Such Stuff As Dreams Are Made On

A few months back we announced the signing of Dream Solver by Luke Foster and Chris Wildgoose.

"When 22 year old picture researcher Ione-Rose Young has a disturbing, recurring dream about seeing her own death, she doesn’t know whether to dismiss it as just another weird dream, or worry that it’s about to come true. Unable to shake the dream from her mind, she sets out to decipher its meaning"

The first concept art for the main character design is now in, and when I opened the pages it was really quite creepy how perfectly the picture of Ione-Rose matched what I'd had in my head when I was reading the script.

Ione-Rose Young

Jacob Young


Danielle Carter

The story is set in Canterbury, and the pair have been there on trips to get location photos and soak up the atmosphere. According to his blog Chris thought the city was like something out of Harry Potter.

I'm especially looking forward to seeing the first sequential pages as I lived in Canterbury for 3 years when I was at Uni, and often go back. In fact Canterbury is the home of the wonderful Whatever Comics, which is still my "local comic shop". Hmm...I feel a tailored made launch event in the making there.

In other news Chris has recently been working on the indy film Warhouse, which looks very very interesting indeed.

Clap Your Hands If You Believe in Fairies...

Oh that's nice, you are all true believers, so you can see her...


There, you're glad not you're not all cynical hard hearted non-believers now, aren't you?

This little beauty is from the brush of Kev Crossley, and she is set to appear in the 2010 'Dark Fairies' calendar Kev has just done for Infocado. She's just landed here for a second to give you an idea of what you can you expect in the upcoming Art of Kev Crossley book we mentioned last week.

Long Nights and Golden Dawns

So, you want to work on a Vigil Book, do you?

This intimidating pile is Martin Hayes initial research material for Crowley: Wandering The Wastes.



Writing on his blog this week about the book he says he " had to crawl around the attic like some kind of giant, malformed silverfish to gather up all my old Crowley books" which is quite scary in itself.

Better get on with making that circle of salt!


From the Chicago Con

Last week Michael "Quarantine" Moreci was at the Chicago con. Here is what he got up to:

"I began going to the Chicago Comic-Con back when I was a kid. One of the best memories of that time is the year Stan Lee attended; I remember anxiously waiting with my father for what seemed like days simply to be called a “true believer.”

Maybe it’s nostalgia for the past, but as I took in this year’s con, I couldn’t help thinking how much things had changed. Back in the day, the con was all about comics—one of the first things you’d encounter upon walking in was the artist tables; now they’re the last, one step away from being delegated to interact with fans in the food court.

In recent years, Chicago has followed in the footsteps of others cons—San Diego, most notably—in shifting its focus from comics to mixed media (movies, television, games). In a sense, I understand this necessity; cons are an extraordinary marketing tool and, in order to survive, comics need the crossover fans brought in through movie adaptations such as Iron Man, or even American Splendor.

My disappointment in this year’s con was seeing the artists cast off to the Island of Misfit Creators while significant focus was given to the supporting-supporting cast of Twilight, Willis from Diff’rent Strokes, and an assortment of washed-up wrestlers. It’s hard to see novelty celebrities placed front-and-center while someone like Jason Aaron (Scalped) is exiled to the far side of the con.

Griping aside, there was a lot to like about the weekend. Chicago has a great community of creators, fans, and shops, many of whom came out for the weekend. I sat in on a Battlestar Q & A panel, and got to hear Admiral Adama—er, Edward James Olmos—lead a chant of “so say we all!” Mark Millar attended, as did Brian Azzarello and George Perez. I admit, I didn’t meet any of these fantastic creators—though I’ve encountered Azzarello a few times in the past (he’s a local guy)—but there was a genuine excitement in the crowd. I did manage to get my hands on a fairly-mint copy of Uncanny X-Men 171, where Rogue (one of my favorite X-Men) joins the team, for two bucks (two bucks!).

One of the highlights of the weekend was meeting Robert Venditti, author of The Surrogates (which has been turned into a soon-to-be released motion picture, starring Bruce Willis). We spoke for awhile; Robert was a great guy, very energetic and insightful about his work. I’m about halfway through the graphic novel, and couldn’t be enjoying it more. The book reminds me of two films—Blade Runner (one of my all-tome favorites), and Gattaca. It does what all great sci-fi does, blending a unique—yet familiar—scenario with a profound look into the future, via social commentary. I couldn’t recommend it more.

So that’s that—another Chicago con come and gone. Next up: the Windy City Comic Con, which is only six weeks away."

Comics In The Classroom

And in more Michael Moreci news...

Michael will be teaching a 6 week course in Graphic Novels from October to November at the Newberry Library in Chicago.

The course description says:

"Comics, or graphic novels, are the topic of many scholarly studies and a myriad of blockbuster films. Yet many Americans consider comic books a lower form of culture, not an art form. This course will challenge that idea by demonstrating comic book authors’ abilities to examine characters and to critique society in ways that are novelistic in scope and depth. We will read Alan Moore’s Watchmen and Brian K. Vaughn’s Y: The Last Man, among others."

Full details and links to registration can be found over on Michael's blog.

Michael Moreci holds an M.A. in English from Northwestern University. He teaches at Flashpoint Academy, and his work has appeared in a number of publications.

Comic Racks

This week I'm going to be a guest on the fantastic Comic Racks podcast. We'll be recording episode 42 on Thursday night, technology willing.

I'll post details when it goes live.

And Finally...

It seems that Burke and Hare are still making their influence felt from beyond the grave.

In a sinister co-incidence this week, the very week that the book is being finalised for print, the life mask of Hare himself, thought lost to history, has turned up in a museum in Swansea.

You can see the mask and read the story over at the BBC Wales site and find out more about the Crime and Punishment exhibition at Swansea Museum, which runs until the 30th November.

Cancertown Triple Header

Saturday 27th of June 2009. Three separate but linked events in three separate but linked countries. No longer able to operate just as one team, this is day we split apart and operate as The Cancer Cells.

Ireland

In Ireland we will have Stephen Downey hosting Insomnia's table as a guest at the Q Con (the annual Gaming Convention hosted by Dragonslayers, the Queen’s University Belfast Gaming and Anime Society.) He'll be sketching and selling copies of Cancertown (with display copies of Cages and Layer Zero from 6 on the Friday night and all day Saturday.

One of the competition prizes is a set of Cages, Cancertown and Layer Zero as well as an original A3 sketch by Stephen, seen below.




Having begged Stephen until he sold me a page of original art (the final page of chapter two of Cancertown, if you were wondering) I can tell you that this is really something worth having.

Andrew Croskery will be on hand to help all weekend and you should go and talk to him about Kronos City which is just zooming along. I saw some more pencils today and they are amazing. We'll also be running a Kronos City colouring competition with a graphic novel of your choice up for grabs as a prize for our favourite. We'll put the winner and any special favourites up on the blog.

For more details check out Stephen's blog and the Kronos City blog.

Scotland

Insomnia Overlord Crawford Coutts has been invited to speak at the Dundee Literary Festival alongside such luminaries of the comics world as David Bishop (Tharg to mortals such as we) and Warren Ellis.

He will be on at 4.50pm for anyone who is around and will be speaking about Insomnia, the developments in the UK comic industry and its changing readership.

He says:

"I'm very excited that Insomnia has been invited to be a part of the Dundee Literary Festival. Dundee was well known for its historic 3 J's - Jute, Jam and Journalism. In the past decade all three had all but disappeared for the future "Interactive Media". It's great to be a part of re-embracing the journalistic origins of the city and returning to the printed page and the great art of story-telling in all its forms of literature."

There will an Insomnia table on the Sunday with previews on show and books for sale. Throughout the festival you will also be able to get our books from the Borders stand.

He's a Dundee boy himself, so this will be something of a homecoming for the "Local Boy made good".

England

Cy Dethan, Alasdair Duncan and I will be in Chelmsford for the first of the Waterstones signings from 11am-1pm.

Organisers often ask for some background to help them promote the events they are putting on and encourage people to come along - so here is Cy, talking a bit about Cancertown:

"My primary focus right now is on prying open whatever doors I can jam a foot in, and using those opportunities to tell the best stories I can.

I've had a phenomenal run of luck in my short time in the industry, and some influential and talented people have been saying very nice things about my work.

Of course, the responsibility now is to somehow live up to that. I'm busy out in the trenches, paying my dues.

The big milestone I've hit with Cancertown is that it's my first creator-owned book. Since there isn't a licence or established continuity to adhere to, I've been given an astonishing amount of freedom in where I can take the story.

That freedom, combined with Stephen Downey's ability to keep pace with every insane idea I could throw at him, has really served to kick the training wheels off our collaboration and allowed us to explore the story in a much more comprehensive way.

Cancertown has really benefited from Stephen's gift for horribly distorting an image while maintaining its essential character. The book requires a number of key locations to be rendered in two distinct forms, one for each of the "realities" represented throughout the story.

Stephen has the Quixotic ability to look at a giant Ferris wheel and consider, just for a moment, that it might contain giant jellyfish/eyeball creatures that latch onto your chest and suck out your personality. That, fundamentally, is what makes him the right guy for the job."

And here is Stephen:

"People have asked me a lot what was the initial appeal of the project and I'd say that right from the beginning it was the concept outline and the range of things I'd get to draw. I was hoping the script would live up to the high concept and after reading chapter one I was itching to get my teeth into the project.

I think the high concept allowed Cy (Dethan) to keep me on my toes. He has managed this really delicate balance of alternating real-world and Cancertown scenes at just the right time so that after working a bit more methodologically on drawing the real-world London, the scene changes just as I'm itching to go crazy with the pencil in the much more monsterous Cancertown version. Then, just as I feel the need for straight lines and ink work again, Cy is just about to reign it back in again. I think this is something readers will relate to as well.


The story is filled with an alternate corroding world, monster gang lords, beautiful women, a little burnt girl and one angry man trying to find his place amongst all this, so to say there were interesting visuals to come up with is an understatement.

I always read visually so when I'm devouring a new script from Cy I'm imagining the scene as I go along (and often reimagining as the script adds layers to the scene). I often revisit these scene and change the 'camera angle' around to get the most dynamic or best storytelling view.

Its almost like Cy has planted little seeds in my head and the world grows out of them by themselves (and of course as Cy feeds them new scripts). There were a few things like a "looking down through a whirlwind of daggers a hundred foot tall" that I had to figure out a way to convey, but its usually the case that there are too many angles and interpretations that I want to draw rather than lack of them. Although I ended drawing every dagger in that worldwind so I wasn't hoping to draw that more than once!

I get asked about particualr highlights in the projects, and an unexpected one was probably just seeing the improvement in my own art from the first pages until the last. As the book builds to its climax in the last few scenes I had gotten to know these characters inside out (some literally) and was able to create a finish to the last chapter that I wouldn't have had the ability to do as effectively when I first started the graphic novel.

It's also a delight to see your artwork coloured and lettered by great talent (thats Mel Cook and Nic Wilkinson respectively), its a surreal tranformation seeing a penciled/inked piece of art turn into a comicbook page."

So there you have it - and if that doesn't encourage you to come and see us at whichever event is closest to you, I don't know what will!

Burke and Hare: The Musical

Well, not quite, but we are very pleased to have been approached by an Edinburgh band, Static 18 (who, we learn, are three drunken reprobates from South Queensferry, who aim to bring their own brand of noise to the Edinburgh scene and beyond!), wanting to use a panel from Burke and Hare as the cover for their demo album Infamous Crime.

In their own words they are:

"Some kind of cross-breeding experiment between Punk, Ska aand Metal!"

You can have a listen at their MySpace or Facebook pages, go on, you know you want to.

And my favourite artist quote of the week is from the blog of Will Pickering himself:

"Crowd scenes are a bit like tattoos: they can look great, but you need to be a particular kind of crazy to put yourself through the pain of getting them that way, and one careless line can ruin everything."

We feel your pain, Will, but you're nearly done, and the results are worth every bit of the agony.

Michael Moreci News

Some news just in from Michael Moreci, writer of the upcoming Quarantine, and The Police Channel short story for Layer Zero:Survival

This Sunday Michael will be speaking on a panel that is part of the annual Think Galacticon. The panel will be at Roosevelt University, from 1030-1145 a.m.

He and others (including Third Coast Comic's Terry Gant) will be discussing "ANARCHISM AND THE SUPERHERO: ANTI-CRIME DIRECT ACTIONIST OR ENFORCER OF THE STATE?"

When he was invited he leaped at the topic.

The description reads like this:

"Let's talk about superheroes. From Alan Moore's Watchmen and V for Vendetta to Warren Ellis's The Authority to DC's Superman to Marvel's Captain America there are a variety of perspectives on the superhero and politics."

Oh yes, we bring you creators who know their stuff.

Also, if you pop over to Michael's blog you can catch a preview of the first lettered page from his short 'Underworld', which will be seen in Something Wicked out this Autumn.

The art is by the excellent Keith Burns, who is currently doing pencils and inks for Garth Ennis's Herogasm (and a fill in for The Boys) - not to mention the cover for our very own Quarantine, and the art for Michael's story, The Police Channel in next year's Layer Zero: Survival.

Back to clearing the mound of emails now, back in seven, with, fingers crossed, some exciting news.

Judging A Book By Its Cover

(Click on the image for a larger version)

That little beauty, ladies and gentlemen, is the Rian Hughes cover for Burke and Hare, by Martin Conaghan and Will Pickering, with letters by Paul McClaren who joined the team recently.

I've been almost at bursting point for the last week waiting until I could post this. Isn't it fantastic? The lettering you see on the front is actually an extract from Burke's original confession in his own handwriting.

Those among you with sharp eyes will have noticed some exciting words on the front that say:

"Introduction by Alan Grant". They do refer to one of the founding editors of 2000AD and the creator of Judge Dredd and Strontium Dog, and the writer of too many comics for Marvel, DC and Dark Horse to mention, among other things, yes.


And on the back "Bonus Gallery featuring art by" above the names:

• Frank Quitely (All Star Superman, We3, The Authority)
• Gary Erksine (Dan Dare, Jack Cross, JSA Strange Adventures)
  
• Colin MacNeil (Dredd)
• Stephen Daly (Ballykissangek storyboards)
• Dave Hill (Gabriel)
• David Alexander (The McBams)
• Alex Ronald (Dredd, Lobo)
• Stuart Beel (computer games)
• Lynsey Hutchinson (Skeptic)

Next week I'll be posting Martin's answers to some Burke and Hare questions I put to him a short while ago where he says things like:

"We got to stare into the face of William Burke himself when the medical faculty at Edinburgh University granted us permission to view his skeleton"

and

"They murdered 16 innocent people in cold blood with and denied them the dignity of a proper burial. worse still, their victims suffered the ultimate indignity of being publicly dissected for the purposes of medical science"

Check back in 7.


Cancertown News

As mentioned last week the Northern Irish launch of Cancertown at Belfast Forbidden Planet was incredibly well attended, helped by this news article appearing in the paper just the day before.



(Click on the image for a version large enough to read.)

Not even pausing for breath Stephen was up and about again spreading the word at the 2D Northern Ireland Comics Festival in Derry, where he was a guest artist.

Huge thanks to Aimee (Stephen's girlfriend, better known as the inspiration for the mysterious and dangerous Babyface to Cancertown readers) and his brother James (the face of Crosshair!) for helping out on the stand all day and selling lots of copies to unsuspecting readers.

Andrew "Kronos City" Croskery was also on the Insomnia stand for the first time and beginning the promotion for his upcoming book with his flyers causing quite a buzz by all accounts. More about what Alex and Lauren, the art team, got up to recently and the first page of pencils, down below.

I am reliably informed that Cancertown was given a very complimentary (and completely umpromted!) mention in the Electic Micks panel.

Stephen got to hand Bryan Talbot his copy of the book, and apparently "boogie" with him later on. I have been promised pictures!

While all this was going on in Ireland, across the sea, at the very Eastern edge of England Cy and I were doing a signing at the shop of our sponsors, Whatever Comics.

We have known Manny Armario, the owner of Whatever, for many years, and as always it was great to visit. As well as signing new copies this time we had the the novel experience of people bringing back copies they had previously bought to be signed, and to chat about the book, which was a fantastic experience. We also signed some reserve copies for people who couldn't make it on the day.

The idea of a one shot prequel was floated, and as all the team are interested, watch this space! Huge thanks to Kim Britnell for the suggestion. You may be seeing more of Kim name around, as well, as she is an artist herself and we talked about "stuff". In a weird co-incidence it was Kim's grandmother, Councillor Iris Pummell, who organsied the Essex book festival where we ran the comics workshops a few months back. Small world.

Returning from our glamourous pasty lunch we even found a little queue waiting for us to get back. Not as big as Stephen's Belfast queue, but pleasing and surprising none the less!

Later in the evening we caught up with Oliver "Dead Goats" Masters, and had a brilliant in depth chat about his book, and discovered he and Cy had a very useful shared interest but I cannot reveal it for risk of spoilers at this stage.

We also caught up with Laurence "The Punisher" Campbell, and got him to sign our copies of "The Punisher: Naked Kill", which features Manny himself as a character, what with Laurence being a local boy, too. We also talked about a project, more news on that as and when.

Finally some interview and review links that came out just too late for last week's blog:

• Stephen Downey inter interviewed on Comicon.com
  
  
• A full review on Sci-Fi Pulse
  
  "Cancertown leaps out of the page at you, grabs you by the jugular and doesn’t let you go.
  
  One thing that grabs you right away about Cy’s writing style is that he is the absolute prince of darkness when it comes to one-liners"
  
  
• Waterstones Bookseller review which says:
  
  "A fantastically dark and twisted tale that drags you through a strange and bizarre world that could be the product of one man's brain tumor. Gloriously written with punchy dialogue and arresting visuals"
  

The weekend of the 27th/28th of June will see a Cancertown Triple Header, as we have simultaneous events in 3 countries!

• In England we have Cy Dethan signing at Waterstones in Chelmsford
• In Ireland we have Stephen Downey at the QCon XVI
  
• In Scotland we have Crawford Coutts at the Dundee Literary Festival
  

Kronos City News

While their writer was busy promoting at the 2D Festival Alex Willmore (penciller) and Lauren Sharp (colourist) were interviewed for the Resonance FM programme Strip! while visiting the Manhua exhibtion. They talk about their work on Kronos City, a short story called Wolf Like Me for the Accent UK Victoriana anthology they are doing with fellow Insomnia writer Michael Moreci, and about his upcoming Insomnia book, Quarantine.

• Listen to the interview at Panel Borders
  

• Read More About the episode
  

Then they hurried home to send me the first pencilled splash page showing the city itself:




Andrew received it while still at Derry and was so pleased he said "I got very smiley and giddy, and I think my eyes teared up a little."

Awww.

Awards!

A huge congratulations and big round of applause for Monty Borror, Layer Zero contributor, who's work on Cold Blooded Chillers with Bob Heske just won a Bronze medal at the 2009 Independent Publisher Book Awards in the Horror category.

You can read more about it on his blog

Things seem to be going from strength to strength for Monty.

I hope to be working with him on a full length project very soon.

And that's me all typed out for this week.

See you in the funny pages.

Warning: Insomnia On The Rise

It's going to be a big news post this week, there is so much to say I don't know how I'm going to fit it all in, so I'll just get started:

New Signings:

As word gets around the number of submissions we are receiving is increasing weekly, and the quality is very high. The wealth of talent out there is incredible and we are extremely gratified that people believe in our approach and want to work with us . This makes choosing what to sign ever more difficult, but the latest are:

• Kronos City by Andrew Croskery
  
  In Kronos City it's not water running through the canals - it's time. It's possible to submerge your head to see visions of the past and future, although it’s risky. If you know how you can even manipulate future events, not just watch them unfold. Some say you can even change not only time, but fate..Finnegan Vedant, being an enterprising individual, sees here a business opportunity like no other, but when a mysterious client puts him on a case with bizarre consequences, he’s forced to face harsh truths about himself and the world around him. The game he’s playing is for much higher stakes than it at first appeared.
  
  
• Midnight On The Mind's Highway by Craig I. Gilmore
  
  The, dramatic, hallucinogenic tale of Carl Sark, a man frequently plagued by horrific, vivid nightmares involving disparate parts of a repressed, long forgotten memory. In desperation Carl volunteers to undergo a brand new form of regression therapy - The Mind’s Highway originally created to let people to re-live their fondest memories like they were happening for the very first time. But as Carl delves back into his past, piecing together fractured memories one-by-one, he’s pursued by a horrific, monstrous force apparently seeking to punish him for something he can’t recall.
  
  Craig adds:
  "Midnight on the Mind’s Highway is a deep, dark, character-driven tale about lost loves, repressed memories, nightmarish dreamscapes and enormous, unthinkable monsters. Oh yes, there will be monsters. It draws on many things – specifically the works of director Guillermo del Toro and Michel Gondry, as well as my absolute love and adoration for Konami’s seminal Silent Hill series of videogames. Comics are also the only medium I could ever imagine doing this kind of tale justice, so I can’t thank the good people Insomnia Publications enough for giving me the opportunity"
  
  Which is very nice of him to say. But really we are the ones thanking him for submitting such a fantastic idea.
  
  
• Cancertown Volume Two: Blasphemous Tumours
  
  Yes, the whole gang has been signed up and will be back for this. Stephen is already missing the monsters (I think we may have broken him a little bit...ssshhhh).
  
  For those wanting more Cancertown news look out for upcoming pieces in ImagineFX and Comics International. There is also some internal art up in the Eye Candy section of Comics Village this week.
  
  

Art Updates:

• We now have it confirmed that Keith Burns will be providing the cover art for Quarantine by Michael Moreci. Keith is currently working with Garth Ennis, and you may also know his name from Blood PSI (currently optioned for a film adaptation) by Andy Winter.
  
  
• Melanie Cook, newly escaped from Cancertown, will be joining the Average Joe team next to provide the colours for Kelvin Chan's gorgeous pencils. Keep an eye out for previews of the first pages very soon.
  
  
• Larry Watts has been signed up for art duties on The Ion Monger's Daughter. If you want to catch a glimpse of Larry's work before that, though he drew Red Wire, Blue Wire by Alexi Conman in Layer Zero: Choices
  
  

The Management

We are very pleased to announce that we have two new members of the Insomnia Management team:

• Richard Johnson, who will be joining us as Art Director,
  
• Martin Conaghan who will be taking up the editorial reins for the new Vigil imprint (more on this below)
  

Richard and Martin both have fantastic experience to bring to the management team, both in comics, and from their work in other media.

About Richard

Richard comes to us from the world of Graphic Design and Illustration, where he was was a recipient of the prestigious D&AD (Design & Art Directors) First Award in the 'Most
Outstanding Mixed Media Advertising Campaign for a Motion Picture' category.

Richard, who also writes under his middle name James, is the creator of Erth Chronicles, an online community of talented artists from around the world who have been inspired by his first novel in the series, The Enemy's Son, from Mam Tor Publishing.

Richard Says:

'The British Independent comic book scene is a close knit family - everyone knows each other, in their many guises and the talents they have to offer. Families support one another and share an important ethos. I'm looking forward in helping to elevate things a little further through the design of these publications and help support all of our own projects in the process.'

About Martin

Martin Conaghan's first published writing work appeared in Aceville Publications' Comic World in 1992, in the form of interviews and reviews with writers and artists such as Grant Morrison and Steve Yeowell. This was followed by a one-off Tharg's Terror Tale in the 1995 2000AD Yearbook and several short stories for the American publisher CaliberPress, including an issue of their popular Raven Chronicles title. In 1997, he produced a weekly internet column for The Big Issue in Scotland, in addition to writing feature articles for The Herald and other Scottish broadsheet newspapers. He now works for the BBC.

New Vigil Imprint from Insomnia

As many of you will know last year we signed the historical graphic novel Burke and Hare by Martin and Will Pickering.

The response we have already had on this book has been great, with people and magazines, not to mention libraries, museums and educational establishments, already emailing me to ask when it will be out. I've seen the first finished pages, though, which is a great perk of the job, and I'm not surprised people can't wait - they are outstanding!

Anyway this got us to thinking and chatting with Martin about the idea of an imprint for more of this kind of book - fact-based stories of a biographical nature with supporting notes and research. As the conversation progressed it was obvious he would be perfect as editor, so we invited him to the party.

Martin Says:

"History is ripe for the plundering - not just classical history or ancient history, but the history of the 18th, 19th and 20th Century - history is being written all around us every day, in the news, on the web - from politics to war, to celebrity life and the ordinary stories of every person on the planet. It's all there, waiting to be plundered - and comics are the ideal format for telling broad, grand stories about people's lives, global events and shocking controversies.

"What we're aiming for here it the comic-book/graphic novel equivalent of a biopic; Nixon, JFK, Apollo 13, Braveheart, Ali, Missisipi Burning, Let Him Have It, Frost/Nixon, In the Name of the Father, Michael Collins, The Damned United.

What we want to do is tell similar stories, and back them up with facts and quality research - even if parts of the stories are fictionalised or the creators take an original slant on their approach to the story. What we want is more than just a comic-book or a graphic novel - this is the comic-book equivalent of the director's cut of the biopic movie crammed full with all the DVD extras, the facts, the research and every scrap of paper that creators leave scattered around their office floor when the work is done.

There are thousands of stories out there about real-life events that can be woven into fascinating tales. Stories about murder, political scandal, military cover-ups, controversy, disasters, war.You just need to look.

We really feel a line of books like this can help lift the comics medium beyond the realm of fantasy and science-fiction, offering material that is entertaining first, but also educational at its heart."

Martin and I will be working on specific submission guidelines for the imprint over the next couple of weeks - so if you have any ideas for this kind of book, start to gather them now.

Final Word

So to sum all that up, Crawford Coutts takes a few minutes away from his master plan and says:

"With the rapid growth of Insomnia in recent months, the development of our new imprint, Vigil, and with the ever increasing list of books we're producing for the coming years, there was going to be a time when we needed more people to manage everything.

Richard and Martin started out, like Nic Wilkinson our Creative Director, as creators. I can't think of two better people to be a part of the management team. Their experience and expertise in the industry is extremely valuable and I would like to take this opportunity to give them a warm welcome them to the Insomnia Publications management team.

I cannot emphasize enough that the creators are what makes this venture possible. Not only do they create the products, but they are willing to devote their time to assisting in the promotion of their products and all the others in the Insomnia lines. The feeling of seeing this all come together is incredible."

And now off to plan for Bristol...Oh My God It's only 3 weeks away!..look out for the Big Bristol update here next week with details of everything that will be going on at the stand.

Don't Say He Didn't Warn You

Today we have some fantastic news that cannot wait until Monday night -

Bryan Talbot has written the foreword for Cancertown.

Creator of books such as "The Adventures of Luther Arkwright" (considered the first English Graphic Novel), "The Tale of One Bad Rat" and "Alice in Sunderland" he has also contributed his beautiful art to titles such as "The Sandman", "Fables", "Nemesis The Warlock" and "Judge Dredd".

Not only that but Cy Dethan says:

"The eye-opening experience of reading Luther Arkwright as a kid was one of the key reasons I wanted to start writing comics in the first place, so to have an introduction from its creator is simply unbelievable. "

So this is what Bryan had to say:

"For a first graphic novel from a new creative team, Cancertown is remarkable. Cy Dethan’s concept alone is brilliant. Is the protagonist, Vincent Morley, a cynical knight in tarnished armour battling unspeakable monsters in a gonzoid Chapel Perilous or a dying sad bastard besieged by visions generated by his terminal brain tumour? Vince’s chosen role, that of maintaining the equilibrium between the “real” London and its parasitic, demonic mirror image and his ability to pass between the two, by grace of his illness, sharply differentiates his story from others in the wide-boy urban sorcerer genre, notably represented by Alan Moore’s John Constantine and Mike Carey’s Felix Castor prose novels. And, though your worst nightmares are his everyday reality, Morley kicks serious arse while maintaining a self-deprecating cascade of gallows humour.

Moreover (do people still say that?) Cancertown actively embraces horror, the genre of horror fiction. It’s not trigger-shy. It doesn’t fuck around. It sets out to horrify, and it succeeds. Although Cancertown owes more to Clive Barker than Ramsey Campbell, it still, like Campbell, has its roots in H.P. Lovecraft and its evocation of genuine creepiness is undeniable. This is in no small part due to the visceral, hallucinogenic art of Stephen Downey working in tandem with the hard-bitten script, the atmospheric colours of Melanie Cook and inventive lettering of Nic Wilkinson. We’re seeing here the first outing of creators who will make their mark on the future comic industry.

Cancertown will disorientate you, suck you in, chew you up and spit you out and you might well be in need of a change of underwear by the end.

Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

Bryan Talbot

Sunderland March 2009"

Cancertown will be released in May, and is currently available to pre-order from Amazon, or even better, ask your local comic shop to order you a copy in. If you don't have a local comic shop try getting in touch with Whatever Comics from Canterbury in the UK. I have been buying my comics there for nearly 20 years and they are outstanding. Tell them Nic sent you.

• ISBN-10: 1905808135
• ISBN-13: 978-1905808137

If you're going to be at the Bristol International Comic Expo and the Small Press Expo 2009, you'll be able to pick Cancertown up (along with its Insomnia brethren, Layer Zero 3 and Cages) at a special convention price as shown below

• Cancertown RRP = £14.99, Con Special = £10


• Cages RRP = £10.99, Con Special = £7


• Layer Zero Choices RRP = £9.99, Con Special = £7


• Cancertown + Cages for £15
  
  
• Cancertown + Layer Zero for £15


• Cancertown + Cages + Layer Zero for £20
  

You can also take advantage of the special prices by pre-ordering directly from us before the 9th of May (either to pick up at the convention or to be posted to you if you can't make it). Just email me at nichola@insomniapublications.com and let me know what you need.

Payment can be made by Cheque or Paypal.

In other news this week:

New Signings

• The Indifference Engine by Cy Dethan:
  Responding to a strangely specific job advertisement, a distinctly ordinary twenty-something suburban slacker finds himself in the middle of an inter-dimensional task force staffed entirely by superhuman alternate versions of himself. Struggling to fit in, he uncovers a conspiracy that strikes at the very heart of the organisation – a conspiracy that only he can stop.
  


• Quarantine by Michael Moreci:
  Quarantine follows a group of survivors trapped in a small town in the Upper Peninsula (U.P.) of Michigan shortly after a biological plague is released into the water supply. This plague turns a person into a homicidal war machine, which forces the borders to close, leaving our band of survivors to fight for their lives.
  


• Butterflies and Moths by Corey Brotherson:
  Butterflies and Moths is about a young woman attempting to come to terms with a terrible affliction and her past, and in finding a kindred spirit discovers - through blood and betrayal - that death is a natural part of life. A prequel, "Fragile" to this can be seen in the upcoming Layer Zero:Choices
  


• The IonMonger's Daughter by Matt Gibbs:
  Victoria Cross wants to see the stars. Against her father's wishes, she leaves the family business to embark on a journey to her mother's home world. Robbed, ensnared by the criminal underworld, arrested and conscripted into the army as a convict, her bad choices turn her dreams into a nightmare.
  


• Focal Point by Jim Alexander, Martin Conaghan and Cy Dethan:
  The first in a new series of "by invitation" book where we ask three creators for three stories exploring one theme, all linked by a shared "focal point".

More on all of these as things progress.

Art Teams:

• The incredibly talented South African art team of Neil Van Antwerpen and Peter-David Douglas will be teaming up with Cy Dethan once again on The Ragged Man towards the end of the year. The three of them last worked together on War Stories: Tasch as part of the Starship Troopers on-going series for Markosia.

Events

• On Saturday we attended the Essex Book Festival, more on that next week when all the images are in.


• We have booked tables for Thought Bubble in November. See you there.