Happy New Year! Or perhaps Cautiously Optimistic New Year? Or perhaps we abolish the concept of years altogether, given the last several? Calendars fake. Here’s some nice Jenn art to celebrate.

So, where have we been? None of your business. But pages are on the way, the first of which will be arriving shortly. Nobody expects anybody to get anything done in January, especially on the internet. Stop booing me, I’m right.

Anyway, Jenn and I would like to use this blog for more than just housekeeping and apologies, so we’ve decided to start a monthly Q&A for readers interested in learning more about Rising Sand, from both production and lore perspectives. Paid members of our Patreon can feel free to check out the post here to drop a Q, which will be A’d in this very blog one month hence. Keep it classy. Maybe we’ll even award a little jpg of a crown or something to the best one. Sky’s the limit, guys.

Thank you all so much for enjoying Rising Sand—your readership has been more inspiring than I could ever have dreamed, and Jenn and I are so grateful.

Pages whenever, but soon.
—Ty

We’d like to thank each and every one of you for sticking with us while we have for reasons unknown continued to produce one of the most needlessly overwrought webcomics in recent history for two hundred page updates. We couldn’t be more excited and proud to have engendered a small community around this story we’re still dumb enough to tell for free—and not for nothing, we’re especially grateful for those of you who help keep the lights on! We’re humbled by your trust, and by my rickety, art-worn handbones, we’ll keep cranking out this story until Earth’s IRL Sun cooks us all alive.

So like, 20, 25 years. Should be about enough.

Anyway, thank you! Let’s talk about boring housekeeping for a second.

Other Sand-related news for your cognition-holes includes hits like the fact that I’ll now be adding transcripts to new pages as they go up—meanwhile, Jenn is tackling the backlog from page 1. It’s ongoing, but we only gained the ability to do this easily at all when we moved from Comicpress, so just, fuckin’. We’re two people. Wait. And speaking of stuff that’s taking forever, some of the growing subset of readers in France might have noticed the oft-alluded-to RS French translation is still in a state of ‘what the hell is happening with the RS French translation’. Good question! It’s still happening! We’ve gone back and forth on whether to use Toocheke’s admittedly-janky language switch, or just post them as their own pages in a special RS French chapter, which would require interested readers to compartmentalize their RS RSS feeds. Which, like, not the end of the world, I suppose, because RSS users are the most intelligent and sexually desirable human beings on Earth, and will know what to do—and if not, I’ll just add multiple feed links to a menu or something.

Thank you again for reading! Here’s what’s up in Clip Studio Paint as I type this; Patreon will be given more context, of course, but this is work for Rising Sand—IYKYK.

Oh, and you don’t have to follow us on Bluesky for timely updates on all things Sand—but it helps!

—Ty

You may have noticed the comparative dearth of pages lately. Don’t riot! I’m but human, and most of you aren’t paying me. I assure you, Jenn and I are busy as ever spinning the twin plates of RS200’s imminent release and Rising Sand’s tenth anniversary, each of which will shine brighter than the other, at least on a quantum level, while you’re not looking. To be honest, you’d be wise to prep your fanart for that latter one, but we can worry about it another time; I’m here to rap about space pineapple.

A year and change ago, I was walking down the street when I tripped over The Space Between by fellow weirdos Wave and Squimoo. ‘Who leaves a perfectly extant webcomic lying in the street,’ I wondered aloud, cradling my freshly-scuffed knee in the middle of a three-lane avenue, where I’d been walking, because I obey no traffic signage. Little did I know my question would be met not with answers, but excellent character design and stellar layouts that made me an immediate fan of the story, and of Squimoo’s work in general. Several months into my tenure as TSB fanclub loremaster, I told her I’d do the unthinkable: work for a comic that isn’t Rising Sand. And lo, I have made good on this threat by providing a brief epilogue page to TSB’s third chapter.

Stop what you’re doing and read it here!

And, for a bit more about my experience making this thing, check our Patreon!

I’ve been fortunate enough to watch the third chapter of this high-quality sci-fi comedy adventure come together on the ground floor in real time, and I’m so grateful—not only to have been given the chance to undercut the chapter’s tense ending by providing a wacky coda about the most sensible place for a buxom woman to store her keys, but to have found such allies in other creators who care deeply about the craft of sequential narrative. Thank you both for letting me be a part of TSB! I can only imagine RS readers have not heard or seen the last of Feri and Vex—whether they want to or not.

All the love in the world to my Emotional Support Puffin for trusting me with this ridiculous endeavour.
The first of many.

—Ty