The Grim Collection update

As I post a new horror comic on The Grim Collection today I realize I did not mention on this blog the posting of a short fiction in October. So let me correct that even as I announce the arrival of Orphan.

Orphan is written by me and drawn by Manoel Magalhaes, who you will likely remember as that artist of The Three Princes, Colonel and Synchronicity. Orphan is a ghost story in which we tap into a little bit of history and slide away from the “horror” of horror storytelling. We hope you enjoy it. http://grimcollection.wordpress.com/2012/01/02/orphan/.

The Draw of Memories is a short fiction I posted on The Grim Collection in October 2011. I shook the dust off a short fiction I wrote years ago that had never found a home. I hope you agree that it is a good fit for The Grim Collection. You can read it online.

Updates galore

The last half of October has been a heck of a few weeks for me. The biggest highlight was my trip to Winnipeg for Central Canada Comic Con where I was selling Acts of Violence: An Anthology of Crime Comics and the issue of IF-X featuring Dark Art, promoting The Grim Collection, and checking out Artist Alley in the hopes of finding some talented artists who might be interested in working together on comics for The Grim Collection. I will have a full Con report posted on this here blog in the near future.

In other news, Song’s End has been lettered by E.T. Dollman. I will be packaging the files and sending it to the Hamtramck Idea Men over the weekend. You might recall that Song’s End will appear in the December 2011 edition of IF-X. The theme is “West”.

There has been movement on other comics as well. Manoel Magalhaes has turned in more pages for Orphan. Tim Hall has completed character designs for On The Other Side of The Bridge, and just the other day turned in thumbs of the first eight pages. My experience with Tim has been great thus far and I can’t wait to see what the final artwork looks like. The third comic currently in production for The Grim Collection, The Dig, is also moving forward. Adam Sward provided me with character sketches that were quickly approved. This will be the third collaboration between Adam and I.

And, I hate to announce this for fear of jinxing it, but there is a very good possibility that a long gestating comic project is soon to debut.

I will finish with one final word about The Grim Collection. I added new content to it on November 4. The Draw of Memories is a short fiction, the first to appear on The Grim Collection.

The Grim Collection publishing schedule

The publishing schedule I intend for The Grim Collection is an aggressive one.  I plan to have a new short fiction or short comic every three months. That said, a new short fiction or short comic will be added every month for the first three months after its August 2 launch in order to generate interest in the Web site. In between comics and short fiction, pin-ups and Grim Reality content will be added. Pin-ups will be added as those are obtained from artists. There will be no set schedule for Grim Reality content but I would like to have at least two Grim Reality updates a month. This should be possible because Grim Reality content is derived from my writing process and research and I intend to be very active in that go forward.

The Grim Collection soft launch

I launched The Grim Collection softly this evening. The featured comic is Cutter’s Reward. Also on the Web site are two installments of Grim Reality, which is a place where I provide behind the scenes information about the comics and short fiction on The Grim Collection or post interesting tidbits gathered in my research. I’ll do a more concentrated push in October leading up to Halloween. By that time I will have at least one short fiction and one more comic in the collection.

The Grim Collection is coming

I have been silent since my return from Calgary Con. The trip was a game changer for me in that it renewed my interest in writing and working on my own projects. I’ve been bummed out by a number of projects that have been written, are in production, but have not yet seen the light of day. I did a lot of writing in 2010, for example, but have very few finished works to prove it. Then on the heels of my return from Calgary, a very large and exciting project I was involved in (never announced on my blog) was shelved (hopefully temporarily). With my schedule clear I’ve decided to focus on a project of my own making:

The Grim Collection

The Grim Collection is a compilation of horror and suspense stories written by me. The stories will appear as comics or short fiction. Wherever there are illustrations, you can be sure my hand drew nary a line. I rely on talented artists to bring my visions to life.

The Grim Collection will exist in three forms: Material first appears on The Grim Collection Web site, and are then collected in 32-page issues that will be available as print editions and digital publications.

The Grim Collection debuts on August 2, 2011.