2 0 2 4 - Investing in Myself
Looking to the year ahead.
Good afternoon from the weirdly balmy shores of Prince Edward Island. It’s been a while time since I last wrote. Sorry about that. I don’t know how we’re already in December but we are. 2023 is basically over. I’ll be glad to see it go.
This year flew by. Astra kept me busy. I’ve become a full time dog Dad trying to make sure she’s well behaved and adequately exercised. It’s nice to feel freed from my desk. Having her around means I have to get up and move my body a few times a day. Which really helps my brain context switch from one project to another (this is something I’ve historically found difficult!).
Beyond dog life. My family moved back to PEI this year. It’s incredible to have my Mom and Dad close again. It’s been 11 years since we’ve lived in the same city. Now they’re five minutes away. This summer, I helped them move into their new place. Since then I’ve been going over to spend time with my Dad a few days a week. Unfortunately, he took a really bad spill in August and ended up breaking his pelvis in two places. Four months later and he’s still in a wheelchair but making a slow and steady recovery. So he needs as much support as he can get. If nothing else, it’s been a nice excuse to spend time together. But it’s gonna be a bit before he’s up and walking again.
Apart from that, this year, we’ve really refined the art of backyard gardening. We built two new garden beds and built a fence around the perimeter (including a working door!). The climate here on PEI is quite different than the Pacific Northwest but we’re slowly getting used to it. Here’s how things looked during the peak of summer.
Okay! That’s enough life junk! This week we’re going to talk about the year ahead and why you’re about to hear a lot more from me.
Investing In Myself
At the tail end of 2022 - I was at a crossroads. I spent most of the year working within the Canadian film industry. I heard different opinions about my work and experienced a very different standard of treatment. It was eye-opening. Working in film gave me the courage (and freedom) to stop saying yes to everything and learn how to ask for what I wanted. It was (and is) a process!
Then in late December 2022, a publisher I worked with almost exclusively declared bankruptcy. The veneer of our professional relationship vanished overnight. The rights to my previous work still belong to this company. All of the money made from optioning my work to film and television is controlled (and kept) by this company. Now, that was pretty-fucking eye opening.
I’m not going to lie, I spent the vast majority of last December in tears. I’m still upset about the situation but I learnt a hard lesson about who to trust with my work. In the wake of my heightened emotions… I was able to take a step back and reflect on what I wanted and how I was going to get revenge.
Well, they say the best revenge is living well. So I went out and found a whole host of folks who believed in my work and made a full years worth of original comics.
Next year is going to be fucking huge, my friends.
2 0 2 4
I’m launching four original comics next year. I’ve spent all of 2023 writing scripts, prepping covers and getting this amazing slate of books ready to enter the world. Each book has a different home and a different flavour.
Everything gets going in February with…
CEMETERY KIDS DON’T DIE
Cemetery Kids Don’t Die is a sci-fi/horror hybrid about playable nightmares. It follows four teens as they flirt with addiction to the most immersive horror game ever made.
The book is born from years of playing World of Warcraft with my little brother. In many ways that was the first place where he and I developed our adult friendship. WOW was so immersive and enveloping that we were able to set aside our petty sibling bullshit, have fun and actually accomplish things together. Those late nights gaming with him and other friends really defined my late teens. I’ve always wanted to write about those memories.
So Cemetery Kids Don’t Die is kinda about that time in my life. But it’s also about grief, anger and loss. It’s exploring the idea that we’ve somehow been cheated of the life we deserve so we have to accept secondary realities as more fulfilling than our own concrete world.
The book follows Birdie Cutter. Five years ago, she was in an accident that killed her mother and confined her to a wheelchair. Life has never been the same since. Her only real respite is getting to hang online with her brother Pik, and her friends Enid and Wilson. They’re all obsessed with a brand new video-game console you play in your sleep… The Dreamwave.
Using the Dreamwave, they all play the action-horror MMORPG Nightmare Cemetery. Which is basically the love-child of Elden Ring and Silent Hill. The point of the game is to navigate the complex nightmare world and confront a enigmatic being known only as The King of Sleep. Shit goes sideways almost immediately. When after a long night of gaming, one of the Cemetery Kids doesn’t wake up…
The comic blends kinetic horror action with deep emotions. It’s brought to life by the incredible artwork of Daniel Irizarri. Daniel has created two very distinct worlds that both come alive on the page. There’s a delicate push and pull with the two competing realities that’s immediately evident. We’ve got the jagged lines and deep-black gutters of the game world. Juxtaposed by the clean lines and white gutters of reality. That tension on the page drives the story. As both worlds start to bleed into one another and a devastating loss in the game forces the characters to dive deeper into their own nightmares in order to find their missing friend. Daniel’s really a dream collaborator. His storytelling is so perfect that you could understand the book without an ounce of my writing on the page.
Just take a look at Daniel’s kinetic action scenes and character designs. They’re to die for. The book is gorgeously coloured by Brittany Peer and lettered by AndWorld Design. Here’s a five-page-preview.
This is my first book from Oni Press and I’m so thrilled to be working with the legacy publisher as they launch a new era.
Issue #1 hits February 7th.
Then in April we’re going to take a detour into neo-noir territory with…
PROJECT SNOW
This one is a big love-letter to Brian De Palma. It’s a paranoid neo-noir about how the things we see are coloured by our own personal biases. It’s set against the backdrop of an unforgiving wilderness and suspense is the driving force of the narrative. There are no heightened or horror elements here. This is grounded and character-driven crime thriller.
This is me writing a story about how people become obsessed with the lives of total strangers. In a post “true-crime podcast” world - we’ve taken to creating narratives where they may be none or empathizing with murderers when we should just let them fade into obscurity. There’s not much else I can say here just yet. So here’s one of the first mood boards for the project.
All will be revealed in January. SOON!
In June, we’re getting lost in a sprawling cosmic wilderness with…
PROJECT TIAMAT
I’ve been working on this book with my co-creator Hayden Sherman since 2020. It’s the biggest story I’ve ever been part of. It’s eight oversized issues but we’re going to do something different with the release. I can’t reveal too much just yet. But it’s an exciting and different approach than I’m used to!
Project Tiamat is a sprawling, multi-perspective look at a horrific anomaly. It’s a big-love letter to the Man Vs. Wilderness subgenre that’s dominated Canadian fiction for decades. But of course, we’ve put our own spin on things.
It’s cosmic, survival horror at it’s most intimate. Every issue is told from a different POV, features prose passages, and is fully painted by Hayden. It’s a mammoth book that we’ve put EVERYTHING into. Hayden’s pages are sincerely life-altering. If you haven’t been paying attention - Hayden is one of the best (and most inventive) artists working in comics today.
I’m so damn excited for people to read it. We’ve been sitting on it for a long, long time. For those who are worried about something like this being late or never being finished, I’m happy to report that we’ve got five issues fully locked. Hayden begins work on issue #6 in the new year and we’ll be fully wrapped on the project before issue #1 is in your hands. The goal is for this to be a seamless reading experience that grabs hold of you and refuses to let go.
You’ll learn more about this one in March.
Finally, September sees the launch of a gross and gritty revenge thriller…
PROJECT DECAY
Project Decay is about a Father who’s pushed into the seedy underbelly of one of America’s biggest industries. This is something I’ve wanted to write for a while and once I started doing research the story basically poured out of me in a matter of weeks. It’s one of those things that I can’t wait to share with people because the premise is so insane but absolutely grounded in the reality of Corporate America (you just never hear anything about it!).
The series is drawn in full colour by Jok. Who is going to blow people’s minds with his nimble line work and heavy silhouettes. He’s an absolute powerhouse and the perfect co-creator for this little neo-noir yarn.
We’re still a ways out from this one. But it’s a big, brutal gut-punch of a story. Flirting with some futurism but mostly grounded in the grim world of American poverty. It’s all set in Florida and is basically the lovechild of movies like BLUE RUIN, SPRING BREAKERS and HELL OR HIGH WATER.
You’ll learn more towards the middle of 2024.
PEACE ✌️
This year was difficult and painful. I’m glad to leave it behind.
Let’s endeavour to make 2024 better.
Until then, take care of each other and enjoy the holidays.
- Z 12/18/23
Sounds like 2024 is gonna be an awesome year for you!
Also manifesting self-investment 🔮 🤞🏽