Sneaky Previews

Hi all! In a continuation of last weeks blog, we have more book previews to take a peek at!

Quarantined

Story: Michael Moreci

Pencils and Inks: Monty Borror

Colours: Lauren Anne Sharp

Letters: Jim Campell

Snow

Story: Richard McAuliffe

Art: Valia Kapadai

Letters: Jim Campbell

The Empyre

Story: Stephen Aryan

Art: Adam Bolton

Babble

Story: Lee Robson

Art: Brian Coyle

We also have another preview of Simon Wyatt's Unbelievable!

Check back next week for more!

Return of the Red Eye

Hello all at Insomnia. Did you miss the blog? It's back! All of us at Insomnia want to say a very big thank you to Nic Wilkinson for running it for so long and giving us all a very good read. It's been hard to start up again without her, but here we are, alive and well.

There has been a lot happening at Insomnia since the last update, so there are a fair few things we can bring you up to speed on.

There is a new artist joining the creative team, artist Song Ye, who will be beginning work on Celeste Sharp's novel Shock Theory. Here's a reminder of what it's all about:

"After a horrific tsunami, England is abandoned and forgotten; even by history. Rising from dark times, a single city known as Hubris is suspended in the Sky, providing a new life based on technology and social order. The N.O Government has put the clocks back to zero and reinvented London as a completely clean slate for a prosperous society and economy... But Hubris wasn’t just built on the ruins of London; it was built on shock. "

Set in a dystopian England, where the totalitation regime uses the Techframe to control its citizens using shock and sedation, Shock Theory draws on the dystopian heritage of George Orwell and Philip K. Dick, woven with theories of investigative journalist, Naomi Klein, to follow Eva and her companions as they attempt to unravel the sinister nature of Hubris and offer the only resistance to the tyrannical Dr.Shock and the New Order government.

Celeste Sharp:

"I'm so happy to have Song signed on board. I was immediately drawn to his style and talent. I'm looking forward to seeing Shock Theory's dark undertones resonate through his artwork."

And here is the talent Celeste spoke of:

Eva

Kat

Peter Sly

In other news Andrew ' Kronos City' Croskery and Stephen 'Cancer Town' Downey along with Reggie Chamberlain-King (a writer in the upcoming layer zero) have started up a "blog-style anthology incorporating all types of creative media". Here's the blurb:

Tales Of The… is an online weekly blog-style anthology incorporating all types of creative media [...] its aim is provide a platform for N.Ireland creators to showcase film, artwork, prose, audio and just about any other type of creative endeavor you can think of.

A new piece will be published every Sunday and similar in style to “Tales of the Crypt“, “Tales of the Unexpected”, or “Tales of insert term here” we intend to create exciting fiction, without being tied to any particular genre. We will have the occasional theme, but for the most part creators and collaborators have free reign to create and share whatever they want.

Check it out here: www.talesofthe.com

There is new promotional material online for Unbelievable, due to be out later this year. Creator Simon Wyatt has been busy putting together teaser trailers for the book, which can be seen here.

And finally, the graphic novel Quarantined has been in the press recently. Since Michael Moreci has been working the cons on the other side of the pond, Quarantined has seen a fair few reviews along with Michael being interviewed by Gapers Block and the Graphic Novel Reporter.

Here are the recent reviews:

Comic Related

From the Tomb

Check back next week for more...

Unbelievable Signing - Insomnia Captures The Beast of Bryn Boncath

It's Midnight, it's Monday and here we are with the first of the Regular Red Eyes. This time the eyes are not red from sleeplessness, and, instead of burning, they glow.


With BICS 2008 now a fortnight in the past We are ready to announce our first signing from the show: Unbelievable (The Man Who Ate Daffodils) written and drawn by the Welsh Wonder that is Simon Wyatt.

Unbelievable: (Adjective: Not to be believed: inconceivable, incredible, unimaginable, unthinkable. Idioms: beyond belief, contrary to all reason).

The remote mining village of Bryn Boncath has its share of stories, of local legends, of half believed histories. It is a close knit community, with closely guarded secrets. It is home to the orphaned Ben Ellis and his grandfather, Emrys, and it has become the scene of a series of bizarre and mysterious deaths.



A new neighbour has moved in. A man long thought dead has returned. Livestock are missing. There are noises in the night. People are afraid to go into out after dark and sightings of a giant hound, or maybe a big cat are on the increase once again.

Suddenly it seems to Ben that what he took to be the tall tales of his grandfather may be more than just stories. It seems that something is stirring in the forests and the mountains around Bryn Boncath. It seems that ancient history is repeating and this time round Ben has an important part to play.

Unbelievable is a dark masterpiece that weaves strands of Welsh legend, modern murder mystery and horror with a dash of crytozoology that wonders: What if seeing isn’t always believing, but believing will allow you to see?



Nic Wilkinson, Creative Director says:

"I first saw Simon's work in progress on Unbelievable on his comicspace page back before I was working with Insomnia, and the art just blew me away. I love British mythology and we chatted about an earlier project of his, Mabinogion - Dawn of The Gods. He promised to draw me a sketch of my favourite Unbelievable character if we met up at BICS later in the year.

Months pass.

BICS rolls round.

I meet Simon in person at the launch party on the Friday night and he tells me he has my sketch. On Saturday morning I spot him sitting at the Orang-Utan table, drawing away and go to collect my picture. It is fantastic. Since we last spoke about Unbelievable things have changed. Under the table is a big black folder with the art almost complete and a spiral bound pitch book with character backgrounds, concept sketches, the full plot breakdown the whole works. I am now working for Insomnia.

If the samples in comic space looked good, the whole thing together was incredible - unbelievable, even. I hurry back to tell Crawford what I have found. They talk. We talk. BICS ends. There are lots of questions and emails and phone calls and things to work out. On Friday last week the deal was done.

I am very proud to be able to say this was my first signing for Insomnia, and it exemplifies everything we are looking for in a book and from a creator. In short, being able to bring out work like this is everything that we, as a company, are trying to do.

Simon has been illustrating books, comics and games for over 20 years and was National Young Cartoonist of the Year for Wales. He has worked for various indie comics publishers including Orang Utan Comics Studio, Angry Gnome Comics and Markosia. This is his first full-length graphic novel.

Part of me is hoping She-Wolf of St. Trinians will be his next, but you'll have to ask him about that."

Until next week.