Digital Bullet

HERO KILLERS - the Eagle Award-winning one-shot I did with Marvel artist Declan Shalvey - is now on ComiXology. You can buy it here for the very reasonable sum of 99c/69p. I now intend to submit a few of the other Moonface Press titles, starting with Blood Psi.

* DEFIANT! THE LEGEND OF BRITHNOTH is now about one-third coloured and - thanks to the excellent Aljosa Tomic - is looking very good indeed. I've also managed to get permission to use a fine translation of the original Battle of Maldon poem in the book which is great news. 

The plan as it stands is to bring Defiant! out early next year so Time Bomb Comics publisher Steve Tanner has a chance to submit it to Diamond and to get a bit of publicity going ahead of its release.

Here is one of the coloured pages; art by Dan Bell...

* I have two other major things I'm working on - one a graphic novel with publisher contracts already signed, the other a very intriguing webcomic with a name artist whose brilliance intimidates the hell out of me. Unfortunately I can't say anything about them until I'm given the green light to do so. Soon, though, hopefully...

* What else? Need to get on with writing more Tim Skinner very soon. It's slipped down the schedule a bit as other stuff has elbowed it out of the way... artist Jim Lavery and I have collaborated on a fun short story which has found a home in a very exciting anthology. I'm really proud of it, actually, probably the best short story I've written since... ever. Aljosa (again) and Nikki Foxrobot have turned in sterling work on the colours and letters for it too.

* I've reached that part of the year where I need to rush to get through as much stuff as possible before the kids break up for the summer. I love them both dearly but struggle to get any writing done when they're around, and there are deadlines I simply can't leave hanging until September. I really don't know how proper professional writers and artists cope with this stuff. I mean, I can't just decamp to a hotel for six weeks, can I? Hmmm...

* Finally, I now have a tumblr page here. At the moment I'm really just using it as a second home for this blog but plan to do a bit more with it soon. Feel free to follow me there, if you must...

Defiant!, Nix and other stuff

WORK continues on Defiant! The Legend of Brithnoth and I can finally see an end to the 80-page script now. I'm probably about two-thirds of the way through and pretty happy with how it is progressing.

I really underestimated just how tricky it would be to write an adaptation of something - especially an historical event in which few solid facts are really known but one that requires a certain amount of authenticity and accuracy to make work. I soon realised the original Battle of Maldon poem fragment (all 325 lines of it) gave me the spine of a plot and characters but not much else. I had to make up the rest.

At first I found it horribly daunting and there were a couple of times I just hit a big energy-sapping wall. But eventually I just said, 'Sod it' and decided to tell an entertaining story that incorporated the themes and events of the original poem but that took great big liberties elsewhere. I think it works, although I'm not sure about the car chase on page 42 or the alien invasion at the end (joke!).

* I'M also submitting more projects to various publishers. The latest of these is Nix (see above), a rude and rambunctious time-travel yarn illustrated by Taylan Kurtulus and lettered by Nikki Foxrobot. It's probably the most eccentric thing I've ever written and Taylan's off-kilter, European-styled art make it an even stranger proposition. I really hope it finds a home.

* BEYOND those two projects I probably have another six or seven on the go at various stages of development. These include one I've been trying to get off the ground for years - thankfully I found a cracking artist a couple of weeks ago and we're flying!

I also have a couple of new story ideas that require artists, so if there's anyone reading this who might be interested, feel free to give me a shout at andywinter1@gmail.com