This week on the podcast, Patrick and Tracy welcome Katie Cook, author of NOTHING SPECIAL.

About NOTHING SPECIAL: In the grand scheme of the worlds at large, Callie thinks she’s nothing special. Sure, she’s friends with the ghost of a radish and her dad owns a magical antique shop–but she’s spent her life in the human world. Her dad won’t let her join him on his collection trips in the magical realm “for her own protection”, so she’s only caught glimpses of that world through the gates of the town where her father’s store is.

On her seventeenth birthday, Callie goes home with her friend Declan to find her home in disarray and her dad missing. Signs of a struggle point to the portal to the magical realm and when there are signs, you follow them. Now it’s up to Callie, Declan, and Radish to band together and bring him home. As they face creatures good and bad, and all sorts of adventure, Callie and Declan may just find out that they are both special in their own ways after all.

About Katie Cook: Katie Cook is the creator of the Nothing Special webcomic on Webtoon and the oldie-but-goodie webcomic Gronk: A Monster’s Story (which was one of the first webcomics archived by the library of congress!). She spent several years as one of the primary writers on IDW’s My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic comics to the point that they made her a pony on the show (really). Then there’s all those books she has illustrated and written for a tiny franchise called “Star Wars”. Maybe it’ll take off one day. Time will tell. She has also written and drawn comics for Marvel, Disney Publishing, Boom! and many other publishers.

This week’s picks:

• Katie: 31 Days of Drawing Things You Don’t Normally Draw: Quiznos Spongemonkeys
• Tracy: That’s Not a Hat (Game)
• Patrick: Stranger Things 5 (Netflix)

Links:

• Katie Cook on Instagram
• Tracy Townsend on BluSky
• Patrick Hester on Instagram
• The Functional Nerds Patreon Page

© 2026 Patrick Hester

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