RELEASED: Charlotte Gainsbourg mon amour

I finished my translation of Fabrice Tarrin's autobiographical comic book Charlotte Gainsbourg mon amour. It's full of anecdotes, mostly from his younger years, revolving around him and his childhood celebrity crush Charlotte Gainsbourg, the daughter of famous French singer Serge Gainsbourg.

If you're not familiar with Charlotte Gainsbourg, check out this Beck video below to see what she looks and sounds like:



The usual thanks goes to the astonishing artisan of proofreading, DanielBT.

On a related note: I'm quite disappointed that there hasn't been more Little Fantasio in Spirou magazine so far. In the interview that was published in the same issue as the last pages I translated two weeks ago, Tarrin even hinted at how the story would go on, saying that he'd give Fantasio "a little companion soon who's a bit lonely". So I wonder why there were no new pages in the last two issues. :-/
Ah, well, maybe next week...

Download: Charlotte Gainsbourg mon amour

Little Fantasio - p.7-12

And here it is! The continuation of The Heroic Youth of Fantasio. Six more pages of young Fantasio and Zantafio. One of the pages was inspired by Franquin's Idées Noires. I'm sure you can tell which one.

Tarrin said in an interview in this week's issue of Spirou magazine that the story will focus on Fantasio growing up and changing into an adult, but also explain Zantafio's descend to the dark side.
(Bad news for all Tarrin fangirls out there: In the same interview, Tarrin mentioned that his girlfriend is currently pregnant. ;) )

In the folder I uploaded, you'll also find a HQ version of this week's Spirou magazine cover. Enjoy!

Download

Little Fantasio - Now WEEKLY

Good news, everyone! Apparently, Dupuis decided to buy a full story of The Heroic Youth of Fantasio. So starting this today, there'll be six new pages in Spirou magazine every week.

And even better: I already have this week's RAWs and I'll try to get the translation out within the next 24 hours.

Looking at the page numbers, I guess the six pages printed in last year's Christmas special of Spirou magazine mark the beginning of the story, while the ones from this year's Valentine's Day special are kind of a bonus. (Though the Octopus café makes a reappearance.)

So look forward to more Little Fantasio. :)

[EDIT: Translation is done. Waiting for my proofreader's reply now.]

Upcoming Tarrin stuff

Sorry for the recent lack of updates. As some of you might know, I also have another blog where I post translated comics from Fabrice Tarrin's blog on a daily basis. (Over 300 already! Yay!)
I'm getting closer and closer to catching up with his blog, so that's what I've been focussing on lately.

I already finished translating his book Diary of a Lemur (orig. "Journal intime d'un Lémurien"). (As always, with the help of the charming DanielBT.) You can download it from my mediafire. It's pretty neat as it's a slice-of-life kind of story about Tarrin's life.

Starting today, I'll be posting the first 15 pages of his book Maki - Well done, family (orig. "Maki - Bravo la famille") and the last 8 pages of his other autobiographical book Charlotte Gainsbourg mon amour  until the end of the month. You can find the 100 or so Charlotte Gainsbourg mon amour pages I already translated here.

In July (and early August), I'll be posting the first 35 pages (out of 45) of his other Maki book Maki - A lemur at camp (orig. "Maki - Un lémurien en colo"). I'm aware that someone translated some of those a few months ago on 4chan. But I don't know if that anon did all of the available pages. If you know, leave a comment, please.
You can already find a few pages that didn't make it into the final Maki - A lemur at camp book here.

(Tarrin also posted the first 30 pages of his third Maki book Maki - A Virgin's Journey (orig. "Maki - Le parcours d'un puceau") that came out in April this year on his blog. I translated those a while back.)

Finally, I'll post 63 pages from his latest book SEXE, AMOUR et déconfiture... (That's pretty much the whole book minus some art between the chapters.)

So, if you enjoy Fabrice Tarrin's comics, check out my other blog. There's a lot of nice (full-colour) stuff coming up.

A Spirou & Fantasio Adventure - Vol. 3 - DONE

The Crypt of Champignac is now fully translated. As always, DanielBT of Sunday Comics Debt, thank you for proofreading the comics.

Just like last time, if you only want to read the last three pages, you can download them here:

A Spirou & Fantasio Adventure - The Crypt of Champignac, p. 56-59: Download

If you want the whole book including front and back cover plus artwork, then download the big folder here:

A Spirou & Fantasio Adventure - The Crypt of Champignac: Download

Here's a little bonus. (If you also follow my blue blog, you've probably seen it before.) It was published in Spirou magazine #3633.

   

Kamala Luonto - Lunatic Nature - 11-20

Coming up next: The final pages of The Crypt of Champignac. Meanwhile, here's some more Kamala Luonto:

The comic above is a reference to a Finnish children's song called Lennä, lennä leppäkerttu. 

Violine - Vol. 3 - DONE

Here are the last six pages of Violine - The Iron Claw. (A big thanks goes to the delightful DanielBT and his dedicated proofreading efforts.) If you've been downloading the four-page batches along the way and just want to know how the book ends, you can download the final batch here:

Violine - Vol. 3 - The Iron Claw, p. 41-46: Download

If you been waiting for the completion of the book to read it in one go or want the whole book including the front and back covers and artwork so you can add it to your collection, download this:

Violine - Vol. 3 - The Iron Claw: Download

I hope you enjoyed the book. The next one will be book 4 - The Cavern of Oblivion.

Maliki - A pink-haired girl and two cats

I just sent the last Violine pages to DanielBT, the magnificent proofreader. So you'll get to read the rest of the book soon.

Meanwhile, take a look at the latest addition to my comic book collection. It's the first one of the five Maliki books. Maliki is the name of the pink-haired girl with pointy ears on the cover above. It's basically a printed collection of webcomics that have been published at maliki.com since 2004.
While the books are currently only available in French, some of the webcomics have been translated to English by fans. You can read them here.

The comics revolve around a young girl who lives in Paris with her two cats Fëanor and Fleya and works as a comic artist. In later strips some side characters are introduced like Fang, the little Chinese girl Maliki rescued from drowning, and Jonn the Norman viking.
The strips focus mostly on everyday stories like Maliki doing her grocery shopping or taking her cats out for a walk.

There is also a four-minute video of Maliki and her friends playing video games while the cats...do their cat things (sleep, jump around, sleep):

The way the website is set up you might be led to think that those are more or less autobiographical comics drawn by a young female artist. That's not the case. Maliki is the creation of Souillon (which is French for "litterbug"), a male comic artist from France, who said in an interview that while the stories are roughly based on RL events, Maliki's character is completely made up. (The cats are real though.)
However, to keep up an air of mystery when at conventions, Souillon acts as Maliki's spokesperson rather than her creator. He even drew himself into his comics (the guy with the Zorro eye mask and skull shirt) having Maliki announce that he'd be at Japan Expo 2008 in her stead. (That in turn led some hardcore Maliki fans to actually cosplay as Maliki & Souillon. How cool is that?)

Maliki is Souillon's first and only comic series so far. His main job is at Ankama Games. He first worked on the flash-based MMORPG Dofus as a video game character artist and is now helping with the WAKFU television series.

Kamala Luonto - Lunatic Nature - 1-10

Sorry for the recent lack of updates. RL has been getting in the way. The good news is I'm only one final batch away from the finish line on every book I'm currently working on.
The first one to be completed will be Violine. It should be out in the next few days.

Meanwhile, here are more strips of the lynx and the stoat:

Violine - Vol. 3 - p.37-40

Almost done! The next Violine batch will be the final one.

Violine - Vol. 3 - The Iron Claw, p. 37-40: Download

Violine - Vol. 3 - p.33-36

Don't do drugs, kids!

Can't really say much about today's batch without spoilering anything, so just download and enjoy!

Violine - Vol. 3 - The Iron Claw, p. 33-36: Download

A Spirou & Fantasio Adventure - Vol. 3 - p.53-56

In today's batch a lot of the questions that were raised during the course of the book will be answered. Also, our friends will have to make a difficult decision...

A Spirou & Fantasio Adventure - The Crypt of Champignac, p. 53-56: Download

Donito - Vol. 1 - p.37-40

More mutilated fish...

We're almost done with this book as well. Only four more pages. So those pirates better hurry up and find Carmina a tasty sacrifice!

Donito - The Siren of the Caribbean, p. 37-40: Download

Little Spirou - Vol. 13 - p.37-40

In today's pages: Spirou, Anton and Father Angelo help with a wedding ceremony; once again, Grandma enjoys traumatizing her grandson; Mister Musk and the boys go skiing; Grandma looks for a good parking spot.

By the way, we're almost through with this book. The next release will be the final one!

Little Spirou - Sweet Dreams!, p. 37-40: Download

Violine - Vol. 3 - p.29-32

Yes, that's the Iron Claw and, yes, that's all you'll get to see of him/her/it today. 

Don't get your hopes up, there won't be much Iron Claw action in this batch either. But don't worry, we still have 14 pages left...

Violine - Vol. 3 - The Iron Claw, p. 29-32: Download

A Spirou & Fantasio Adventure - Vol. 3 - p.49-52

Our friends leave Nepal and return to the castle of Champignac where an unexpected guest awaits them...
Only seven pages to go and there are still many questions that need yet to be answered. Oh, the suspense!

A Spirou & Fantasio Adventure - The Crypt of Champignac, p. 49-52: Download

A semi-related note: I checked the contents of this week's issue of Spirou magazine. No sign of more Little Fantasio. :(

S&F: Lost in translation

I just sent the next Spirou & Fantasio batch to my proofreader. Meanwhile, here's something I've been meaning to post for a while now. The above picture is an example for the subtle jokes Tarrin added to The Crypt of Champignac - unfortunately it's also an example for humor getting lost in translation:
"On a oublié" means "we forgot". "La capote" can mean different things. In the context of the story, it's referring to the convertible roof of their Turbotraction, which they forgot to close the night before. However, "capote" is also a French slang word for "condom". So the text in the panel can also be read  as "The condom! We forgot the condom!"...

Donito - Vol. 1 - p.33-36

Awkwardness

Today's release is mostly about Carmina the evil red-haired siren (and Captain Clod). As usual, there's talk about death, killing and whatnot... I love children's comics!

Donito - The Siren of the Caribbean, p. 33-36: Download

Little Spirou - Vol. 13 - p.33-36

Animal cruelty? But...but this isn't Donito!?!

In today's release: First Father Angelo wants to go to a fancy-dress ball with the boys, then they go to visit an old convent in the middle of the night, Spirou and Anton pretend to be pirates and Spirou goes looking for his dog.

Little Spirou - Sweet Dreams!, p. 33-36: Download

Little Fantasio - Valentine's Day Special

Here are the three new pages of The heroic youth of Fantasio I mentioned two days ago. I have to admit, I'm a bit disappointed this time. For a story about Fantasio, there's not very much Fantasio in there. In fact, half of the three pages deal with yet another one of Tarrin's "100% true" stories about one of his hysterical ex-girlfriends. I usually enjoy these stories when he tells them using his Lemur character, but bringing his personal relationship drama into the Spirou & Fantasio universe just seems out of place to me. (And reading the comments he received after posting the first page of this comic on his blog, it seems I'm not the only one who feels this way.)
One thing I did enjoy though was the cameo of a certain S&F character you should be very much familiar with, if you've been reading my translation of the The Crypt of Champignac.

The heroic youth of Fantasio - Valentine's Day Special '12: Download

Kamala Luonto - Lunatic Nature

The promised Little Fantasio pages are currently being proofread. Meanwhile, I'd like to introduce you to a Finnish comic strip I discovered a few weeks ago: Kamala Luonto. That's cute character design paired with crude jokes.

Kamala Luonto is about two best buddies - a lynx and a stoat - who are always looking for a good time. The two things they enjoy most are farting and playing pranks on the other animals, especially the sheep, the pig and the moose.

The comic strips were created by freelance illustrator and comic artist Jarkko Vehniäinen, who draws comics as well as caricatures for several Finnish newspapers and magazines.
Kamala Luonto has been around since 2002, when Vehniäinen created the characters to participate in the Arctic Comics Festival's drawing contest (where he reached the finals but didn't win).
In 2010, the book in the above picture, which contains 173 strips in black-and-white from 2002-2010, was published. I bought from a Finnish online shop two weeks ago. The price was €5.00 plus shipping.

To give you an idea what the comics are like, I translated some of them from Finnish to English. (However, I have to admit that even though I wanted to learn Finnish since I was 14, today - over a decade later - my knowledge of the Finnish language is still basic at best. So the translation of the following comics is based on my limited Finnish skills, an online dictionary and Google translate.)

Kamala Luonto
by Jarkko Vehniäinen
Price: 5.00€
ISBN: 978-952-5754-21-6

Coming soon: More Little Fantasio

Today the Valentine's Day special of Spirou magazine came out. Among other things, there is 3-page story about little Fantasio doing some research for his story on jealousy. And guess what, guys! I already have the RAWs! Is that cool or what? :)

Violine - Vol. 3 - p.25-28

Is that...? It is! Finally!!!

Half way through the book, we finally get a glimpse of the mysterious Iron Claw the story was named after.

Violine - Vol. 3 - The Iron Claw, p. 25-28: Download

A Spirou & Fantasio Adventure - Vol. 3 - p.45-48

Drunkards on the cemetery? In my Spirou?

Fantasio is still trying to find some motor oil. Meanwhile, someone's visiting the castle of Champignac.

A Spirou & Fantasio Adventure - The Crypt of Champignac, p. 45-48: Download