Tuesday, March 23, 2010

Updates on Nevermore and ATG

Spring again, thank god. No more winter darkness.

I have found a different artist to work on Chapter 2 of ATG, Alyssa; we're working on pencil sketches at the moment. Alyssa's style is radically different from Sienna's, much more comic bookish. I think it'll fit the tone better. She's also doing some awesome little family portraits and titles for the project. I'll share those on the SmackJeeves site as soon as I get them organized.

I've also gotten together with Kristen Ridley, a buddy of mine from college, to start working on a 9-page teaser for Nevermore. For those not playing along at home, here's a summary of Nevermore:

Nevermore is the story of Kim Conrad, a God-fearin', gun-totin' lesbian
badass who never met a woman she didn't want to bang and is quite handy with
blunt instruments. Her best buddy in the whole world is Josh Crosby; they're
raising Josh's son Taylor after the death of Josh's wife. Their semi-quiet life
gets torn apart, though, by the arrival of the mysterious Grey People. Suddenly,
whole buildings are disappearing into thin air, Josh is transformed into a
heroin addict who doesn't recognize Kim, and Taylor's nowhere to be found. And
what's with all the Edgar Allan Poe references?

The lesbian in question is actually based on Kim Ridley, Kristen's wife. They were dating while we were all in college; I actually take a wee bit of credit in getting them together, as I was first in our group of friends to meet Kim, who'd just transferred. Y'see, she and I were both in film school together, so I was riding through that section of campus on my bike when I passed this orange-haired girl dressed all in black. I immediately pulled a U-turn to ask if she'd be at the BarbeQueer that afternoon; that's how obviously lesbian Kim is. :)

Anyway, over the course of the conversation I asked her if she'd met Kristen yet. I think Kristen had neon blue hair at the time, so it seemed like a natural fit. And it was! They started dating shortly thereafter, and when same-sex marriage was legal for that short time in Cali, they got hitched.

The two of them are some of my favorite people in the world, but beyond that I really feel Kim deserves her own comic book superheroine. This one time in the middle of film class, I told her about a dream I'd had the night before in which she, Kristen, and I had tried to stop a kidnapping and almost been killed because we were unarmed. Kim looked at me and responded, "I have three knives on me right now." The 'you silly fool' was entirely silent.

Kristen's already done a little bit of crossover art.

Saturday, March 13, 2010

Insta-bookmark: Duotrope's Digest

A friend recently linked me to Duotrope's Digest, which is an index of writing magazines, what they take, what they pay, and various other information that would be invaluable to freelance writers.

I'm going to start tearing up their horror listings like a chainsaw through coeds.