3. By The Lights
The fireworks are done. The last of the Christmas lights still linger on the lazier houses. We decided to leave the angel lights strung over our windows for a little while longer because it gets dark much earlier these days and I quite like my late afternoon coffee by the lights, looking out the window.
It's the new year. Happy New Year! It's my third year of getting newsletters going and the key this year is going to be shorter ones but doing them more often. So let's dive in.
A Kinder Year
On the work front, 2020 was probably my busiest year yet. Which is an odd thing given the contrasting circumstances of life in 2020. And although I am certainly used to spending inordinate amounts of time alone and at a desk, in front of a screen, it is not my prefered MO.
I am a cafe writer, a man of crowds, at home in chaos. The quiet is disconcerting to me and while I've gotten used to interminable (but necessary) lockdowns here in London. I am forever reminded of that one month inbetween where I could go to the cafe again and my productivity doubled.
So the thing I learned by the end of 2020 was that it was okay to be a little kinder to myself. I reached out to editors, deadlines were moved around a little. Collaborators get it. As always I need my kindnesses also to be structured so I'm calling it organized comfort.
I put in a fireplace in December. I spend a lot more time reading in front of it. I spend a lot less time in front of a screen. It's a good start that hopefully leads to good work. So my advice for starting out 2021 is be kinder to yourself, organize your comfort, take care of you.
Work
These are all the things I worked on that came out in 2020. A bit of a cheat with These Savage Shores and Grafity's Wall - which were new releases/translated editions of previously published material. But all in all that's about 400 pages of comics. Blue In Green was IGN and AIPT's best OGN of 2020. It was also on multiple best of the year lists including Nerdist and SyFy. My work on JLD and Catwoman was also placed on multiple best of the year lists.
Of course the writing work on these started much earlier and so there's 2021 releases that I've been working on since September or so. 2021 promises to be equally busy if not more so.
The first of my 2021 releases is out this week
Part of the DC Future State event, Swamp Thing Future State #1 is out this week with Mike Perkins on art, June Chung on Colours, Aditya Bidikar on Letters. It was also announced that Mike and I would be working on a Swamp Thing series in 2021
Swamp Thing famously has had a long and storied history of incredible writers and artists on the book since its original creators Len Wein and Bernie Wrightson. My own interest and foray into comics is largely due to Alan Moore's defining run on the character back in the eighties. So when DC asked to see concepts for what was to be their 5G initiative, I put forward a Swamp Thing proposal. Of course there have been pubishing and organisational changes at DC but the interest in the concept remained strong with editor Alex Carr to be thanked for ensuring the book made its way through to publication.
We're changing a few things radically with the character. Swamp Thing features an Indian "host" for the first time. I love Alec Holland - he was part of my gateway into comics, he was my first introduction to Moore's writing. But change is important if you're going to make something new. Swamp Thing itself is an archetype, near immortal, mythological thing of the swamp, destined to watch the world change around itself. Aiding, fighting, managing it. I think it is perhaps important to the character to have that change be internal at some point. To have the character interrogate his own identity once again and to see the new world reflected in his interrogation of it. A Swamp Thing for today, here and now.
All that is to say, I am excited for people to see where we take this book. Mike Perkins, the artist on the series picked this project over several others that were offered to him and Mike's one of those guys that strikes me as someone who's seen it all in comics. His knowledge of characters and stories both on the page and behind the scenes, is near encyclopaedic. To see his reaction and enthusiasm for the things we're doing has been endlessly encouraging.
Swamp Thing Future State #1 is out today. I hear orders have been high and there have been allocations. So if you're picking up a single issue. Do it early!
There have been teases of more creator owned work.
Anand and I have begun work on our next book. It's oddly a project that we'd started working on long before we did Grafity's Wall (2018) or Blue in Green (2020) - but we're only now getting to work on it. I've promised to reveal no further details about it until Vault have had a chance to do so. So...watch this space.
I expect there will be 2 more creator owned books that'll be announced and published in 2021.
Work has also begun on an insanely ambitious project for late 2021 / early 2022. Dan Watters is involved. Stay tuned for a White Noise collaborative project?!
My work on Justice Leage Dark continues with Xermanico on art duties.
My work on Catwoman also continues with Fernando Blanco on art.
So the first half of 2021 is going to be utterly busy. I've been learning to be a bit more cognizant of the fact that I can only work on so many things at once and learning to be clear about that is an important thing, but also, I'm that guy who's wanted to tell stories since he was 13. I've had two and half decades worth of ideas sitting in my head and I'm getting to tell all of them now. Enthusiasm is a monstrous thing.
CRAFT
Big picture stuff to share on the craft front. Being busy and being kinder to myself has entailed a need for better organisation. My routine for 2021 is likely to have a few modifications.
I'm up at 10:30 as always. (Hey I quit a proper job just so I didn't have to wake up earlier.)
I was gifted a snazzy new coffee machine this Christmas. So 2 coffees while I listen to podcasts and catch up on current events.
12-2 work session
2-3 Lunch
3-5 work session
5 I go for a run
6-10 Reading by the fire, more coffee, general break and dinner.
10:30 - 12:30 - work session
12:30 - 1:30 - Read in bed.
the 3 work sessions work well. The brain churns between work sessions and so the writing while I'm at the desk tends to become easier. I get about 6 pages of script done this way. Yeah, I don't do whole issues in a day etc. I don't enjoy it. Not how I'm built.
I'm taking weekends off comics work, for the most part. I've started work on a prose thing on the weekends. We shall see how it goes.
2021 is also likely to see some TV related work come in. When that happens of course, I'll panic and this schedule will need exploding. Joy!
Speaking of schedules this has already eaten into my first work session. So to speed things up.
READING, LISTENING AND WATCHING
Books
A Collapse of Horses - Brian Evenson
The Loneliness of the Long Distance Cartoonist - Adrian Tomine
Music
Nujabes - Modal Soul
Film
Following - Chris Nolan
That's all I have for you, folks. Remember it's important to take care of yourself. Remember the days and nights are passing even if they seem to stand still. With each one we get closer to a better time and place. Just hold on and last it out a little while longer. I'm right there with you.
- Ram
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