ATGTSTZA: Chapter 2

I'm happy to announce the arrival of Chapter 2 of A Teenager's Guide to Surviving the Zombie Apocalypse. In this 13-page chapter, The Miracle family ponder recent events, and Max meets the girl of his dreams. Too bad she seems to hate everything in the entire world, including him. Oh, and there's that decapitated zombie running around. Good times!

This chapter was illustrated by the lovely Ms. Alyssa Gnall, badass zombie killah and all-around good sport.

Go check it out! And do tell me how y'all like using the SmackJeeves site. Pros? Cons? Preferences?

Max & Kara: ~This magic moment~

This makes me grin so hard:






















This isn't from Chapter 2 per se, but Alyssa, the artist who's taken over drawing Chapter 2, did this as an extra little bit. It's Max and Kara, eyeing each other as nervous, awkward teenagers are wont to do. ♥___♥ Hearts in my eyes, people! They are so precious. I love Kara's little facepaint.

ATGTSTZA: Chapter 1 posted!

I'm very happy to announce that Chapter 1 of A Teenager's Guide to Surviving the Zombie Apocalypse is now online. I've put it up at SmackJeeves.com, a hosting site for webcomics; it's a fairly basic yet usable site. The only drawbacks I've found to it thus far is the fact that people have to create a SmackJeeves username and profile in order to "Favorite" a comic and be counted as Fans. It'd be nice if folks could do that with an OpenID or just as a Guest. Ah, well, can't have everything. I do like their premade templates especially the Sleep Cable one I selected for ATG. Depending on how well this one goes and the feedback I get, I might use them for other comics in the future.

There does seem to be quite a bit of yaoi over there...

*****

On the subject of webcomics, I've come across Harvey the Gay Android and found it charming. It hasn't been updated recently, but maybe with some encouragement the author will return hir attentions.

It's no fun unless the world is ending.

As of last Saturday I have "A Teenager's Guide" fully outlined. As my projects are wont to do, it turned out a bit bigger (16 chapters) than I'd expected (12 chapters); I tend to go epic with my stories.

So with Chapter 1 written and polished, the outline done, and a rough draft of Chapter 2 written, I find myself wondering what I should work on at the moment. I'm sort of inclined to poke at another comic I've written called "Nevermore." Glancing to my project list, I realize that I haven't even talked about it here, and the completed rough draft of the first issue has been sitting on my hard drive for months.

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 series is a scifi mystery-comedy, as Kim and Josh search for Taylor and struggle to figure out what the hell is going on. Here, have a snippet from the first issue:


Panel 1
Establishing panel inside Josh’s small kitchen. It’s definitely the apartment of a single dad, with space rockets on the curtains and a bunch of appliances to make cooking easier. Still, it’s homey. The fridge is covered with Taylor’s starred homework. Josh is at the stove poking pancakes with a spatula. Conrad sits at the table reading a newspaper.

JOSH:
I like how you offered but I’m the one behind the stove.
CONRAD:
If the Good Lord had intended me to cook, he wouldn’t have created other women.
JOSH:
You’re the most chauvinistic person I know.
CONRAD:
The irony was too beautiful to pass up.

Panel 2
Josh carries a plate of pancakes over to the table. He looks down at the pancakes instead of at her. Conrad looks up at him with concern. In the background the pan smokes.

JOSH:
Listen, I was wanting to ask you…Taylor’s class is going on this trip in Eastern Oregon next month.
JOSH:
It costs three hundred…
CONRAD:
You need me to pitch in? Dude, of course.

Panel 3
High angle, looking over Josh’s shoulder down at Conrad. He rubs the back of his neck, his expression unhappy. She’s having none of it.

JOSH:
Thanks. I’ll pay you –
CONRAD:
The hell you will.
JOSH:
I don’t want to just –
CONRAD:
If you don’t take it I’ll spend it on hookers. And then I’ll get Chlamydia.
CONRAD:
Do you want me to get Chlamydia, Josh? Do you?

Panel 4
We see Taylor from the back as he wanders into the kitchen dressed in jeans and a T-shirt. Josh and Conrad shoot him uncomfortable looks.

TAYLOR:
What’s Clymidia?
JOSH AND CONRAD (in unison, sharing the bubble):
Uhhh…tell you when you’re older.
CONRAD:
So, uh, how’s school?

Panel 5
Josh heads back to the stove. Conrad pushes the pancakes over to Taylor, who settles in the other chair and reaches for the syrup.

TAYLOR:
Today we have to give a speech ‘bout what we wanna be when we grow up.
CONRAD:
Oh yeah? What’re you gonna say?
TAYLOR:
A clown.

Panel 1
Medium panel of the kitchen. Conrad makes a horrified face at Josh, who silently points the spatula – dripping pancake batter – at her. Taylor doesn’t see.

CONRAD:
A clown? Really? That’s awesome!
TAYLOR:
Or a ‘struction worker, like Daddy –
JOSH:
Construction, Tay
TAYLOR:
-- or a lesbian.

Panel 2
Small panel. Conradn looks at Taylor sharply. Behind her, Josh stares, too.

CONRAD:
What now?

Panel 3
Small panel. Taylor smiles innocently up at them, a pancake skewered on his fork.

TAYLOR:
A lesbian, like you.

Panel 4
Conrad puts both of her arms up in surrender. Josh looks like he might hit her with the spatula. Outside, brakes squeal and Taylor jumps up.

CONRAD:
I didn’t do it. It’s the most awesome thing ever, but I didn’t do it.
JOSH:
You…you…
SFX (OP):
Screeeeeeech
TAYLOR:
That’s my bus!

And then later she fights dinosaurs with a chainsaw. >:)

ATG developments

Much going on. I've signed a contract with Sienna Morris to have the first chapter out by the end of the year. You can check out sketches and other pieces of Sienna's work here. Besides being totally enthusiastic about my weird little story, Sienna is a fantastic artist who did an amazing series of paintings called Numberism. Check them out!

Sienna is currently doing character sketches and laying out the pages. I'm working on an outline for the whole graphic novel, which I'm shocked I haven't done yet. Usually I write that out first thing, but something about teenagers and zombies has thrown my usual MO for a loop.

*****

I find myself nervous about how not-witty I am. Every writer has hir strengths: mine are plot and pacing. If I designed a car, it would have a powerful motor, airbags for every seat, and would never break down; it would also probably have doors that were different colors from the rest of the body, crochet seat covers, and a bent antennae. I don't know what the antennae would be there for, nobody listens to the radio anymore. But it'd be there.

My point being: witty dialogue is not my strong point. Never has been. Which is a problem because, well, that's very often what sells a story no matter the medium, but especially comic books. Think about the dialogue in a comic book: it's fast, punchy, a snap to every dialogue bubble.

Pardon moi while I fret.

*****

On the plus side, I get to blow up a church.

*****

TOOLS OF THE TRADE:
I used this as a template for writing my work-for-hire contract with Sienna. We made a few changes and I left out big chunks of the more technical babble, but that's mostly it.

So...eaten any good people lately?

Tonight's challenge: figuring out what two zombies say to each other when they make small talk.

Whither goest thou?

I have a meeting next Tuesday with a comic book artist and her troupe of local writers to read through the first chapter of A Teenager's Guide. So it's edit, edit, edit, today.

Despite being at the first chapter, I am contemplating the ultimate ending. There's a lot to consider: the novel's balance between comedy and horror, Max's mental well-being, the physical well-being of an entire town, and the overarching thematic question of whether or not society (as represented by said town) is worth saving.

Pardon me while I dance on the head of a pin.

I mentioned recently that a lot of my inspiration to write comes from rage. Most of the act of writing, however, comes from music. Once I know that I'm going to start working on a project long term, I sit down and create a playlist of appropriate songs out of my library. I literally can't write without the appropriate music to put my mind in the right place.

The playlists can change a lot depending on how the story develops; sometimes I'll hear a new song and hunt it down to add it to my collection, or I'll take one off if the story's tone or events change. But the reverse is also true: sometimes I'll hear a new song or listen to an old one in a new way, and the music itself will affect the story.

There's a lot of stuff on the ATG playlist; right now I'm writing Max's intro to the town of Estacada, and listening to Postal Service's song "This Place is a Prison." Max and Kara's love song is "Modern Romance" by the Yeah Yeah Yeahs. I don't know what this entirely necessary connection between music and creativity says about my post-MTV generation, but I can't argue with the facts, yo.

Je suis jolie

I have no idea if that's the correct French or not. Apologies to Frenchpeople if I have just butchered your language, but I am jolie, dammit! (The emotion, not the goddess.)

FINALLY figured out how to start "A Teenager's Guide." It does involve a bit more carnage than I had originally intended, and might make the Estacada school system nervous, but eh. It works. I love those moments when I've been thinking and thinking and picking at something, and finally the gears catch, the clutch goes out, and I achieve flight all over again.

I'll be moving in to Portland at the end of the month, and intend to immerse myself in the blooming comic book scene there. My list of places to hang out include:

Cosmic Monkey, particularly their monthly "Drink and Draw" event (where I can hopefully meet artists while they are intoxicated and vulnerable to suggestion, mwahaha)
Floating World
Excalibur
Dark Horse (I hope to find an unpaid job there of some kind, even if it's mopping floors)

I haven't been working on my music as much as I wish I were, but I'll be house-sitting the next five days and will try to use the time towards that purpose.

Breaking the block.

Have been struggling with ye old writer's block for a little bit. So instead I did some research and while I always knew that we had a high proportion of Christian churches in my hometown -- and wanted to use that as Max's introduction to the town -- but I never realized exactly how many: 16. For a population of 2,659.

Kristen is back on Mastema. She sent me a character sketch of the lady herself. YAY.

Living the trans-life

I'm getting more familiar with cross-dressing, transgenderism, and gender coding. It's fascinating to me how we take some things for granted, without a second thought. For instance: I am wearing pants right now. I'm crossdressing, according to the cultural coding of many countries around the world, and the coding of my own country about fifty years removed. In the 70's, wearing more than three articles of clothing culturally determined to be of the opposite gender was cause for arrest. Yet these days it's widely acceptable for a woman to wear pants.

I don't see many guys wearing skirts, though. Funny, isn't it, how a woman wanting to dress like a man is so much more acceptable than a man wanting to dress as a woman? Or, well, funny perhaps isn't the word I should use.

This is a roundabout way of saying that progress continues on A Teenager's Guide, and I'm getting really into Kara's mindset. A happy discovery for me was the level of her courage: it's easy to say that Max is brave, facing down legions of the undead with a shotgun and a katana...but Kara faces legions of the living armed only with a bra and a lipstick tube. That, I think, is what really draws Max to her and vice versa.

The question of identity also has to play a huge part in the story. Who we choose to be, how we choose to present ourselves, what we share with one another. There needs to be a betrayal of identity somewhere down the road. Kara doesn't believe in Miracles. I'm just rambling at this point so I'll leave it at that.

Go soak your brain

Baths are awesome. They're relaxing, they leave you feeling fresh and healthy, and very often they get my brain going. Case in point: I have a towel wrapped around my head and am still dripping slightly because I just mentally tripped over half the plot for "A Teenager's Guide," and had to write it all down before I forgot. Not only is it fun and funky, it makes Kara's situation and her very existence integral to Max and his parents being able to pinpoint the origin of the zombie outbreak. I love it when my brain does that.

Talked to an artist last night, my college friend Kristen. She sounds like she's really going to do the "Mastema" teaser I wrote! Thumbnail script next week, penciling to follow. Yay!

You would think that I would have let this go, by now. You would be wrong.

Deciding to move the setting of 'A Teenager's Guide' to my hometown -- I'd originally placed it in Beaverton -- was about the best thing I could have done for the story. I think I'll need to be mindful that I don't scrimp on the visual descriptions: I can see these places in my head, so I might forget that not everyone attended Estacada High and know how the girl's bathroom was painted this very specific shade of stale green, designed, I am convinced, to Destroy All Hope. Other than that, however, it's helping so much. And is somewhat therapeutic. (I can't believe that's the right way to spell 'therapeutic.' It just looks weird.) I've already named one of the villains after an asshole who gay-bashed me in high school, Jordan (GAH), and at the moment I'm deeply overidentifying with Kara, Jordan's favorite target.

I'm just now writing the scene where Jordan snaps Kara's bra and unintentionally-but-not-accidentally rips it. Comic books are by their nature succinct and contained, but I could go on for pages about how awful this is: Kara's transgendered (I am not, but apparently that's not going to stop me from wallowing in her pain) and there's so much mental and physical comfort tied up in that bra. It was originally her mom's; she stole it years ago when she first knew, and smuggled it away with her when her parents kicked her out. She stole two, actually, then cut the padding out of one and carefully, carefully stapled it into the other one. That bra means something to her, and Jordan so casually destroys it. It's an excruciating moment: she's already been forced by the teachers to use the boys' bathroom, she's humiliated, and then she loses this small symbol of femininity that she's managed to gather around herself.

So then of course I had to have our hero Max karate-kick Jordan. IN THE FACE.

Like I said. Therapeutic.

I have an appointment tonight to meet online with Kristen, an old college friend and an artist, who has expressed interest in doing some character sketches and maybe even a teaser for Mastema. Fingers crossed.

*tap tap*

Twould seem proper to start with an introduction. Hi, I'm Rachel. At the moment (my time, not necessarily whenever you've stumbled across this blog), I'm 25 years old. I am a writer in the strictest sense of the term: I write. I've always been a writer. For some time I thought I would go into television, and even graduated from film school in Los Angeles; after time, however, I grew disillusioned with that field. Several people suggested that my ideas are better suited to comic books, being as they are populated with time travelers and demons and shapeshifters and shotgun-toting lesbians and monsters. This is handy, since I was born and raised in Oregon and Portland has become something of a comic-book nexus. Portland-ho.

My primary genre is fantasy, with a bend towards the horrific. It's kind of weird, because as a kid I could never watch horror movies. All the biggest names in the genre, I've never watched. I had awful nightmares all on my own, of things dragging me out of bed and ripping me apart; people say you don't die in your dreams, but I always did. Wait, I guess it's not so weird, then, that I'm drawn to the horror genre. My nightmares have just grown up into serial killers and vengeful demons. The point is, I've never read H.P. Lovecraft or Stephen King and I've never reveled in the delights of Romero or Barker. All the horror I've ever known was internal.

So, here I am! I intend to use this blog to talk about my projects and the process of writing these hairbrained ideas.

At the moment I'm writing the graphic novel "A Teenager's Guide to Surviving the Zombie Apocalypse." I originally started it as a prose novel, but it's undergone some major changes and the more I worked on it the more I realized that it would work best in a graphic format. For all the fact that the gen-yu-ine ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE lurches near, I find myself writing out the awkward teenaged romance part first...which is possibly the right way to go about it, because that's really the emotional core of the story. Or possibly I'm just so enamored of Kara and Max both that I can't focus on the zombies quite yet.



What I'm reading: "What It Is," by Lynda Barry. Dramatically and interestingly illustrated, but I feel like the format overpowers the content. You'll find that I have a very utilitarian outlook: I judge an item of clothing by how many pockets it has. As someone just starting out in the field, I can't say the book was particularly helpful; it did contain a few moments of brain-turning -- that feeling you get when your thoughts pivot and find a step that you didn't know was there -- but on the whole it was rather pretty and rather pointless. I had it on loan from the library, so I couldn't do the exercises in the back. There's a chance that I didn't have access to the book's full potential. Still, I wouldn't really recommend it to someone else looking into the field.