Hi there. My name's Becky Turpin. I was born and raised in the Chicago suburbs. I'm 24 years old, happily married to a really great and supportive geek from Georgia that I met over the internet ten years ago. We just got married last November after almost three years of being engaged. Things are going very well.

I'd like to say I do this kind of thing--the comic, that is--for a living. But alas, even with my graphics design degree, I'm a bank teller. Believe me, I find graphic design and its related fields incredibly interesting, but after going to school for it, I realize I'd much rather stick to doing it for myself or for things I love, rather than bending over and taking it just to appease clients.

If it's not obvious, I'm a bit awkward about writing biographies.

Hatpire started as a series of fun doodles. I was participating in an ARG, an alternate reality game and viral advertisement for a new HBO show coming out by the name of True Blood. This part of the game in question was a website whose content was locked via password. However, every night for two hours, a Gate Keeper would come on to a webcam chat. It was your job, as the user, to get on your webcam and convince her to let you into the website.

I decided to give it a try, but as I was waiting in the queue to talk to her, I got cold feet. I really hate webcam chat as I find video chat awkward. So I brought out my notebook and started doodling pictures of a little vampire. The vampire eventually got a hat, and with this he became the Hatpire.

I never did get into the chat--however, I did amuse the Gate Keeper and one of the designers for the viral campaign enough that they created a video of the doodles for one of the other viral websites. The video is here, courtesy of YouTube.

Since then the little guy's just been really addicting to draw, and I decided to try a comic. Success!