A wonderful hardback version of the graphic novel Sinners is now running as a project on Kickstarter.
Sinners is Book Three in the Outland hardback series and Book One: Personal Demons and Book Two: Inheritance are also available as pledges in the Kickstarter, as well as a hardback edition of New England Gothic and Oddatsea combined, the fabulous Tarot deck and a brand new novella, A Semblance of Truth.
In fact, this Kickstarter is the only way at the moment to get this new novella.
There are also limited edition pins and original artwork on offer.
For more information and to pledge, please head over to the Sinners Kickstarter page. Your support on this project would be most appreciated!
Early on in the life of this book, the working title was Sins of the Fathers – as that’s very much what’s driving the story. Specifically, the fathers of our main characters.
Salamandra O’Stoat is the daughter of a rather unpleasant occultist called Durosimi who – with more ambition than wisdom – has managed to become a vampire. With the whole vampire/consumption plot under way, Salamandra has the awkward issue of dealing with a problem that has probably been caused by her father.
Owen Davies is the son of Reverenced Davies and we’d be getting into the realm of plot spoilers if I told you too much about his plot line through this book. Fair to say that none of it is easy for Owen as his father does something truly terrible.
If you’re a regular on the blog, you’ll mostly know the fathers from their regular appearances in The Squid and Teapot. here we find their more everyday selves. Reverend Davies tends to be austere and ineffectual, Durosimi is always plotting something but seldom gets what he wants. They’d both be a lot more harmful if they were competent, but thankfully most of the time they are not that effective. In Sinners, they both manage to cause a lot of harm.
Sinners represents the first of my writing on the Hopeless, Maine story. When I came to the project, Tom had already created a few pages in which Owen returned to the island and found a whole situation with consumption, and vampires. This draws on New England folklore that blamed consumption on vampires. I included Tom’s original story fragments in these graphic novels, and managed to weave them into a larger tale.
I’d written all kinds of things prior to Hopeless, Maine, but never a comics script. I had explored radio plays, so I drew primarily on this. Comics call for a really different approach to prose – you can’t have much narration, for a start. If you’re trying to describe scenes and action for an artist, you have to do that in a way that will sit on the page. At the outset, I didn’t have much sense of how anything was going to sit on the page, or how to pace things, or what anything should look like.
By the time these scripts were being translated into book form, I had more idea of how to make the text work. What came out in the Sloth editions was greatly pared down from the first draft. As a younger writer, I tended towards longer and more wandering sentences. Characters were circumspect, their intentions obscure, their speech misleading. I was all about the ambiguity. Frankly there’s only so much of that you can get away with in a comics page. I kept what I could of the flavour, but sometimes I had to cut the script to the bone and focus on getting the story across.
Comics are not my natural habitat. I’m too interested in the inner lives of characters, in thought and feelings, and as a young writer, I wasn’t big on action. As I’ve got older, the amount of action in my stories has increased considerably. Shedding literary pretentions like the dead skins they were, has helped a lot. Having more life experience has helped a lot too. There was such a long time between the first draft and the final script that I changed a lot as a writer along the way.
Initially, I wrote Hopeless (starting with Sinners) as a single script, because it looked like it was going out into the world as a webcomic. Also I had no idea how much script represented a page, or how big a book ought to be. I really had no idea what I was doing. That lead to a later process (when I did know what I was doing) of breaking the story into book length chunks, and then figuring out chapters, and specific pages. It took a lot of work, time, learning and thinking. I went from having no clue as to how a graphic novel works structurally, to having a pretty good idea.
I occasionally have thoughts about doing a small comic on my own – so far I’ve not got beyond three or four beat comic strips, but it might happen.
Mr Squash regarded the great wall of rocks barring his way, and absently scratched his mighty head. Reluctantly he had to accept that it was beyond even his ability to shift them. No one else would be strong enough to help him, either; besides, such aid would have been impossible. The rockfall was blocking a portal that only he could see. It was the blessing and curse of this liminal gateway that anyone who did not happen to be a Sasquatch would simply find themselves staring at two old, unremarkable, ash trees, their trunks leaning against each other like a pair of companionable drunkards. Non-Sasquatches wishing to pass beneath that natural archway could happily do so, and would, as expected, find themselves to be still on the island of Hopeless, Maine.
You will doubtless be unsurprised to learn that Mrs Beaten does not approve of Mr Squash. It is not just that he is eight feet tall, covered in coarse hair and weighs-in at eight-hundred pounds. Neither is it the fact that he insists on wandering around totally devoid of any sort of clothing. She can let this point pass, purely because he has no discernible ‘bits’ on display (to use her own terminology). Heaven knows, she has looked often enough. Obviously, this was a sacrifice she was forced to make in order to ensure that proper standards of decency are maintained on the island. (You may recall that the mystery of Mr Squash’s private parts was discussed in the tale ‘A Safe Place’). What really disturbs Mrs Beaten is that the creature pretends to be so civilised, casually conversing with one and all, and dropping six-syllable words all over the place, as if he were human – which he most certainly is not. Worse still, he seems to have lately joined forces with Durosimi O’Stoat, someone else for whom Mrs Beaten has little time. Far be it from her to gossip, but various snatches of conversation that she has overheard seem to imply that this Mr Squash fellow and Durosimi have conspired to take advantage of Doc Willoughby’s recent illness. It appears that they have kidnapped the poor man, imprisoning him in some ghastly monkey-house, which, as far as she understands, is situated in somewhere called the Hilly Layers, wherever that is.
It’s just not right, not right at all. Something should be done about it!
“Do you think that Squash has forgotten about us?”
Doc Willoughby scowled at his bowl of tsampa, and wished that it would magically transform into a slice of starry-grabby pie.
‘What? No, of course not,” said Durosimi reassuringly, whilst crossing his fingers behind his back. “Just have some patience, Willoughby. He’ll be here soon enough.”
The words were barely out of his mouth when Tenzin, a young novice monk, appeared at the door of their lodgings. He bowed and said,
“I have news from The Spirits of the Glaciers.”
(Tenzin’s ability to speak perfect English is one of those mysteries of the orient with which we need not concern ourselves.)
“Who are they?” asked a somewhat irritated Doc Willoughby.
“They’re a bit like Squash,” said Durosimi. “Cousins of his, I believe. I saw them when I came here before. Come to think of it, they’re a lot bigger than Squash. Much, much bigger, in fact, and covered in white fur.”
Doc gulped, and paled visibly.
“The Spirits of the Glaciers tell me that the path to your island is blocked and your friend will not be able to get through,” said Tenzin. “It is their intention to clear a way for him, but it will take time.”
Doc’s face fell.
“That’s all I need,” he grumbled. “I want to go home, and I am sick of the smell of Yak Butter.”
Durosimi nodded. The lamas splashed butter around everywhere and anywhere that oil or grease might be needed, including using it to fuel their lamps. Its ubiquity could be off-putting, but that did not prevent him, however, from scheming to take a generous supply back to Hopeless when the time came.
Unlike the Doc, Durosimi was enjoying his time in Tibet. Although regarded as something of a mystic by the islanders of Hopeless, he was aware that his powers were as nothing compared with many of the lamas whom he had encountered here. Durosimi wanted to learn everything that he could.
“As our rescue doesn’t appear to be imminent,” he said, “I’d like to visit an anchorite who lives a mile or so away. Tenzin, will you come and act as my translator?”
A cold hand seemed to grip Tenzin’s heart. He knew who the anchorite was, and he had little wish to visit him. It would, however, break the rules of hospitality to refuse the apparently simple request of an honoured guest.
They found the anchorite standing at his door, as if expecting his visitors, although no word had been sent ahead. The fellow cut an odd figure, not being dressed in the familiar burgundy robes of the monks, but instead clothed in a simple, sleeveless white shift which reached his feet. Beneath this he wore a saffron-yellow shirt with voluminous sleeves. A rosary, apparently fashioned from small ivory beads, hung around his neck. Strangest of all, his long black hair fell in thick braids, almost touching his heels.
To Durosimi’s surprise, Tenzin immediately prostrated himself at the feet of the anchorite who, as if used to such behaviour, waved a hand in blessing, then turned, retreating into the dark doorway of his hut and signalling for his visitors to follow.
“Who is this man?” whispered Durosimi, who had been expecting to meet some gentle and saintly lama.
“He is Dawasandup, a powerful gomchen, who has lived alone in the hills for many years. It is said that he has dominion over demons, is able to fly through the air and can kill a man at a distance. They say that the rosary which he wears is made of one hundred and eight pieces of bone, each cut from a different human skull.”
Durosimi smiled grimly.
“He sounds exactly like my sort of holy-man,” he gloated.
“And that’s what troubles me,” thought Tenzin, but wisely decided to keep such concerns to himself.
After some recent discussions in the pub it has become obvious that not everyone knows what to do if they find a dead g’nee. Back in the day of course we caught the giant ones and processed their oil, but the really big ones don’t come to the island any more, for some reason.
G’nee are easy to identify. If you find something with tentacles that has been crushed by a rock, this will be a g’nee. They have a nearly-invisible hot hair balloon as part of their anatomy, and when their candles run out, they fall out of the sky and are often killed by the stones they were carrying. Why they feel the urge to carry the stones is anyone’s guess – maybe as stands for the candles. How they get the candles remains a mystery. How they light the candles is also unknown. But they are at least easy to identify when dead.
Having scraped what remains of the g’nee off the stone, you have to press the oil out. This is best done through either squeezing, or the application of weight or pressure. Do not try to boil the oil out, this does not work. The oil is dark, thick and smelly. It is exceptionally good for oiling machinery. It is singularly dreadful for cooking with, and as James Weaselegrease has recently ascertained, likely to induce vomiting. Frankly, if James can’t eat it, no one can.
We hear rumour that some people swear by it as a skin oil. Applying it to the skin is likely to make your average islander smell a good deal worse than usual, and as the oil deteriorates, the smell increases. Whether there are any skin benefits to be achieved remains to be seen – we look forward to hearing about you experiments with this.
(Image and text by Nimue, with input from James and Keith)
Or so Duckhouse Eddie would have thought, were he given to thoughts.
You see, Duckhouse Eddie … but I get ahead of myself.
Allow me to introduce myself. I am Delia Spatchcock.
Yes, you heard me right.
Delia.
It’s an old family name; both my father and my grand-uncle (who was also my grand-aunt for a while) went by the name Delia.
But anyway.
Duckhouse Eddie was a lodger at – well, that doesn’t actually matter for this story.
He was strongly built, with a wide chest and a narrow waist; legs almost too narrow to support his bulk, but fortunately his head was quite light because it was mostly empty. It was said that when it rained – which, given it was mostly cloudy all the time, wasn’t actually that often – that he would feel it first.
But that wasn’t why he was called Duckhouse.
He was called Duckhouse because –
Well. I’m not sure we really need to go into that.
Anyway.
To rd. Yes. Well.
Oh, is that the time? I must be going. Maybe next time. You see, there are lots of interesting people in this cul-de-foggy-sack-built-buildings area. Thing. Whatever we call this place we make a home. I shall introduce you to some more of them later.
“Do they really expect me to eat this muck?” Doc Willoughby regarded his bowl of dark cereal with a look of disdain.
“It’s called tsampa, the staple diet of the monastery, and it is all that there is,” snapped Durosimi O’Stoat. “If you bothered to taste it, you would find that it’s really quite good.”
“I would be happier if I knew exactly what I was eating,” complained the Doc. “I can’t say I trust these fellows…”
“They are monks, for goodness sake!” exclaimed Durosimi, exasperated. “They’ve saved your life. Show some gratitude for once.”
Doc eyed his companion warily. This sudden respect for others was a side of the sorcerer that he had never seen before.
“Well, what’s in it?” asked the Doc.
“As far as I understand,” replied Durosimi, regaining his composure, “it is made of roasted flour and some seeds…”
“And what else?” muttered the Doc, suspiciously.
“Something called bod ja – Tibetan tea. It’s all perfectly good and, I have been assured, extremely nutritious also.”
Durosimi decided not to go into the details of how bod ja is made. Doc did not need to know that a large lump of greasy yak butter gets added to some heavily salted tar-black tea, which had previously been strained through a horse-hair colander. Neither did he need to be apprised of the information that this concoction is then churned until it reaches the consistency of thick oil, and added to the flour and seeds in order to make tsampa. Durosimi felt that knowing this, the Doc may have been disinclined to eat. Why such facts might have bothered someone who was more than happy to gorge on starry-grabby pie, however, is something of a mystery to me.
If you have just wandered into this tale after several weeks, or more, away, you may be wondering what Durosimi O’Stoat and Doc Willoughby are doing, enjoying the hospitality of a Tibetan Buddhist monastery, high up in the Himalayan Mountains and many thousands of miles from Hopeless, Maine. To cut a long story short, Doc Willoughby – for reasons yet unknown – had been found, not so much at Death’s door, but wiping his boots on Death’s welcome mat. Philomena Bucket and Mr Squash, the Sasquatch, agreed that the Doc’s only hope of being saved lay in the healing hands of the lamas of the legendary Dge-lugs-pa, or the Yellow Hat sect, (fortunately, these days they are known more for their distinctive burgundy robes than their yellow hats). Durosimi, who had visited the monastery some time before, offered to go and keep an eye on the Doc, and so Mr Squash transported the pair of them to the Himalayas, via one of his mysterious portals. Now you are up to date.
Philomena Bucket winced as Mr Squash lowered his huge, eight-hundred pound frame onto the old wooden settle bench that had stood for years in the corner of the bar of The Squid and Teapot.
“Is that worried look, etched upon your dear face, placed there for my welfare, or for the settle’s?” he asked mischievously.
“Both,” Philomena admitted. “I wouldn’t want to see either of you damaged.”
“That’s not likely,” said the Sasquatch, “This old seat is as solid as The Squid itself; it will take more than my delicate weight to do it harm.”
Philomena smiled. She hoped that he was right.
“Talking of damaged goods,” said Mr Squash, “it’s high time that I brought Doc Willoughby back from Tibet. If the monks have not cured him by now, they never will.”
“You don’t know, he might want to stay there,” said Philomena, optimistically.
“Don’t get your hopes up,” replied the Sasquatch. “Besides, Durosimi is with him. Having to entertain those two for any length of time wouldn’t be fair on the monks. It would be enough to make them lose their religion completely.”
“And we wouldn’t want that, would we?” laughed Philomena.
Mr Squash waited until daybreak on the following morning before leaving for Tibet. As ever, wisps of mist curled around the portal, which was just a simple natural gateway formed between two trees. If you or I had stepped through we would have found ourselves to be nowhere other than a stride away from where we had started, but for Mr Squash, and anyone whom he carried, it was a wormhole – albeit a large one – to the Himalayas, the land of his cousins, known to humans as the Yeti.
“Bon voyage, old friend,” said Reggie Upton, who had come to see him off. “Give my regards to your relatives.”
Mr Squash waved and disappeared into the portal. A few seconds later he returned, a concerned look in his wise and ancient eyes.
“Something wrong, old chap?” asked Reggie.
“There has been a rock-fall on the other side,” said the Sasquatch. “It’s totally blocked, and far too much for me to shift. There is no way that I can get through.”
A Semblance of Truth is a Hopeless Maine novella set in the same time frame as the first graphic novel. It started life here on the blog, and developed into a tale of the island from the perspective of journalist Frampton Jones.
It would be fair to say that Frampton is not a reliable narrator. He tries very hard to be fair and honest, but he experiences a descent into madness that has him questioning everything he knows. What he shares can therefore only ever be a semblance of truth.
It’s interesting looking back at the early island science in this book, for it was written before islanders had really got to grips with the presence of spoonwalkers. Imagine not having any spoons but also not knowing why you don’t have any spoons. Fortunately we all live in more enlightened times now.
In recent weeks, we’ve had odd glimmers of sun on the island – rare summery conditions that have had strange effects on the locals. A person might safely venture forth without wearing a scarf. Some have even gone so far as to roll up their shirt sleeves, or turn up the cuffs on their trousers.
This has proved difficult for Mrs Beaten. The sight of exposed forearms inspires uneasy feelings in her. Especially the vision of blue-ish veins in skin pale from scarcity of sunlight. Gaze for too long and you can make out the presence of a pulse. It is too much, too intimate beholding such things unexpectedly. And as for the trousers…
Mrs Beaten tries not to think about what anyone else might have beneath their trousers, or under their skirts. If the notion is unavoidable, she likes to picture candlesticks and lamp stands. It is a horrifying thing to be able to see a person’s socks. No one should bare their undergarments in this way. A little exposed skin about the calf is too shocking, truly wanton. The young men seem at ease with these appalling displays of flesh.
Mrs Beaten worries about where this will lead, and what unspeakable acts may follow. This orgy of trouser rolling, this hedonistic horror of visible shins runs the risk of inviting other, even more dreadful acts of deviation. She fears the exposure of knees, tries hard not to think about knees, finds herself haunted by the idea of them.
What would she do if she happened to be walking in the street and a man came towards her with his knees on display? How could she possibly cope? Could she control herself in such circumstances? She hopes that the overwhelming nature of the encounter would provoke her into saying some stern and appropriate words of condemnation. She fears that she might stand there transfixed, unable to look away from the sordid display.
If the man asked her to touch his knees, what would she do?
She thinks a lot about the danger of such a proposition. The exact way in which it might be phrased. She pictures a scenario in which she is unexpectedly close to the man who has exposed his leg joints so shamelessly for her viewing.
“Look at my knees, Mrs Beaten. You know you want to look at them,” he says in her mind.
She tells herself that she absolutely does not want to be trapped in a narrow alleyway with a man who demands she looks at his knees. And yet somehow she can still hear his voice in her head. “I’ve got big knees,” he says.
Mr Squash squatted on the ground outside Neville Moore’s mausoleum-like home, idly stroking the bible-black, though distinctly dishevelled, feathers on the head of Neville’s pet raven, Lenore.
“People have lost fingers for attempting less,” observed Neville, admiringly.
“And over-ambitious birds have lost their heads for trying,” said Mr Squash. “Luckily, Lenore and I have an understanding.”
The raven gave the Sasquatch a sideways glance and shuffled uncomfortably on her perch.
“Reggie Upton told me that you’ve been away, trying to find a cure for whatever it is that’s troubling Doc Willoughby,” said Neville, changing the subject.
“Yes. I had to take him to a Buddhist temple high in the Himalayas,” replied Mr Squash. “He’s barely alive, and the monks there are his only chance.”
While it is almost impossible to leave the island of Hopeless, Maine, Mr Squash is able to come and go as he pleases, via a series of secret portals. Convenient as these doorways are, they are potentially lethal for mere humans. As I have mentioned before, in a society more conscious of Health and Safety procedures, each portal would doubtless have carried a notice, proclaiming in large, angry letters:
‘DANGER – NO ADMITTANCE. HUMAN ACCESS STRICTLY FORBIDDEN. SASQUATCHES ONLY BEYOND THIS POINT.’
“What concerns me,” admitted Mr Squash, “is if the trip kills Doc Willoughby, then so be it. He would have been a dead man anyway if he’d not gone. Durosimi, on the other hand, didn’t really have to accompany him. I would have stayed.”
“Durosimi?” said a surprised Neville. Mr Squash nodded.
“He volunteered to keep an eye on the Doc. The trouble is, he looked in as bad a state as Willoughby when I left them. The monks are going to have their work cut out with those two.”
“Good luck with that,” said Neville. Lenore, who had become restless, and still brooding over recent references to lost heads, flapped noisily up onto a window ledge that had been generously streaked with guano.
“When are you fetching them back?” asked Neville.
“I’ll give it a week or so. I’ve relatives living up that way.”
“Ah, the Yeti,” said Neville, who had read about such creatures in several of the many books that Philomena regularly sent along to him, foraged from the attics of The Squid and Teapot.
“Don’t let them hear you calling them that,” said Mr Squash. “It’s not particularly complimentary in Tibetan. It’s almost as bad as referring to me as Bigfoot.” With that, Mr Squash rose to his feet (and yes, they are inclined to be on the largish size) dwarfing the hermit of Ghastly Green. “I need to get back to The Squid and collect Drury,” he said. “We’re keeping young Winston Oldspot, The Night-Soil Man, company tonight. It seems that he thinks we’ve all abandoned him.”
“Yes, apparently so,” said Neville. “He did look a bit miffed when I saw him the other night.”
“Philomena’s sending him over some Starry-Grabby pie,” said Mr Squash. “That should cheer the lad up.”
“If there’s any going spare,” said Neville, hopefully, “Lenore and I would be very grateful…”
“I’ll see what I can do,” said the Sasquatch, quietly wondering to himself how anyone could possibly manage to eat the stuff.
Meanwhile, half a world away, in the high Himalayas, Doc Willoughby and Durosimi O’Stoat were lost in comfortable oblivion, unaware of the burgundy-robed lamas who rotated the prayer-wheels on their behalf.
