El Bigote Pinups...

'Tonight I played cards with a disgraced priest. We wagered confessions...'

Artist Stewart Davies drew the above pinup of El Bigote's skull-faced nemesis. It'll appear in the A Tequila-Drenched Reckoning collection, and will be the cover of a future collection...

'I got hellfires a'burnin' inside me. Hellfires thet scorch flesh an' char bones. Hellfires thet blacken souls...'

2000AD art droid Grant Perkins - of whose absolutely bonkers style I'm a big big fan - drew the above pinup of Undead Quillslinger El Bigote and his faithful Ostrich. It'll appear in the A Tequila-Drenched Reckoning collection, and is set to be the cover of issue 4. Be sure to visit Mr. Perkin's website...here!

For more information about El Bigote, get yer tail on over to El Blogote.

Travel Waaaaaay Down South of the Border with El Bigote...

Take a trip South of the Border, the border between Life and the Afterlife, and visit Undead Mexico, where El Dia De Los Muertos never ends…

Living dead banditos and ghoulish conquistadores, cannibalistic muertoads and spectral sessquatches prowl Mexico’s haunted prairies – and it’s up to Undead Mexican Mustache-Quillslinger El Bigote to put them back in their tequila worm-infested graves!

Writer Locust (that's me, but I'm trying to make this sound like an official press release), artist El Chivo and letterer Bolt 01 are set to uncork El Bigote: A Tequila-Drenched Reckoning on unsuspecting comic book readers.

A Tequila-Drenched Reckoning is a special stand-alone series preview issue aimed to introduce readers to and showcase the bizarre world of El Bigote, which just might be the only Gothic Mexican Horror-Western-Fantasy-Comedy comic book in existence!

Blending dark humor and cartoon violence with biting satire and the meanings of unlife, El Bigote is sure to be regarded as profound by someone and nonsense to everyone else.

'So where can I read El Bigote: A Tequila-Drenched Reckoning?' you inquire impatiently.

A special limited (100 copies) print edition of A Tequila-Drenched Reckoning will soon be available for FREE through the El Bigote El Blogote or the El Bigote Facebook Page (details will follow in a future post, but it’ll basically be first come first serve).

To make sure no one’s left out, the issue will also be available FREE digitally through…well…everywhere really: Clickwheel, Dropbox, Comixology, Myebook, ect. The plan is just to get as many people to read and (hopefully) enjoy El Bigote’s adventures.

Of course El Bigote's creators are actively searching for a Big Comics Executive off-kilter smart enough to throw lots of money at a weird little comic project and make them Rich Comics Superstars…

Buuut in the meantime, they'll continue to produce the comic independently.

The first full-length El Bigote story, La Noche De Los Muertoads, will be available mid-2012, and a series of episodic quillslinger adventures will appear in the pages of British Small Press anthology comicsParagon and AAAIIIEEE!!!.

Be sure to subscribe to El Blogote for updates!

Squashed Bugs.

above: Exterminator extraordinare, Elroy Wargle, and entomologist wannabe, Stoss, prepare to take out a colony of space earwigs in Extermination Theory (art by Matt Soffe).

Some disappointing news. The Starscape Comics Storypaper has been cancelled after a single issue. Editor Christian Smilie issued the following statement:

"Thanks to all those who bought the first issue of the Storypaper...unfortunately, there just wasn't enough of you. I do however, appreciate those who dipped their hand into their pocket and, for many of you, the feedback given. With a number of big name artists and writers (both sides of the Atlantic) showing interest in the concept, it's a shame there was not enough appeal to develop a bigger audience.

"The good news: the stories will be switching to the internet to read for free, with collected text stories available in both book form and via Kindle etc.. See 'Prose' to read the first chapters of the Knights of Eternity (sword'n'sorcery) and Extermination Theory (action sci-fi), plus full stories for Identity Unhidden (superhero) and the Metphysical Police (weird sci-fi). Also, comic and television fanfiction plus links to classic sci-fi/fantasy. Stay tuned for more stories too, including Atomic-CALL (feline espionage), the Deterrent (if Spidey was on Battlestar Galactica), the War Dogs (WWII superhero action) and historical war stories (Vikings, Romans, Celts etc.).

"But what happened with the Storypaper?

"Reviews from readers were extremely good but, without distribution, it's just not possible to go on in print form. At £1.50 for over 50 pages, plus terrific spot art and stories that seemed to be popular, there appeared to be a lot of pull but it was just impossible to get it into readers' hands.

"Comic shop distributor, Diamond, rejected the Storypaper (in the nicest possible manner) as it wasn't a comic. A specialist sci-fi book/mag distributor rejected it for not being either a book or a mag. I tried the direct approach. I mailed every independent comic and sci-fi bookshop in the UK I could find. Each got a copy of the Storypaper, plus generous terms, that included the option of sale-or-return. I then followed up with an email after a couple of weeks to gauge interest. Now, I used to run a comic shop myself. I know how difficult it is to sell indie work. However, I also know that replying, which about 90% of comic shops chose not to do, is easy. How long does an email take? So no distribution to shops. That's the biggest shame really. If people didn't take to it, fair enough. Truth is, most potential readers had no chance of even seeing a copy.

"I had also hoped to do more with the pocket-book format. Around 50 pages of comics featuring Vikings, Romans, Medieval and Celtic action for £1.50? In my book, that sounds terrific. But if comic shops won't even countenance this format, there seems little point continuing with it. Unfortunately, almost halving the page count doesn't mean being able to sell 28 page US-sized at £1.50, taking into account comic shops' 50% discount. Its pocket format or small press only.

"Not that I'm having a go at small press distribution but, hopefully, I've moved on from that. With some of the previous work having sold into four figures, selling the odd 50 by mail order, then doubling that at festivals, but losing out via hotels, transport and table costs, is not something I'm interested in doing regularly. I've already written on my thoughts on distribution. It depends what your comic is for. In the case of the Storypaper, it was an attempt at mass-market appeal, rather than fanfiction, vanity press or trying out ideas. The choice then between a few small press readers (where superheroes/sci-fi/fantasy isn't the main interest) or hundreds of thousands of web readers, plus collected print editions seems a fairly obvious choice.

"So, unfortunately, no room in the UK for pocket-books at an attractive price with terrific covers. I did what I could."

above: Earwigs teeming under the surface of Colony Planet Dustworld (art by Dustin Parr).

So that's that. An interesting endeavor, fallen through.

Boo! Hiss!

Extermination Theory, was one of the stories serialized in the Storypaper, and as (maybe) one of you might recall, I was very enthusiastic about the project. Now I wonder if I should submit the story again - at this point there's a very big possibility it's a jinx, and I'd hate for Extermination Theory to exterminate another unsuspecting magazine.

Something Wicked 07 Named SFX's Small Press 'Zine of the Month!

above: Warrior-Sorcerer Nakis battles the Witch Amondi and the Spirits of the Dead (art by Vicky Stonebridge) in Witch of the Mists.

I woke up this morning to the news that Something Wicked 07 - which featured my comic strip, Nakis: Witch of the Mists - was named SFX Magazine's Small Press 'Zine of the Month (editor Bolt 01 has posted a pic of the mention over on the FutureQuake Press Blog; be sure to buy a copy or two of issue 07 while you're visiting).

Congrats to editors Bolt and Richmond for putting out such a quality release, and congrats to all the writers and artists involved!

Paragon and Done It for the 9th Time...

above: Thrill, Gasp and Shudder - in whichever order you please - to Paragon the 9th (cover art by Davey Candlish)!

Hmmm. Seems like only a few posts ago I announced the arrival of the 8th issue of Paragon Comics.

...

Right, that was only a few posts ago. But that was posted three loooooong (and looking back, they sure felt loooooong, or maybe just sloooooow) months ago.

In the meantime I've been busy. Some massive comics and prose projects are afoots and afouls, in the offings and prowling the yards. Been simply itching to blah-blah-blog about these, but...well, besides being sworn to secrecy under the penalty of death or tickling or something like that, I always feel that the more I'm blogging, the less I'm doing what I ought to be doing: offing things.

Words are precious, so why waste them on blogs or facebook posts, twitter feeds or myspace spaces (does anyone even myspace anymore)...?

So anyway, yeah, um...right, okay. Let me stop pissing away letters and cut to the chase: Paragon #9 is out, and you should buy it. Ordering details to follow, sales pitch here:

I've got two stories in it, Jikan: Caves of Death and Rise of the Mekkosapiens: Who Am I, Robot?. In Caves of Death (art by James Corcoran and letters by Jim Campbell), time-traveling samurai Jikan slaughters a horde of demon-possessed cavemen, while in Who Am I, Robot? (art by Louis Carter and letters by David Withers) G127 learns who he was a thousand years before the rebellion...and then robots are blown up into bits.

Also in the magazine you'll find the latest installment of Icarus Dangerous, a great strip by my good friend Dirk Van Dom (art by the fantastic Stephen Prestwood), one-off Western No Compromise and the initial adventure of a pulpy hero-type called Spencer Nero (good old Davey Candlish renders these two tales).

In the UK you can order your copy of Paragon #9 - and copies of 1-8 while you're at it - by adventuring to the Paragon Blogspot; US buyers, journey to Lulu. All you cheap bastards and trendy e-reader readers, you can get yours on Lulu for only 99p British cash-money.

Now...I'm off to the offing, afeeting, prowling and afouling.