Rainy Road Warrior Newsletter
January 1, 2024
So, What’s New With You?
2023 has come and gone and I say, “Good riddance!”
I had a suspicion that 2023 wasn’t going to be a great year for me and that’s pretty much how it turned out. Of course, 2024 might be a very bad year for all of us but let’s not focus on the negative. Let us look forward to what will hopefully be a positive future.
And, if not, we’ll water that tree when we come to it.
I Can’t Stop The Feeling
I mentioned in the last newsletter that I had met up with a local aspiring artist and we had started working on a project together, which would basically be a refocused continuation of Book of Legend.
The idea is for it to be a showcase for all-ages characters/concepts with a featured, serialized story along with random stand-alone stories, similar in format to Epic of Darkness. But there will be an additional step that I’ll discuss later in this newsletter. I’ll will say that this is about more than just producing a single comic book.
As of today’s date, I have written the script and the artist has completed a few character designs for the story that will anchor the book. I can’t give away too many details (because it’s still very much a work in progress) but I’ll share a few tidbits and outline the overall strategy at play.
For Your Eyes Only
Here’s a few character sketches that artist Ben Biller has done for the new project. Let’s just refer to this as “Prometheus” for now.
Who are these characters? What is this story all about? Those answers are going to have to wait for a future newsletter. In the meantime, let’s talk about the bigger picture that this specific story fits into.
Zig When They Expect You To Zag
In 2023, I had to come to the realization that the current way of making indie comic books — creating a cult through a constant online presence fed by righteous indignation and making the purchase of a comic serve as what amounts to a tithe — was not for me. And never would be.
So being on (anti)social media and solely relying on crowdfunding just isn’t the answer. And selling a few comic books for $10 a piece isn’t what I want to do, either. I want to make comics affordable and easily accessible again.
But is that even possible? I believe so.
Book of Legend #2 will be similar to Epic of Darkness in that it will have a serialized feature story along with a few backup stand-alone stories. (A GunEngine Zero prologue may be one of them!)
BoL will be aimed at an all-ages, mainstream audience.
BoL #2 will go up on crowdfunding sites to raise whatever amount can be raised to fund a very limited print run. (I was able to find a job recently with a flexible schedule so I can save up enough money to get the book done regardless of how the crowdfunding campaign does and Ben is working on the book for no up-front money anyway.)
This specific version of the book will be exclusive and never offered again.
Now, here’s where we zig.
With all of the stories from BoL #1 and #2 in the “bank”, they will be used to create multiple issues of digest-sized, black and white, mini-comics consisting of about 16 pages each. Essentially, ashcan-style comics.
Why black and white, digest-sized? Because b&w is much cheaper to print than color and, with the popularity of manga, I think people are okay with it. And the lower page count and smaller size makes them cheaper to print and ship.
Issues will primarily consist of chapters of a featured story with a major character along with a random back-up tale or two. (The “Prometheus” character is what I believe will be the star of the group but there are others being developed as well.)
The reason for serializing the main story into small chapters is to incentivize people to come back for future issues. But the back-up stories will provide a complete tale within each issue.
I will then take this concept to retailers around the southeastern USA to sell the books on a mini-spinner rack (e.g., the type used for greeting cards, post cards). I have already determined some retailers to target with this and, no, Wal-Mart is not one of them.
The goal is to secure purchase orders for a high volume of comics so that they can be printed cheaply and sold for about $1 each.
I will stock the comics myself in a limited test run to establish a proof-of-concept.
I realize that this is a big reach and could be a colossal failure but it should at least be an interesting ride.
And, if this works out, I may do all of my future comics in this way — a standard, limited edition version thru crowdfunding then breaking it up into small parts to sell to the general public as cheap, ashcan-style, mini-comics.
Oh, By The Way
For those of you that supported previous projects like Neotheric and Epic of Darkness please know that they have NOT been abandoned. They are basically in suspended animation waiting for the “cure” that will allow me to continue making them. The “cure” being some way to raise the funds to pay artists to get them made.
Until next time!
~Michael T Gonzalez
