Mike Smith (Illustrator)

Only 8 years after The Hundred Decker Bus, and after much work spanning lockdowns, my new book arrives in the shops on August 5th!

Another France painting: this is in Saou. I crept out early to catch the sunlight streaming down an alley, then had the best almond croissant of the trip. Those days seem like a dream now.

This is the camper van, based on a Peugeot Boxer, that was our home. Struggled a bit up mountains, got very hot in cities, but started when we needed it to. Thanks Billy.

I haven’t forgotten this blog!

This summer we took 7 weeks out to drive around France in an old camper van. I managed to do a bit of sketching along the way, so I thought it would be good to share a few pictures here. More to come in the next few days.

Five years ago I wasn’t drawing for a living, and this blog was a pleasure to do in my spare time. Now I scribble all day long, so I prefer to do something else in the evening. It’s not just the drawing, it’s also the whole process of having to work through ideas. That’s why the blog has dried up recently. I’m quite relaxed about this, as I feel that ten years without a break was a good run.

However, since Eddie died I have missed the blog as an outlet for my thoughts. It can feel a bit like therapy. More so as I get older. So I think the best approach will be to pick it up from the current date; and in future, instead of forcing myself to post weekly, I’ll just do it when I feel I want to say something. That will mean I’ll dispense with the cartoons sometimes.

While I’m here I might as well mention that I have often thought about trying to get these diaries published in book form. Publishers, however, don’t share this desire and never respond to emails. So I have plans to do this myself. Two things I can’t make up my mind about: firstly, whether to have it printed actual size (pocket diary); secondly, whether to do a ‘best of’ compilation or go the whole hog and do the annual volumes. I’d be really interested to hear anybody’s thoughts about this.

Thanks for reading.

My dear, loyal old friend Eddie died a couple of weeks ago. As I often predicted on this blog, he broke my heart. And took a large piece with him.