2017 - In retrospect

I usually make a summary of the past year, but since I now use mostly my instagram (or at least more than I blog) I will make this summary even more summarized than normal. If you want more details, check out my instagram.

So, here's some important things I did 2017:

• Visited a bunch of comic conventions!
  (links to my blog reports):
  23-26th of February: NärCon Vinter (Linköping, Sweden)
  1-2nd of April: Malmö Seriefest (Malmö, Sweden)
  14-16th of April: GothCon (Göteborg, Sweden)
  21-23th of April: J-popCon (Copenhagen, Denmark)
  26-27th of May: Nordsken (Skellefteå, Sweden)
  27-30th of July: NärCon Sommar (Linköping, Sweden)
  15-18th of September: FumettoPolis (Novara, Italy)
  28th Sept - 1st Oct: Göteborg Book Fair (Göteborg, Sweden)
  27-29th of October: MCM London Comic Con (London, United Kingdom)
  28th of December: Mellandags-marknad! (Panora, Malmö, Sweden)

• Made a lot of manga pages!
  I finished my 42-page historical short story manga Goodbye Sweden, later published in the Swedish manga anthology Nosebleed Studio reser i den svenska historien and the Italian manga anthology Comic 2 Bite. I also finished my 75-page watercolor manga Sjöjungfrun Minna och den hemliga vännen, which will be released in April 2018 in Sweden.
  
  
  

•  Held a lot of manga workshops!
  ...and lessons at schools, libraries and of course my dayjob at Serieskolan (Comic Art School) in Malmö. Plus a bunch of role playing game events with my RPG-book Sword Princess, based on my manga Sword Princess Amaltea.

Dags för mangaworkshop på Österängs bibliotek i Kristianstad! Kl. 14-16 idag. Är ute och håller workshops hela veckan. Imorgon blir det på Anderstorps och Burseryds bibliotek i Småland, på torsdag blir det Kirsebergs och Lindängens bibliotek i Malmö. På tisdag nästa vecka kommer jag till Kristianstads stadsbibliotek. Boka plats hos biblioteken om ni vill vara säkra på att ni får en plats! #tecknamanga #workshop #mangaworkshop #ritamanga #mangateckning #manga #svenskmanga

Ett inlägg delat av Natalia Batista, mangaka (@nataliasmanga) 11 Jul 2017 kl. 3:54 PDT

And last but not least:

• Signed a bunch of International deals!
  Not just one or two, I signed 6 International contracts for publishing deals for my mangas:
  
  
  
  Sword Princess Amaltea will be published as an omnibus by Zanir in Czech in April 2018
  
  
  
  Mjau! and Sword Princess Amaltea will be published by PYRAMOND in Germany all through 2018.
  
  
  
  Sword Princess Amaltea was published by Kasaobake in Italy in September 2017 and will continue through 2018.
  
  
  
  Mjau! will be published by Phoenix Dreams Publishing in the US in early Spring of 2018 and Sword Princess Amaltea will be published by Tokyopop in the US starting in June 2018.

So, in the end, I'm pretty satisfied with this year. Couldn't have asked for a better year, actually. This year was a year of travelling, a year of completion, a year of International recognition and a year of a lot of new friends!

And in my private life, big things have been happening as well... oh, what the heck, I'll tell you!

Me and my BF have bought a house! A tiny 50 square meter house that we will rebuild to our liking. All on our own. THIS HAS BEEN MY DREAM FOR SUCH A LONG TIME! It is finally coming true!

Here's a photo of the cottage right now. It will look totally different in a year or so, when we're done with it. I will keep you posted now and then, I promise.

It's the bigger house in the back. The one in the front is a small
guest house in terrible shape, that needs to come down too.

Thank you so much for reading!