Hertling spent a month completing the
initial draft of Avogadro Corp, the first novel in what would become his popular four -
book Singularity series, which together have sold more than sixty thousand copies.
The
book tracks his movement from an
initial interest in signage (the early -»60s
drafts for his iconic paintings
of the 20th Century Fox logo, the Standard Oil gas - station sign, and «Annie» in the comic strip's type) to later images that are highly idiosyncratic, downright poetic concoctions («Thick Blocks
of Musical Fudge» is the phrase in one 1976 pastel).