i-Magery: Mark Waid on the digital reinvention of comics

When cinema was first invented, plenty of people thought it would just be like pointing a camera at a play. Television? Oh sure, that's radio you can see. And again when videogames came along: all those wannabe-movie cut scenes with bits of shooting and platform jumping between. I'm sure I've said this all before. It sounds like the kind of thing I would say.

A new medium always has a period when it is struggling inside the confining box of an earlier medium. You don't get The Unfinished Swan or Shadow of the Colossus or even Telltale's Walking Dead until you've sat through the long linear infodumps of something like Metal Gear Solid. You can't arrive at the end of Tony Soprano's driveway without passing through Peyton Place.

I talked a while back about how digital reading platforms can change comics. For "change" read "liberate" - from the tyranny of the page, from having to hit a reveal on just the right panel, from having to take a machete to the dialogue (a particular bugbear for a word nerd like me) because it takes up too much space.

Comics have always been storyboards. In the absence of today's tech, writers and artists had to find ways to nudge the reader's attention to the right word balloon, to make them parse and run the images cinematically in their mind without the intrusion of a storyboard's zoom lines and motion arrows.

I've never minded doing that work. Captain Kirk said problems give him a bellyache, but I thrive on 'em. That said, if a new technology solves the problem, I'm not going to be a Luddite about it. There are plenty of other exciting things about visual storytelling to get my motor started in the mornings. This business is Ready Brek for problem solvers.

To be clear, I'm not talking about motion comics here. Motion comics are just cheap animation. Very cheap animation. And I like animation, almost as much as I like comics, but I'm not rushing to pay out for a cheap, bastardized form of both. When Porter Anderson, publishing industry scrutineer and a stalwart champion of serious literature, originally told me about Malk Waid's talk at the Tools of Change conference, I feared that's what it was about. I should have had more faith in the author of Irredeemable.

Porter described the attentive silence in the room as Mark demonstrated the comics that his company Thrillbent are producing. And this at TOC, where awe is awful hard to earn. So maybe that's another way that new technology can liberate comics - it can liberate the medium from the stigma of pulpy trash that so many people in publishing attach to it.

I'll close with the two key takeaways from Mark's talk: "This is using digital storytelling tools to do things you cannot do in print," and yet: "Like any other form of reading, you are in control of the pace at which you absorb the story." See, there's nothing to be afraid of. For all the glitzy new tech, right at the heart it's still comics. 

Comics on Kindle

Following on from the preview of Mirabilis: Winter volume 2, here's news that should please anyone who found a Kindle under the Christmas tree. We've just re-released the Kindle mini-episodes collecting the first thirty pages of volume 1. If you're signed up for Amazon Prime you can borrow them anytime, but even if not you can grab the first two completely free tomorrow or Saturday.

Episode 1.1 is "Stung!" which first appeared in DFC #30 (the 2008 Christmas issue). Jack is about to face a duel to the death when he finds an ancient two-headed coin that's destined to change his life forever. Get "Stung!" from the Kindle Store US here and UK here.

Episode 1.2 is "The Door in the Water". Jack meets Gus for the first time - but it's in a dream, so maybe it doesn't count. And when he wakes up he goes witch-hunting, only it turns out the witch is the one with the killing jar. That's in the Kindle Store US here and UK here.

Episode 1.3, "The Wrong Side of Bedlam" sees Gus (that's Talisin of the Shining Brow to us) escaping from a padded cell, Jack trapped in a witch bottle, and the boffins of the Royal Mythological Society explaining what's in store now the green comet has reappeared. It's in the Kindle Store US here and UK here.

And if you don't have a Kindle, don't despair, because all of those early episodes are online right here.

All-new Mirabilis

Tomorrow and for ten days, Leo and Nikos and I will be bringing you a never-before-seen taster of season two, work on which is what has kept us so busy that we've barely had time to post anything recently. But now those pages are rolling off the production line and - oh my, they look fantastic. But don't take my word for it. Pop back tomorrow and see for yourself.

Eyes on the road

I've had my head down the last week tweaking the various versions of the Binscombe Tales series (see previous post) which is why there's been a dearth of Mirabilis-related material lately. But the good news is that's going to be fixed in a major way very soon, as we'll be bringing you nearly two weeks' worth of daily Mirabilis strips as a trailer for the first Spring book due next year.

In the meantime, although the Binscombe Tales books don't go on sale till October, there's already a trailer for them too, in the form of a story called "Eyes" which you can view on BookBuzzr (below), or as a free EPUB here, or as a Kindle version here, or PDF here. I feel guilty for neglecting you, that must be what it is.

"Eyes" (also known as "It Has Been Said") is one of my favourite Binscombe Tales. And if it should put you in mind of a certain long-running horror movie franchise, be aware that the story was originally published by the Haunted Library over a decade before the cameras started rolling on the first in that series. And there are twenty-five other tales in the series, each with its own killer weird concept. If you like ghost stories, horror, modern fantasy and dark SF, you'll want to keep an eye out. Um, okay, maybe that's a poor choice of words, considering...

In a few days we'll be back with more news of the Mirabilis daily strip. Don't miss.

Mean little beasts, all shaggy with kelp

Two more days remain of the under-a-dollar special offer on the Kindle edition of The Year of Wonders. The book comprises fifty fantasy vignettes in the form of correspondence sent from around the world to the Royal Mythological Society. Wondering what to do about a talking cow? Missing breakfast because fairies got at the milk? Turfed out of your local by pirates? Vexed by the problem of how to catalogue a chimera? Or at the mercy of the elements thanks to a levitating roof? Our boffins, armed with little practical experience but plenty of enthusiasm, are ready to advise on these and many other problems caused by the head-on collision of reality and fantasy. For example:

Dear Doctor Clattercut and Professor Bromfield

I would expect you to be familiar with our village, as it is famous in a small way for having a sunken twin a little way out to sea. When I was a girl, I could stand on the cliffs and, with the wind in the right direction, it was possible to hear the tolling of the submerged church bell coming up out of the waves.

Now that things are as they are, our submarine neighbours no longer content themselves with the occasional ringing of a bell. Walking my dog along the beach, as often as not I will encounter a group of mermaids riding there. Their manners are polite, but I think there is some teasing in their glance and their ponies are mean little beasts, all shaggy with kelp and very high and briny to the nose. You know the smell when the tide goes right out; it's like that.

My concern, however, is the mermaids’ effect on our village. Twice a week, or Wednesdays and Saturdays, they come and sit on the beach with trinkets to sell. And I know where they get those trinkets. One of them had an ivory pipe that I recognized. It belonged to my grandfather, who was drowned at sea on my first day at junior school.

Yours sincerely, Mabel Catchpole (Mrs), Dunwich

Dr Clattercut replies: An interesting case, Mrs Catchpole, and thank you for bringing it to our attention. I don’t know if I would consider what the mermaids are doing to be looting. Any knickknacks they find on the sea bed were, after all, irretrievably lost to us on dry land. One could argue they are performing a valuable service akin to marine salvage. Admittedly, however, there is a suggestion here of grave-robbing. What do you say, Bromfield?

Prof Bromfield: Hmm? Just thinking… Cabyll-ushteys, those sea ponies are called – that’s what they call them in the Isle of Man, anyway. They’re more than pesky. Get in trouble out swimming and they’ll drag you down and eat you up. All of you except the liver, funnily enough.

Dr Clattercut: I believe the Suffolk version is less outrightly murderous, though still a creature to be wary of. I was kicked by one while collecting trilobites at Aldeburgh two months ago and I still have a bruise. But just a moment – how do mermaids..?

Prof Bromfield: Side saddle, old chap.

You can get the complete Kindle book of Royal Mythological Society correspondence from Amazon US, Amazon Europe or Amazon UK, and if you want to look at a few more letters you could check out the free previews on MyEbook or fReado.

Comics 2.0

Six months ago, when we launched the Mirabilis iPad app, we had only the vaguest idea about online stores like Graphic.ly and Comics+. We figured that getting our work out on them was just like putting it in Barnes & Noble as well as Borders.

Well, these are interesting times. There's a lot to learn, and it's fun having to learn it. Like seeing how the online comic stores are as much like fan clubs as they are places to browse and buy digital comics. I enjoy Graphic.ly boss Micah Baldwin's regular mail-outs, wherein it seems to me that he has picked up the mantle of Stan Lee's old Bullpen Bulletins that made Marvel not just the home of fabulous stories, but a great place to hang out too.

If you haven't encountered Graphic.ly yet, this update by Micah on the revamp they're doing this week ought to whet your appetite:

When we started Graphicly, our intent was always to create a place for people that love creating, sharing and discovering great stories.

Remember the first time you ever heard a great story? What was awesome about it is that someone shared the story with you. Story is not a solo activity.

We are taking a big step towards making story truly social and collaborative with the launch of our new site. There are the features you would expect: Profiles, Twitter and Facebook integration, amazing reader, solid search and a great store.

But, here is what is cool. Take the comics with you. Just like a YouTube video, you can now embed the comic wherever you want. Put it on your blog. Include it in a story.

Story has become truly shareable, and great content has become discoverable.

Interview on Guys Can Read

Guys Can Read is a must-not-miss podcast series in which co-hosts Luke Navarro and Kevin McGill take a weekly look at books. What's really refreshing about their shows is that, no matter whether they're tackling a comic book or a literary classic, they always bring the same respectful attention, enthusiasm and demand for high storytelling standards.

Their love of story really crackles across the airwaves (I know but, come on, it sounds better than "cables") and it came as no surprise to me that Luke is working on his Literature Ph.D. while Kevin is the author of a exciting new fantasy series called Nikolas and Company that I think will appeal to Mirabilis readers.

I was honored to be asked onto their 50th show and we had a great time talking about comics and writing in general, role-playing games, fantasy, science fiction, mythology... Lots of cool stuff. And you know what? It's not a private party - you can come too. Jump in right here and then come tell me what you thought.

Mirabilis nabs top three slots on BookBuzzr!

We just heard that Mirabilis took the #1, #2 and #3 positions in the overall ratings on preview platform BookBuzzr for last month, with our first issue having clocked up nearly 30,000 views on that one site alone!

Now, impressive though that is, you don't need to read Mirabilis in the nifty little BookBuzzr widget any more because it is now (as I'll never tire of saying) up there for the whole world to see on Graphic.ly's gorgeous array of digital platforms. And to cap that, the first two issues are free. That's 60 pages of green comety goodness for the whopping price of absolutely nothing. Grab it before the wind changes!

The digital future of comics

It's kind of odd, as I'm not really that much of a tech-head. I've designed videogames, but I always had a team of coders to handle all the complicated techy stuff. And suddenly Leo and Martin and I are embracing all the new-fangled digital media - and the biggest surprise is that I find I'm really getting into it. Not just the tech side, but the whole big picture of how it's going to change comics.

Like collecting an armful of books every month. That's in my bones, been doing it since I was 9 years old, but more and more I found I was saving all the latest issues of Hellblazer or BPRD or whatever till there was a complete story to read. If you're doing that, you may as well just wait for the trade paperback, but of course that's not much fun for the publisher, who really needs the regular cashflow of monthly sales. However, the cost of paper has gone up and the number of places you can find comics on sale has gone down. Monthly comic books are never going to be on the shelves in Waterstones. Hmm, problem.

Now, I know a lot of old-school comics fans hate digital comics with a passion. They shouldn't, though, because digital comics are the answer to that problem. What's more, digital comics don't spell the death of print; they're going to rejuvenate it. Now I can dip in and try the first few pages or even the first couple of issues of a comic for free. If I like it, I can buy all the issues I want straight away, and I can read those on my iPad, phone or desktop. That's the kind of freedom Steve Jobs was talking about when he said:

"Your den, your living room, your car and your pocket: I hope that gives you a little bit of an idea of where we're going."

So that's cool, but here's the thing: I now buy more TPBs and print graphic novels than I ever did before. Digital isn't replacing the whole comics reading experience, it's just gradually taking up some of the slack lost to falling monthly sales. E-comics sales aren't (yet) at a level that Dark Horse are going to drop their monthly books altogether, but already we can see how e-comics can add to and enhance the raft of formats available for fans.

Our own toe-dipping with Mirabilis began with our dedicated iPad app - still the best digital comics reading experience for my money, and I can say that because I did actually have to pay to buy my own issues through the App Store! We've got an update coming for the app that will introduce social networking features, reorganize the in-app storefront and improve the UI. But a dedicated app for each title, even if that's the jewel in the crown, is not going to be the future of e-comics. We're seeing the rise of... are they publishers? are they stores?... sites like Comics+ and Graphic.ly, who take a modest share of revenue for adapting and hosting your comic on multiple platforms. This week we launched Mirabilis on Graphic.ly (iVerse's Comics+ will follow later this month) and that means readers can buy once and then read the comics on iOS, Android and PC/Mac, with Sony PSP not far off.

Why is it good for creators? Fifty to seventy percent royalties, and a means of cashflowing your work without having to sign away any ancillary rights. Why is it good for publishers? Digital sales can give a title a leg-up to the point where it's ready to come out as a collected print book. And all those digital outlets build the brand so there is a ready core market for the print book. Also, because comics are no longer tied to the narrowcasting inherent in selling via hobby comics stores, that means the end product actually can sit on a shelf in a store like Waterstones and not look out of place. Comics can be for everyone.

And that's why, most importantly of all, e-comics are good for readers - even for those readers who prefer to stick with print. Because digital editions will create more choice, lead to a more robust business, encourage creativity and innovation, and broaden the appeal of the medium. It's all good news for comics fans, so look forward to some exciting things coming your way in the very near future.

Mirabilis on Android, iPhone, Windows Phone 7

A picture may be worth a thousand words but, in the immortal words of Tony Stark, is it too much to ask for both? So here's the thousand words: Mirabilis season one launches this week on Graphic.ly's multi-platformed storefront. If you've had your nose pressed like Tiny Tim to the Apple Store window wondering about that iPad, save your money - the new version's out in a month or two anyway, and in the meantime you can now get Mirabilis on a whole bunch of smartphones and other devices.

Which devices? Well, desktop or laptop for starters. You can get the free Adobe AIR application which really is a nice presentation frame for your comics. Then there are the iPad, iPhone and Android versions - also absolutely free, naturally. And if you prefer to go old school, there's Graphic.ly's web reader that lets you have a look inside all their latest titles and to view the ones you collect on stunning fullscreen view. Setting up your Graphic.ly ID takes a couple of clicks and then you can read your comics on any or all of the supported platforms.

Is that not enough great news for you yet? Okay, well try this: as an introductory offer you can get both Mirabilis #1 and #2 for free. And Graphic.ly offer a whole bunch of other great titles in their online store, many of them free, and all backed up by the kind of extras we're coming to expect in digital comics: creator info, interviews, trailers, character tags and so on. Having just raised a further $3 million investment, Graphic.ly are ramping up to be one of the major forces in the new comics media, and we're very proud to have Mirabilis as part of their 2011 flagship line.

Know what, that's not even three hundred words - but I don't want to hold you up. I'm sure you'll be eager to get your phone out and start reading!

Mirabilis on Android and iPhone

Big shout out today for Kate Lauder and the rest of the awesome Graphic.ly team, who have been pulling out all the stops to get Mirabilis season one converted to all their platforms. I've just been taking a look at the online proofs for issues #1-#3 and the work Kate's guys have done is stunning. Even if I wasn't the writer, I'd be one of Mirabilis's biggest fans.

Those first 8 issues will be going live next month, and what that means is that you won't need to buy an iPad to read Mirabilis any more. It'll be on iPhone, Windows Phone 7, Android and Adobe AIR for Mac/PC. And you only need to buy once to have the issues on any of those OS/devices that you own. (I'm still going to say you should have an iPad, though.)

Graphic.ly aren't just about putting the comic pages out there digitally, oh no. They appreciate that comics are about community as well as content. This was a big part of what made me a Marvel rather than DC fan when I first got hooked on comic books in the (gulp) late '60s. The DC stories were fine and all, but they didn't seem too interested in the stuff that surrounded that. Often you didn't know who'd created a DC story, while Marvel credited inks and letters as well as story and art. DC often dropped the letters page, whereas Marvel usually gave you two and made sure to reply to them. And most importantly, Marvel comics had the Bullpen Bulletin page. When you look at some of the news snippets, it sometimes seems to me like Stan and co had foreseen Twitter :

Our own STAN LEE and his old friend CARMINE INFANTINO shared a lively lunch together recently. They got all misty-eyed talking over old times and speculating about what might have been and what new excitement is still in store for all of comicdom.

Speaking of JACK KIRBY, he and his radiant Roz are now building their own home in sunny California. He should worry how much we haveta spend on postage stamps!

How about RASCALLY ROY THOMAS finally seeing his life-long idol, Elvis Presley, during his recent West Coast vacation?

Maybe you had to be there. Anyway, Graphic.ly's Micah Baldwin totally gets this. What first attracted us to getting Mirabilis on their platform was his comment that, "Digitial comics need to be more. [We need to] grow the comic experience."

So part of what Kate's team has been doing is tagging characters (so that new readers don't confused - something a book like X-Men could do with) and setting up the feedback, comments, creators' cameos and other extras that turn a bunch of words and pictures into a full-blown comic community.

Mirabilis on Android, iOS and Adobe AIR. The whole of season one. Next month. Be sure to have your phones charged 'n' ready.

The green comet is getting hot!

Almost six weeks on from release of the Mirabilis iPad comics app, things are getting exciting. We've had two million impressions webwide and over two thousand hits on the Mirabilis website. Is that in the six weeks since the app was launched? Nope, would you believe in the last three days!

Meanwhile, Mirabilis is still in the Top 30 on "What's Hot" in iTunes books and in BookBuzzr's Top 10 most-read ebooks for December. The mini-episodes "Stung!", "The Door in the Water" and "The Wrong Side of Bedlam" are starting to storm up the charts in the Kindle Store. And we're gearing up for our debut in the iBookstore too.

And all of this is just the start, because in a few weeks you'll see all eight issues of Mirabilis: Winter appearing on a whole range of devices courtesy of leading digital comics platforms Graphic.ly and iVerse Media's Comics+. So although iPad is still my personal e-reader of choice, you'll now be able to carry the Year of Wonders around on your phone too. (Shavers and TV remotes may take a little longer.)

Nor is electronic the only option. If the age of digital comics has shown us one thing, it's that all these new ways of reading are breathing a new burst of vigor into print comics and graphic novels as well. In a few weeks I'll get you the on-the-street dates for those big 'n' beautiful hardcover editions of Winter volumes one and two from Print Media Productions, and a pretty firm idea of when the first issues of Mirabilis: Spring will be hitting the App Store.

I'm writing those issues right now and it's a blast. The action leaps on a couple of months from Winter, the green comet is getting dazzlingly bright in the sky now, which means that fantasy is rife and... oh-oh, no spoilers. Let's just say that this new season starts with a bunch of stunning surprises that will put your jaw on the floor. And it all gets bigger, sexier and more wondrous from there on in.

Kindle users - here's your MOBI comic book!

After the app and epub versions, of course the Kindle had to be next on our list. So here is the first issue of Mirabilis in MOBI format. Creating this version meant chopping the pages of issue #1 into two hundred separate images (one panel per page in most cases) and then converting them to grayscale and crunching them down to a size the device can handle. Yet, as the picture above shows, the spark of genius in Leo's, Martin's and Nikos's work still shines through.

If you've got a device with a Kindle emulator and a color screen, you'll probably opt for the three full-color mini-episodes: "Stung!", "The Door in the Water" and "The Wrong Side of Bedlam". Just one thing... don't read those using the iPad's Kindle app, will you? You can get the exact same content in our bespoke Mirabilis free comic book app and there it's presented in zoomable, swipable comic pages the way it's meant to look.

A caveat: I don't own a Kindle, so I only know that this version works in Amazon's online emulator. And I'd still recommend viewing the comic in all its glory, either in its jaw-droppingly amazing App Store incarnation (where you can buy all 8 issues) or at the very least take a look at issue #1 as a full-color ebook. And if you do read at it on the Kindle and spot a problem, please let me know so I can fix it!

EPUB comics

Do not adjust your monitor, this is the slightly restyled cover to go with the new black & white Mirabilis ebook. There's also a full color e-comic of issue #1 that we'll probably put up in the iBookstore in the near future.

Of course, neither of those EPUB versions will replace the truly scrumptious iPad comics app, which is still the very best way to view all eight issues of Mirabilis so far - not to mention the upcoming issues #9 and #10 that we're working on right now. More on those very shortly.

Incidentally I don't have a single share in Apple, I'm just a genuine born-again iPad nut! And I'm not alone. Over Christmas another 7 million savvy people became iPad owners.

If perchance you're hovering in the doorway of the Apple store wondering whether to buy yourself an iPad - well, you're not going to hear any arguments to the contrary here. My mate Dermot Bolton came round last night and we were both ready to bore for England with our mad enthusiasm for Steve Jobs's little gizmo. You can be sitting around at dinner and somebody mentions a new movie, or a Shakespeare sonnet, or a piece of music, or the latest discovery about mankind's ancestors, and with a swipe of the hand you're in Star Trek territory looking it up. Being light and easy to handle, it's nothing like a laptop (let's face it, laptops are rubbish for handing round to look at photos and videos) and although I cited the sci-fi connection just now, the thing the iPad actually makes me think of is a Victorian family encyclopaedia combined with a brilliantly colored magic lantern show. Just the perfect device for reading Mirabilis on, if you think about it.

Top slot on BookBuzzr for Mirabilis app

After the Herculean effort of finishing Mirabilis: Winter and working with our code maestro, Simon Cook, to get it in the App Store, Leo and I started to think about ways to get the word out. One of the best forums for this is BookBuzzr, which is usually used for print books. BookBuzzr lets you set up a flipbook widget so that people can take a look at the first few pages of your book before they decide to buy.

As chapter one of the Winter book is free on iPad anyway, we also put that on BookBuzzr just before Christmas and promptly forgot all about it. (Two plates of turkey with all the trimmings and a bottle of Crozes-Hermitage 2003 can do that.) So I was astonished this week to take a look on BookBuzzr and find that Mirabilis is the #1 most-viewed title on BookBuzzr's comics and graphic novels section.

Now, I know what you're thinking. BookBuzzr is mostly looked at by proper literary types. You know, the folks who read Dan Brown and James Patterson. So how big a deal is it to be top-ranked in comics? Well, we're also #1 in Young Adult and #1 in Science Fiction & Fantasy. And we're in fourth place most-viewed on all BookBuzzr books last week.

How this will translate into app sales remains to be seen, but if you're a novelist or comic book creator and you're looking to publicize your work, I recommend giving BookBuzzr a try. Don't worry about giving part of your work away for free. If the story is compelling, people will come back for more. As Cory Doctorow says, today the artist's enemy is not piracy but obscurity.

Mirabilis graphic novel app in Top 100 grossing books

Mirabilis - Year of Wonders has been in the App Store for four days now, which is pretty exciting as it is. But the really great news is that we just nudged into the Top 100 grossing ibooks at #99!

You can get the first instalment of the story completely free, then other chapters cost $1.99 each. So it was fabulous when we rose to #13 in iTunes books, but to actually be in the top-grossing charts too shows that new readers are following through with the story after they've been astounded by the fluid interface, easy in-app issue management, eye-popping zoom and page flip, magical colors and dramatic art.

Next stop: the Kindle. And in the meantime, if you haven't got the Mirabilis iPad app yet, you can find it here in the USA and here in the UK.

Mirabilis graphic novel on iPad

I'll be doing a complete post about this as soon as we go live - which is a matter of weeks away now. But I just had to share this with you because I've been playing the ad hoc build of the Mirabilis app and it really is a dream. Lush magic lantern colors, razor-sharp graphics, and an interface that's as stylish and smooth as an Irish coffee poured by George Clooney. If you're used to struggling with existing comic reader apps, you're going to be blown away by what our resident iOS wizard has conjured up.

Don't wait. Really, you should go direct to your nearest Apple retail store (look here for store locators: Apple in the UK and Apple in the US), buy yourself an iPad for Christmas, and you will then be able to get the reader app and the first chapter of Mirabilis free, with the other chapters available via our nifty in-app storefront. Mirabilis on iPad is our way of telling you that the Year of Wonders has arrived. And we have a lot more incredible news coming up, so don't go away.

DriveThruComics latest - and other big news

You've seen this cover before. The big difference is that it's about to be the first in an eight-issue run of real comic books. I'm talking about regular, tried-and-true printed comic books now, not e-comics - though we are also on course to have the whole of the Mirabilis: Winter graphic novel on iPad in time for Christmas.

The iPad issues will probably retail around $1.99 each, but if you haven't gone totally digital yet then you may prefer to buy the physical comic books on IndyPlanet. Those will be tagged around $4.50 each, meaning you can read the whole 200-page graphic novel for $36. At that price you have to bring your own Mylar bags. Issue 1 should be on sale in a few days.

On the other hand, if you've never been bitten by the comics collecting bug then you could hold out for the graphic novel editions. We anticipate the trade paperbacks (two comic-sized volumes) going on sale in the USA in December. Those will retail at $19.99 each. But if you live in the UK, the real treat will be massive European-album sized hardback editions due out early next year. Save up your book tokens as those should be the most gorgeous incarnation of all Mirabilis's many forms.

Oh, and we also have breaking news of serialization of the episodes in India. This has got me and Leo beside ourselves with excitement because Jack will be heading off from Britain to India in the Spring GN, so it'll be great to think of Mirabilis becoming another bridge between those two great cultures. More on that as the details firm up.

2011 is guaranteed to provide you with a format of your choice for reading Mirabilis - whether it's online, as an app, in paperback or hardback, or in the form of regular comic books. As a special offer to get you started, we've put Mirabilis #1 up online and you can get it for free on DriveThruComics. Even if you've read this opening issue already, please hit the link and give us a review as we're collecting stars.

Extra! Extra! Read all about it!

Have you spotted the DVD-style extras that are going up on the main Mirabilis website? Many of these are articles based on earlier blog posts, but you especially won't want to miss "The Forgotten Year", which is a big all-new feature about how the arrival of the green comet changed everyone's lives in the Year of Wonders.

Not only do you get some of the broadest hints we've ever let slip about the direction the story is taking, you can also feast your eyes on some stunning super-sized Mirabilian artwork by the incomparable Mr McKenna. This is why Hollywood producers have him on speed-dial.

The picture here shows the care and attention Martin gives to his work. Because that view of Mr Stoop the removal giant, which in most artists' portfolios would count as a near-finished picture, was the rough that ended up on Martin's cutting-room floor. You can see the final version on the website, and it is at a completely different angle, a more dramatic scene, and with a gnarlier-looking giant. But this is simply too good to throw away, don't you agree?

More of the Sime

This is for Peter Richardson, artist and co-creator of the marvellous Cloud 109 and host of the fascinating blog that bears its name. If you would like to read the stories that Lord Dunsany spun around Sime's pictures, "The Distressing Tale of Thangobrind the Jeweller" is here and "How Nuth Would Have Practised His Art Upon the Gnoles" (illustrated above) is here. It looks as though you can buy the whole book on Kindle - or for reading in the Kindle App on iPhone, take your pick. I heartily recommend it to aficionados of Edwardian English (well, Anglo-Irish) fantasy.