Newsweek called him one of the top 100 people to watch in the new millennium.

Personal life

William Joyce lives with his son Jackson Edward Joyce in Shreveport, Louisiana. His daughter, Mary Katherine, died from a brain tumor at the age of 18 on May 2, 2010, and the 2012 movie, Rise of the Guardians was dedicated to her memory. His wife, Elizabeth Baucum Joyce passed away on January 20, 2016 at the age of 55 after a long battle with ALS.

Through Moonbot Studios, Bill Joyce and his family released this statement:

“	Elizabeth said goodbye this afternoon surrounded by friends and loved ones after a long battle with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). She was sharp as a tack and witty to the end.  She made an indelible mark on Shreveport as attorney, and social worker. She never hesitated to help people who were at the most desperate edges of poverty. And she did so with genuine grit, grace and determination. Our family hopes she will be remembered for the work she did with the VOA Lighthouse. For those who wish to honor her memory, we ask that they help carry on her mission to be an advocate for those who are in need. Along with our friends and family, we are working to bring Elizabeth’s memoir “With Love and Fury: How My Fierce Daughter Taught Me to Live and Die” into publication. To be notified of updates, please sign up on our mailing list at withloveandfury.com She was a fun woman. Amazingly good company with an easy charm and a rapier wit. She charmed diplomats, fast food workers, presidents, check-out folks at the grocery store, movie stars, captains of industry, and every person she ever met. She got things done in a way that made everyone feel like they had won. She was everything the South and Shreveport could be proud of."	”
—Bill & Jack Joyce'

Occasionally, he releases sketches her on his social media.

His wife is in all his books and very heavily inspired some of the characters in the Guardians of Childhood series like: Tsarina , Mother Nature , Toothiana and a warrior mermaid . On his instagram, she is the Queen of the Mermaids.

She has also inspired many of his other characters, as well.

Works by William Joyce

Books

Note: All books are written and illustrated by William Joyce, except as noted

• George Shrinks (1985)
• Shoes (1986) - Written by Elizabeth Winthrop
• Dinosaur Bob and His Adventures with the Family Lazardo (1988)
• A Day with Wilbur Robinson (1990)
• Bently & Egg (1992)
• Santa Calls (1993)
• The Leaf Men and the Brave Good Bugs (1996)
• The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore (2012)
• The Mischievians (2013)
• The Numberlys - co-illustrated with Christina Ellis (2014)
• A Bean, A Stalk And A Boy Named Jack (2014)
• Billy's Booger (2015)
• Ollie's Odyssey (2016)

Rolie Polie Olie series:

• Rolie Polie Olie (1999)
• Snowie Rolie (2000)
• Sleepy Time Olie (2001)
• Big Time Olie (2002)

The Guardians of Childhood series:

The Guardians:

• Nicholas St. North and the Battle of the Nightmare King (2011) - Written with Laura Geringer 
• E. Aster Bunnymund and the Warrior Eggs at the Earth's Core! (2012)
• Toothiana: Queen of the Tooth Fairy Armies (2012)
• The Sandman and the War of Dreams (2013)
• Jack Frost: The End Becomes The Beginning (2018)

Picture books:

• The Man in the Moon (2011)
• The Sandman: The Story of Sanderson Mansnoozie (2012)
• Jack Frost (The Guardians of Childhood) (2015)

Films

• Toy Story (1995) - Conceptual and art design
• Buddy (1997) - Screen story, screenwriter
• A Bug's Life (1998) - Conceptual and art design
• Robots (2005) - Producer, production designer
• Meet the Robinsons (2007) - Writer, executive producer
• Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium (2007) - Production designer, main title sequence design
• The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore (2011) - Director, writer
• Rise of the Guardians (2012) - Writer, executive producer
• Epic (2013) - Writer, production designer, executive producer

Television series

• Rolie Polie Olie (1998–2006) - Created by, based on the book series of the same name
• George Shrinks (2000–2001) - Created by, based on the book of the same name

Sketches

Jack Frost

The sketch for one of the most elaborate spreads in the book was very simple. Really just three almost abstract shapes: clouds. Earth. Jack.

#JackFrost : the proof of the finished spread. This piece ended up being so much fun to get nutty wth the clouds.

The sketch for this spread was really difficult. Placing all the figures. Leading the viewers eye gracefully. Giving the composition a sort of musical rhythm but everything circling around and leading to jacks upraised finger at the window. The emotional point of the painting. The thing that keeps jack separate from the rest of the world. His icy touch. His being outside. Outside the window. Wild. Reckless. Free. But always abit apart.

The key to this illustration is showing the seperation that jack feels from the world. The girl is surrounded by family and home. Jack is separate. Alone. But he's trying to reach through. Everything in the placement of the family circles the eye around and directly to jacks finger tip. His great longing, his delicate hope are manifested in that almost tentative, shy gesture. Can he break through? Will he belong?

#jackfrost #rotg "Jacks cold and lonely heart brought snow that turned the world white all around"
From the upcoming book. This image was the most calming to paint. White is so abstract and and mood so quiet and cold. The tree a lyrical twining of branches and curly-q's. The the intense spattering of whites to make snow. The mood is solemn but it was fun as hell to paint

Hey JACK FROST and #ROTG fans! This month for #Inktober, I’ll be creating special ink sketches focusing on JACK FROST! His past! His present! His future! Meet his closest secret friends. See his formal attire. Go to some of his unknown hide outs. Discover some of his ancient enemies. Loads of never before revealed JACK FROST facts.
Are you fascinated by JACK FROST too? This October, share your Jack Frost fan art by tagging me (@heybilljoyce) and use the hashtag #Inktober to be entered to win a weekly giveaway, including one of my ink sketches, Jack Frost books and other surprises. A winner every week!

After Jack had been victorious in his penultimate battle with Pitch he went through many extraordinary changes. He was able to physically age (up to a point) or become younger at will. It was during one of these periods that he made the acquaintance of many artists and intellectuals of the Belle Epoch. The poet Rimbaud, Whistler, Sargent, Mark Twain, Oscar Wilde and Poe all found the company of this "young Mr Frost" to be both memorable and haunting. At the height of her considerable fame the dancer Isadora Duncan threatened to jump into the then active volcano on the island of Stromboli if jack did not marry her. Here is Jack as drawn by the then young William Dana Gibson. #ROTG #jackfrost #Inktober

The Oak of Sorrows is the closest place to a home jack has ever known on earth. It is his fortress of solitude. The great tree protects him. Give him shelter. And absorbs his sadness. It is a noble entitiy and a true friend.

Couldn't let the day go by without a jack pic. He can fill the sky with leaves and twist them about as he wills. They can act as a shield or blister down like charging cavalry. All elements of nature are allies of Jackson Overland Frost, King of Wild Things. King of Childhood.

Jacks staff came from an a willow that stood on the ancient burial grounds of Mohican Indians. The Mohicans called it Warriors Willow for from its branches came the strongest and most flexible bows, staffs and arrows that their warriors and hunters fashioned. The warrior dead of the tribe were buried among the willows roots and each limb was said to have the spirit of a warrior within its heartwood who could help the person that wielded it, but only if that being were brave and true of heart. Jacks staff was his friend, his comrade his protector. It would alert him to danger. It could focus jacks power to speak to the wind and learn the language of leaves. It's name was Twinetender. If you want information on the new Jack Frost book go to http://moonbotstudios.com/jackfrost #Inktober #jackfrost #jackfrostcosplay #goc #ROTG #pitch. I'm trying to get better at my pen work. I started this one out with a brush pen for the shapes. Then scurried back to the safety of my charcoals. I m so brave with charcoal but such a wus with the pen. Gotta get braver. Oh ! This is after a Shane Prigmore piece that I always love. Shane is awesome.

Jack Frost. Ink and Charcoal.

The Boy-God of the Skies. Removed. Remote. But a part of everything. He's in the clouds. The air. The wind. Fierce. Strong. Lightning fast. With the instincts of a hawk but the heart nobleman. He is a king of childhood. And it's unfailing protector.

There is among the yetis a small number of full blown Giants. They are referred to as the Titans. For all their size and strength they are remarkably calm and extremely well read. Some are even accomplished artists. They infact may be responsible for what we now call the "comic book" and the "graphic novel." They can of course be impressively fierce in battle and have only one weakness. An Achilles Heal if you will. If you scratch behind their nearly invisible ears they will become docile as a kitten. And may even fall into a nearly coma-like sleep. Jack, his mischievous streak always present, finds great joy and some amusement in applying a blissful tickle behind their ears.

Jack Frost battling the notorious Lermantoff Serpent. The Serpent had once been a human statesmen of considerable skill and charm and had infact been the Lord High Protector of the Valley of Lost Dreams. But Pitch, the Dark Master of Nightmares seduced Lermantoff and transformed him into a giant snake with an insatiable appetite for consuming good dreams.

Ok. This drawing of Jack Frost will be the 1st prize for the last week of Jack Frost inktober contest. So draw yourselves silly and go check out the brand spanking new Jack Frost book at your local bookstore or Amazon and find out the secret ancient origins of mr Jackson Overland Frost.

Jack doing a handstand because it seemed like the thing to do. Elves swiped his hoodie and cape and staff. He'll get em back later. He's just not in the mood. It's just time to tumble.

Many years ago when I first started working on the guardians, Jack Frost was an adult. A sort of Rip Van Winkle character who had saved his villiage from the Werewolfian Hoards that would invade from the mountains of Carpaithia. He was buried in an avalanche that blockaded his village and stopped the werewolves from ever threatening his region again. In his pocket was a an acorn that his young daughter had given him and from that acorn there grew a mighty tree that encased and protected jack in his frozen state. 200 years passed before the Avalanche thawed and from the now ancient tree Jack emerged. He wandered down to his villiage and found it safe and thriving. But his wife, his children, everyone he knew had died long before. And from that point on he was a unreal creature. Ageless. Frozen. Part man part tree-like being with a cape of leaves that could part like wings and give him flight. He was a lonely quiet soul who coursed the night skies and filled the dawn with his mournful, haunting songs. But he watched over his village and kept it save from any evil.

Jack Frost novel cover sketch. Posted another cover a few weeks back. But then I got this image in my head. I want this novel to BE JACK. Thought anyone?

"A portion of the opening of the Frost Novel is set in London when Jack first resurfaces after a 100 year absence. He becomes a mysterious and much sought after figure in Edwardian London. A dashing and charismatic lad of intrigue. He travels in the most rarified circles. Oscar Wilde. Whistler. John Singer Sargent. H G Wells. So here he is. In a tuxedo and opera cape. Twiner his staff is with him even at the the most opulent party."

Illustration for the opening chapter of the Jack Frost Novel. It’s Christmas Eve 1933. Jack’s about to make his way to the North Pole. He is in the multi-roomed hollow of one of his many ancient trees. This is his tree in New York. In Central Park. The oldest tree on Manhattan island. He’s just been attacked by some Nightmare Men. Twiner, his staff, morphed into a long bow before the first Black Arrow came out of the dark. It is a different sort of arrow than jack has seen the Nightmare Men use before. It’s tipped with Dark Matter and therefore more deadly. Hmmmm. Jack Frost nearly got his nose nipped.

Jack Frost, or at least his character is equal parts Peter Pan and Robin Hood. Pan and Hood. Both seemed invincible. Both seemed to be having the best time being the hero. I thought a great deal about Errol Flynn’s Robin Hood when I was concocting jack. The 1938 film version is a peerless entertainment and a sort of wishful adult sequel to Peter Pan. Robin and Peter are both clad in green tights and live in the forest with a bunch of rowdy fellas swashbuckling against tyrannical adults. Robin’s men of Sherwood are tall versions of the Pan’s lost boys. They commit cheerful anarchy against the venial royals of Nottingham with the same insolent joy as the lost boys made mischief with Captain Hook. No one has ever played Robin Hood with such gleeful, swaggering charm as Errol Flynn. And for both stories it took a girl to bring calm and an almost adult element to the heroic hijinks. Wendy in Neverland. Maid Marian in Sherwood. But both stories hide their depth and poignancy behind a screen of swordplay and adventuring. And in both stories it is the girl who guides us to the tragic undercurrents of the hero’s life and journey. For Jack Frost I found myself pulled in a similar direction. For all his strutting and smiles he is a lost boy desperate to find out it if he can love and be loved. His only vulnerability is his care. His deep, unwavering love is his salvation but also the source of all of his danger, worry and pain. And like Robin Hood he will face any hardship to protect his hearts desire. Love makes us all grow up. The great tragedy of Peter was he would not, could not love Wendy. Or anybody. He could never leave Neverland. Robin Hood saved the king and England but only with Marion’s help and love. It’s poignant when he and Marion wave goodbye to Sherwood but for them it’s time to move on. And so jack comes to a similar juncture. He wants so desperately to move on. To feel. Love makes heroes of the lost and lonely.

As I come to the last bits of the Jack Frost novel I find myself experiencing unexpected rushes of remembering. (He holds his beloved hoodie. We learn it’s origin)Jack has become so much more than I had ever expected. More complicated. More satisfying. More embraced. He was at first inspired by Peter Pan the boy who could never grow up. I first saw the musical play version when I was perhaps five and I have never come all the way back from Neverland, just as I had never completely left Oz or Skull Island or Transylvania, those happy provinces where all my favorite monsters and beings dwelled. I always sided with giant gorillas, lonely monsters, and cowardly lions. But a flying boy who never grew up? That was a career goal I could really believe in. As Jack began to evolve in my mind I thought a great deal of James Dean the movie star who never really grew up. He rocketed to stardom playing a teenager and was dead before he’d finished his third film. He is forever frozen in his celluloid perfection of rebellious youth. Then the very young Leonardo DiCaprio. In “This Boys Life” and “The Quick and the Dead” DiCaprio had a Huck Finn quality that was full of canny mischief and danger. And he was for a brief time cast to do the voice of Jack. But as time passed Jack’s qualities became the dominion of my two children. Particularly the kindness and courage they displayed as tragedy cut short their childhoods. They became the children who had to grow up and face the worst that fate could conjure. But they held tight to their memories. And that became Jack’s defining quality. Unlike Pan, Jack Frost knows there is an end to childhood, he knows that heartbreak and hurt are coming. But he will use memory as a weapon to keep the darkness at bay. As I drew this image I thought of all these things. And of NC Wyeth and his great romantic flowing cloaks. I listened to Debussy and George Auric and New Order. Art and writing can seem like lonely endeavors. But remembering the inspirations can make the task feel like a warm gathering of treasured colleagues.

Jack Frost finds home. It is a long, long journey. Through wars and heartbreak and across oceans of time. Home. A simple word. A single syllable that represents a vast and powerful notion. Warmth. Love. Family. Friends. Safety. It is something we long for. Especially if the reality became dark or damaged. How to express that feeling in an illustration? I think back. I model the home after the ice palace from Dr Zhivago. The home Zhivago returns to after the Russian revolution. Then I remember Norman Rockwell’s soldier returning home from war. We only see his back and somehow that makes us feel more than if we saw his face. In an almost identical composition we see the elderly priest from The Exorcist coming to the home that he will save. In a single image we feel his journey, his weariness and lonely courage. An amazingly lyrical and haunting image to come from a horror film. Without it the movie would be so much less. In David Lean’s “Bridge on the River Kwai” the main character Colonel Nicholson (played by Alec Guinness) turns his back to the camera and for close to two minutes we hear him reminisce about the home he’s barely seen in 28 years of being in the military. We don’t see his face and yet it’s one of the most quietly touching scenes in cinema. Dorothy’s home takes her to Oz and crashes into the middle of Munchkinland but she spends the rest of the story looking for the idea of home. Time and again we see her from the back approaching the next stop on her journey. Finding home. Perhaps it’s to big of an idea to face head on. Maybe the less you show the more the viewer will see.

Bunnymund

Jack is of course quite good friends with Bunnymund though he likes to tease the over logical Pooka from time to time. Whenever he tells Bunnymund that he is getting kinda of paunchy the great rabbit sucks in his gut and is walks around for days trying to look buff not fluff.

Bunnymund when he's hoping not to be seen. Sometimes the quickest sketches say it all and doing anything more just dilutes it. I had always thought that Bunnymund would use his ears in combat much more than he did in the movie. It was too expensive to build an ear rig that could do that much stuff. There were lots of little comprises like that. A robe for him or a cape would taken a lot of time to animate. And we already had 5 main characters to deal with that required extroidinarily complex models. Jacks hands and feet were some of the most subtle and complicated rigs ever made for an animated feature. But man, are they good.

So Bunnymund can't swim. He hates water. And he has this nutty steampunk swimming suit. But it's tough to get the helmet not to leak because the ear holes aren't tight enough.

Bunnymund was originally a much leaner and more meditative being. He would only buff up when he ate chocolate which had a transformative effect on the Pooka. In the time that the movie is set he had eaten so much chocolate that he was permanately bunny buffed. Here he is in the earliest days of the guardians when he was handier with his ears than his fists. He had of course invented the Shoalin style of combat but always considered the use of hands in battle to be for inferior species. He is in this illustration battling a Nightmare Man, a denizen of Pitchs realm.

When E. Aster Bunnymund eats chocolate he is transformed in a variety of ways depending on the intensity of the chocolate. This transformation was the result of a particularly robust blend which was required by the situation at hand. Battle on Bunnymund!!!

North

North has two coats. The one with white fur which he wears in peacetime. And the one with black fur which he wears when Pitch is making war upon the Guaurdians. Here he is on his way to the Naughty Stacks in the Hall of Naughty and Nice.

Ok. North has by now amassed a library unmatched in its vastness and beauty. He started with Ombric Shalazar's collection of science and legerdemain that included the only remaining books from the great lost librairy of Atlantis as well volumes from the Golden Age itself. His library has been growing for centuries and he considers the gift of a book as one the most powerful exchanges of magic available. "Books are amoung the only objects in the universe that generate their own power indefinitely! Give them freely and and you will change worlds and lives!"" Such a wise and noble fellow.

Nicholas St North has something grand he wants to show you..... Ah ... but ....not just ...... yet...

Oh... He's getting jolly now...It's coming...

Christmas is over. The naughty and nice lists begin anew. Our jolly friend tries to look stern but he's a bowl of sugar. He cuts us so much slack as you well know. But he has such hopes for us. Such hope! It's a shame to let him down.

Pitch

Pitch will someday grow even more powerful. And haunted. A creature of mournful magnificence but capable of extroidinary cruelty.

Early version of Pitch. Inspired by night on bald mountain segment from Fantasia. And fritz langs Wagnerian silent epic Die Nibelungen

As for our friend Jack Frost I've been thinking of how his nemesis Pitch would evolve. Will he be more damaged and physically vulnerable? It's something to consider. Black Hate Smoke churning from inside his coal black heart?

This is the first complete drawing I did of Pitch. This was after several years of exploration. He was always somewhat similar to this but this one was the first that echoed his tiny remaining humanity. He is not a total villain. There is something vulnerable deep inside. A dim shadow of the man he once was.

Pitch just after he was overtaken by the nitemare men. He still has some of his old golden age uniform.

Pitch, the Nightmare King. Imprisoned on earth for centuries after the battle of Bright Night (the last great battle on the moon). For the Jack Frost novel for The Rise of the Guardians series.

Sandman

This is an early early Sandman drawing. Found it today in the bottom of a drawer in my old office along with abunch of other super early Guardians stuff. Cleaning out stuff is good.

As the Sandman's hair began to evolve I tried lots of different shapes for his quaff. This one was sorta 80s Tina Turner with a little mix of House Party/Christopher Reid. The giant floating pillow is something I kept coming back to in the books but for the movie it became cumbersome and difficult to to use in blocking out scenes. Especially when all the Guardians are in the same scene. So Sandy lost the pillow and instead became sort of lighter than air. As if filled with helium. It was a lovely production compromise and was a very charming way to present Sandy. You need to sometimes be open to these alternatives when making movies. You listen to the reasoning. You question the alternatives and sometimes you find you can get exactly what you want. And sometimes there is an inspired solution. The point is to listen. Take seriously the budget and technical difficulties. Most of the time if the crew sees how important something is for you they will try to find a way. You shouldn't play primadonna and demand your exact vision at every turn. It's a collaboration and you're all working to make the movie cool.

TheSandman conversing with TheMan in the Moon. They seem destined to be pals.

Tooth

Here is the Toothfairy early on. She was always bird-like and many of her design elements stayed constant. As I developed her back story I began to think of her less and less as a suited human and more as a human/bird hybrid. One afternoon, in a crazy daydreaming fague state, she became the half breed off-spring of a princess of the Sisters of Flight, a tribe of winged women from the Kingdom of Punjam Hy Loo. Her father was a slave named Haroom (named after Salman Rushdie's hero from Haroom and the Sea of Stories). The Toothfairys birth and childhood is perhaps the most delirious episodes in all my fictions. In the Gaurdians novel "Toothiana: Queen of the Toothfairy Armies" I tell her whole story. I was channeling Kiplings Jungle Books, the animation masterpiece "The Adventures of Prince Achmed" some Edgar Rice Burroughs "Tarzan" and "The Thief of Bagdad" both the silent version and the 1940 version.

Katherine

"In the Jack Frost novel the Guardians have matured into their modern selves. They have grownup in other words. Katherine, who was a child with a talent for stories at the beginning of the series has evolved into the person children call Mother Goose, though she has no children of her own. She does however have a giant Himalayan Snow Goose (which she acquired early in the series) and has assembled a vast library on her remote headquarters called Ganderly. She and her warrior librarians called The Raconteurks not only supply the world with tales of wonder and enchantment they have developed something called The Mythosphere, an invisible layer of creative energy that surrounds the earth and inspires writers everywhere to write the stories they wish to tell. This ascendent power of story is something Pitch the Nightmare King fears deeply. Katherine has long interested Pitch. He had intuited her youthful brilliance and wished to make her into his darkling princess but her goodness and strength were too strong to be turned. Now, as an adult, she has a weakness Pitch may be able to exploit. Her tender relationship with the boy she’s known for centuries. The boy who saved her time and again and who she saved. The boy once known as Nightlight. The boy now called Jack Frost."

Others

When elves go bad (which happens more often than you'd think) they become Jack's responsibility. They are often rowdy, gross and generally impossible. But Jack enjoys their company and gives them low level missions which they always screw up in spectacularly rediculous ways. But they are fiercely loyal, good of heart and unfailingly brave and can sometimes win the day with tactics of epic grossness.

I figure jack is highly regarded by the Fairy Folk. And that they often aide him in battle or to defend children and other noble creatures. I'm sure they live in his Trree of Sorrow. He even carries a small troupe of them with him from time to time. In a small pouch that hangs from his waist. #ROTG This drawing comes from my work on the film Epic.

So I'm gonna flood the place with Jack lore today. There is a sub species of the yetis (or abominables)who are more human like. They are the tribal leaders of the Yetillian Clans and they are actually close friends with Jack. He is infact an honorary Chief and General of the Yeti though he is known as the He of No Clan. Jack lives with the Yetis from time to time and he cherishes their culture, customs and bravery.

In the Tree of Sorrow there lives an army of warrior Fairy Folk known as the Nods. In time the Nods become the eyes and ears of Jack through out the world. They fly great distances on their various Bird Mounts and observe in every land the well being of children. With their Midnight Trumpets they can sound the call to action of a child in need and let Jack know if he must come to aide.

Jack Frost has a special kinship amoung the world of leaves. He can command the leaves of any tree or plant (other than Mandrake). He can use them as spies to keep watch for Pitch. They can change color, fly and even return to their tree if he tells them. They speak to Jack as though he were one of them and revere the magic lad as a king. His strength and power derive much from the realm of nature and his mysterious friendship with the being known as Mother Nature.

The tooth fairy's mother. The most fierce and fair of the Sisters of Flight, ancient protectors of the creatures of Punjum Hy Loo.

I've been trying to think of a story of a Halloween King. An ally of Pitch from the guardians. Or is he a wary adversary of the Nightmare King ? This Lord of goblins and ghosts and mischief that appears for a single night. Would he not be more a friend to Jack Frost?

The sandman has a giant helper name The Great SaNooze who goes about and gathers the various Dreamsands. Because of his close proximity to Dreamsands, The SaNooze is of course nearly narcoleptic. Keeping him awake and standing is problematic and the focus of much technology. He has small jets (front, sides and back) that give short bursts if he leans to far in any direction. He has tiny eyelid lifters to keep his eyes open and a peppy little robotic coffee pot attached to one shoulder which plies him with constant shots of very strong 'joe'. He maintains a curious but blissful state of near sleep and has a very even and cordial disposition.

I went Alittle nutty with this E. Astor Bunymund idea. Some of his eggs have gone rotten and started a rebellion and he had to send for some help. I dunno. Eggs gone bad in a big way kinda "cracked" me up. Trying figure out a way to get this in the next novel. But it may just stay a one off. But dude. The egg puns. Dozens.

Ya know, I think that yetis come in many shapes, colors and sizes. I'm just musing here. My oldest sister chased yetis in British Columbia. She had some theories. My uncle told me he was an alien when I was a kid. My nephew is a balloonist or has we prefer an "air-o-naut". My dad told me that people didn't see in color till the invention of color tv. My other sisters resteraunt was on a ghost hunter show and the ghost hunters ran away screaming and didn't come back. So ......Yeti musings come easily to me. Have a good weekend folks!

I'm very grateful to all the Instigram Jedi who gave me so many Vulcan Mind-meld Messages the past week or so. Powerful and lovely stuff that will put the spring back in my step and the whoosh back in my Paint Saber. So.... With renewed force wielding of my Kenobi.025 I'd like to present a drawing of Pitch's restored Nightmare Gallion from the upcoming (and tentatively titled) "The Beginning: JACK FROST at the Battle of Moon"

"His name is Skreeklavic Shadowbent. He is ruler of the Werewolvian Hordes of the Carpathian Mountains. Which is of course in the wildest, most primordial part of Transylvania. He and his followers are men who become beasts to fight injustice. They only savage those who savage the weak. Is he a friend to Jack Frost? Perhaps. But Shadowbent does know Pitch and knows the Nightmare King’s deepest fear and weakness. The earliest sketch of him was more Vampiric and comic. As I wrote he evolved as you can see."

Here’s a flurry of fresh off the pad illustrations for the new Jack Frost novel. 1) A guard of the Raconturks, Mother Goose’s personal Army on the Island of Ganderly. The Raconturks main weapons are words and rapier sharp witticisms though their quill tipped pen spears do come in handy. Of course they make powerful use of Onomatopoeia BOOM! POW! KABLAM!! And they are modeled after the Winkie guards from the Wizard of Oz.

2) Ana and Jacklovich who become Jack Frosts beloved adopted brother and sister in the wilds of Transylvania.

Jacklovich

My lovely wife as Queen of the Mermaids. Though stricken by ALS and paralyzed she is still the queen of my imaginings. This is from The Sandman book from ROTG.

A cheerful Yeti. Good at being abominable. Likes the mountains. Summers in Boca.

Today's story: When Elves GO BAD. There are several ways elves GO BAD. 1) they are never elves at all. They are bad children. They are such bad children that they take the black coal offered by NOT SANTA buuuuut by The Queen of the Dark Elves. This distinction of whether a child is good or bad is descided by mutual record keeping at the North Pole but is only enacted if THE CHILD IN QUESTION TAKES THE COAL WHEN IT IS OFFERD. Where upon it devolves into the stunted creature you see illustrated here. They loose their teeth(from lack of brushing) they loose the ability to write or speak in complete sentences( from lack of diligent study) and often carry a sad talisman of their childhood on the end of a stick ( in this case a cowboy boot) Other bad elf devolutions will be discussed at a later date.

An elf.

Cameos

A change of pace. Zozo the clown king with his army of Creeps steal the favorite toys of children and turn them into slaves. From my upcoming novel "Ollies Odyssey" #SimonandSchuster. I'm certain that Jack Frost knows this ZoZo guy and may have helped out Ollie the hero. See if you can find jacks cameo in the book which comes out this spring.