Instant Books will be representing at Edmonton’s super popular Royal Bison with these fine goods:

- the second printing of Shtoriesh (with an all new illustrations and formatting!)

- the newest issue of Instant Books Are Your Future: Girls are Dumb. And Pretty.

- the last 5 copies of issue 2 (Family is Dumb) and issue 3 (Be a Mailman!) are bound to disappear, so come early Friday evening and snag ‘em before they’re gone for all of time. Plus, the first 20 people in the doors will be getting gift bags full of Royal Bison vender gold! (probably not literal gold)

Above: Team Big Dumb Sound Booth inside the Big Dumb Sound Booth (Looking really good from left to right): Erin Ottosen of Otto Stalk, Dwight Allott of booth building, Matt Prins of Instant Books, and Stacy Brown of lighting and electronic engineering!

Otto Stalk (Edmonton’s largest two piece rock force) will be sharing a table with Instant Books selling their first LP! Erin and I have combined forces and dreamt up (with the help of our two aforementioned pals) a fully immersive interactive exhibit that you gotta get inside of to believe! The Big Dumb Listening Booth. Please listen to the recording above to sample our wares.

BISON, guys! Starting tomorrow – May 3rd!

In the beginning of 2008 I left Fabrica, (a place I’ve written about a few times on this blog) which meant leaving behind an amazing job and even more amazing people. In my time there I had the chance to work on a few issues of Colors Magazine. This stands as a great moment of pride for me, as it was a magazine I admired throughout my adolescence. In the last several years, the magazine has slowly slipped away from the magazine shops (I can no longer find it in Edmonton) and I think that could be due to a misstep in its content and visual style.

Luckily for me and Colors enthusiasts, my old Fabrica friends are at the helm of the magazine. Patrick Waterhouse (editor in chief) and Cosimo Bizzarri (executive editor) have brought a real life force back to the name of Colors . The last several issues have touched upon some very important subject matters and each issue has come out reading and looking astonishing. I was glad to be a small part of the latest issue (having written the Yellow Pages insert) almost exactly 5 years after having left Fabrica. It was like being home again for just a tiny bit.

Find out more about Making the News at the Colors website.

The General Story of My Brother (and I) was published in PIG Quarterly’s – La Famiglia issue. PIG mag has been around for a while but this is their first foray into the literary and photo quarterly. It’s beautifully designed and is full of great stuff. Get a hold of it throughout Europe or check it out here.

A sweet heart of a book in the wake of St. Valentine’s Day. Merci, Pia!

When I was 8 I submitted an illustration of Snoopy to the Edmonton Journal, which I expected to find published in the Saturday comics section. Week after week after disappointing week I was disheartened to find some other kids’ shitty drawings of Doonsbury characters or Dagwood. Well look at me now Comics Editor – there’s a giant pic of me lying on my rug in the Books section! And the nicest write-up ever from columnist Michael Hingston. Neat. Read the article here.

Ah yes. Girls. I’ve written countless pages about girls. They’re my favorite story subject. That’s why I think this is the best issue yet. I had so much content to choose from that I could only manage to squeeze in the bestest stories. Stories about girls! Dumb ones, pretty ones, dumb pretty ones. I love that stuff.

Each box is unique, hand painted and drawn. A very limited run of 45. So much pain and suffering and time went into making each box, so much effort and love. It’s such a perfect metaphor for my relationship with pretty girls. It really hurt my fingers and heart and backbone.

15 instant books are stuffed in each box. Some of which you have never ever seen before! At the very least, it’s worth a look. Go on and have a gawk. What could it hurt? Just don’t get caught staring. It’s so embarrassing.

Visit the Instant Bookery Etsy store and put in your order. If you live in Edmonton and are interested I am willing to hand deliver. Contact me at matt.prins@gmail.com.

Your shitty ex-boyfriend,

- Matt Prins.