TWO TOM THE DANCING BUG BOOKS COMING, PRE-ORDER BY JUNE 30!
Tom The Dancing Bug Blog 2020-05-06
Hello, friends.
So Clover Press and I had plans for these two books to be published this Spring. But the coronoavirus had other plans.
Because of the turmoil the pandemic crisis has thrown the entire publishing industry into, with new risks involving distribution and bookstore sales, we are changing the publication model for these books into a kickstarteresque online preorder-only deal. These will not be in bookstores, and they may not even be available at all after the pre-order window expires -- the only way to guarantee your copies once they are released on July 15 is to pre-order by June 30.*
Obviously, there are far bigger tragedies than this going on. But these books mean a lot to me, I worked hard on them, I'm proud of them, and I kind of pinned hopes on them being enjoyed by lots of people. So if you're in a position to enjoy some summer sheltering reading, please consider them.
👉 You can order Tom the Dancing Bug: Into the Trumpverse from Clover Press here.
👉 AND (again, until June 30) you can order the Super Fun Tom the Dancing Bug Book Package (both books!) directly from me.
You get:
☑️ a copy of Tom the Dancing Bug: Into the Trumpverse, signed / sketched / dated** by Ruben Bolling, personalized if requested
☑️ a copy of The Super-Fun-Pak Comix Reader, signed / sketched / dated** by Ruben Bolling, personalized if requested
☑️ two signed Tom the Dancing Bug / Super-Fun-Pak Comix bookmarks
☑️ an EXCLUSIVE pdf booklet of "artist's materials," presenting notes, scripts, sketches, pencils and inks for selected comics from both books.
Publication date is July 15, 2020, and Packages will be sent out rather shortly thereafter.
$89.99, cheap.
Order below. If you would like the books signed "to" a particular name (your name, the name of a gift recipient, etc.), type that name in the field below. If not, you can leave that field blank.
Continental U.S. only please. Includes Media Mail postage.
For deliveries to other locations, please contact teamdancingbug at gmail dot com
Name I'd like books signed toInner Hive address (if any) 
I've got to say one of the biggest disappointments in these books not getting into bookstores is that the physical version of that amazing back cover will never come under the gaze of perusing shoppers. What a selling point! I'm about as proud of what these folks said about my comic strip as anything I've done.
For your reading convenience, here is a larger image of the back cover, with the blurb text below. I'm so grateful to all who contributed.
"Ruben Bolling's craft and commentary are as powerful and as pointed, as capable of making you laugh while breaking your heart as they were when we were all so very young."
from Neil Gaiman's foreword to Tom the Dancing Bug: Into the Trumpverse
"God bless Tom the Dancing Bug! Funny, succinct, and highly original, Ruben Bolling is able to make sense from the chaos and tragedy of America's political nightmares and make you laugh while doing it. An increasingly rare and more difficult feat these extra bleak days. This is worth your time and money. Do it!"
-David Cross
"Behold the wondrous, whimsical, witty world that is Tom the Dancing Bug! If you're someone who's not a fan of potent political humor with an incisive absurdist twist that's not only consistently funny, but downright therapeutic for an ailing world, I suggest you avoid this book like the plague. For everyone else, it's a MUST-READ!"
-Mark Hamill
"Delve into the dementia, the dread, and the delightfulness of this collection of Tom the Dancing Bug's strips -- it's history through the lens of a self-loathing insomniac. In a way, it's all of us."
-Patton Oswalt
"Ruben Bolling has been sending me his secret messages for years, in the form of comics printed first on paper, and then, once paper became extinct, on the internet. I don't know exactly what he's trying to tell me, except he seems to know about everything I find funny, delightful, strange and inexplicable to get my attention, from obscure literary references to negging deep dish pizza. I don't understand exactly what exactly he's trying to say to me, but I still obsessively keep reading, not just because he's hilarious, but because someday I hope to find out who this Tom the bug is, and why he is dancing."
-Peter Sagal
"This fine collection of work by Mr. Bolling provides ample evidence as to why he is unanimously considered one of the greatest cartoonists in the known universe. How he would rank in that other part of the universe is, of course, a matter that’s still being hotly debated within the scientific community.”
-“Weird Al” Yankovic
"I am a HUGE fan of Tom the Dancing Bug! It makes me laugh and think of course but it makes me feel better. No kidding, I read it and I think, someone else thinks like me, only funnier and better informed and I feel good. Thank you Ruben Bolling for giving us Tom The Dancing Bug. (Can't decide whether to capitalize ‘the’)."
-Gary Gulman
"That fact that Tom the bug can keep dancing in this day and age is a testament to Ruben Bolling’s skills as a cartoonist!"
-Seth Meyers
“Each week Ruben Bolling takes an unassuming little blank white rectangle and fills it up with clever cartoonery, sneaky commentary, and more political laughs than you can shake a stick at. All hail Tom the Dancing Bug!”
-Matt Groening
---------
*If you've already pre-ordered the book(s), the only thing that has changed is the publication date, from May 26 to July 15. This was done to give potential buyers a window to pre-order now that the new publishing model has been announced.
**Yes, I will date your book. But I will be a perfect gentleman.