Good news! Eduardo has finished the artwork for THE LONG HAUL, and post-production is underway even as I write. We're now shooting for a mid-February release - I'll give a more specific date in the next couple of weeks.

I've already seen over half the art for the book, and in my opinion this is the best work Eduardo's yet done. I'll see if we can get a preview up online in time for the book's release, because you really need to see these pages.

>  Greg McElhatton includes JULIUS in his 'Best of 2008' list over at iComics.com.

As for me, I've just returned from visiting family and friends over the holidays. Now I'm looking forward to knuckling down with a whole load of new work in 2005. I'm halfway through NIGHTJAR Book Two; I'm planning on writing the second book of SPOOKED (titled LOW SPIRITS) this year; I'm also considering a sequel to JULIUS; and I have two pitches currently on the boil, which I'll tell you more about if they get picked up. So that lot should take me through till about spring, I reckon...

The more perceptive among you will also have noticed that the tail-end of 2004 hit me with a rather bad rash of latebookitis. I wish I could tell you more about when THE LONG HAUL, NIGHTJAR #4 or YUGGOTH CREATURES #2 were coming out, I really do. But until I hear definite dates from the publishers, I simply can't. What I can do is promise that I'm taking steps to make sure it doesn't keep happening in 2008.

Here's to a happy and prosperous year for all.

  There's a new interview with me about F-STOP over at Newsarama today, discussing romance, comedy and the pitfalls of entertainment. It also includes the first ten pages of Matthew Loux's art. Lovely stuff.

  Ahoy, me hearties.

I'm currently engaged in a discussion on a comics industry board about digital comics piracy. (It seems quite a few comics retailers and publishers are still unaware of just how prevalent comics piracy is.) It got me wondering how easy it would be to legitimise comics downloading. And it didn't take long to realise that really, as digital solutions go, it would be very easy indeed:

Follow the iTunes Music Store example.

I would guess around 95% of comics produced these days are 'finished' on a computer, and sent to a printer as digital files. It would cost publishers almost nothing to send these same files to a third party company (let's call them Smapple, Inc.) who have set themselves up as a licensed supplier of digital comics.

Smapple would encode these files into a single 'issue file'. This issue file is in a secure format which can only be viewed with a multi-platform program that Smapple supply, free of charge (let's call it iPanels).

Anyone who's used the iTunes music store can see how this works. A customer uses iPanels to browse/search a database of available comics on Smapple's servers. When they find one they like, they download it (having already set up an account) and view it on-screen using iPanels. Voila. Smapple pass on a percentage of the revenue from the download to the publisher/licensor/whoever.

The key, and the most difficult part of the solution, comes in not only making the format solely compatible with iPanels, but also completely secure - in other words, the comic would have to be 'locked' into the program, so it couldn't be moved to another computer or converted to a different, more portable format.

(Sure, someone would eventually crack it, but just like with music, the majority of people are law-abiding types. Make the legal part easy - really, really easy and idiot-proof, just like iTunes - at an attractive price, and most people will go the legal route rather than face the hassle and guilty conscience of piracy.)

It would take someone with money, vision and very robust servers. And who knows whether it would actually make any money? I reckon it would be worth trying, though.

[Addendum: I've started a thread on my message board about this, if you have an opinion you want to share]

  There's a new interview with me today on Broken Frontier, conducted by James Powell. It's quite an interesting one - James asked some very good questions, and although the chat was ostensibly about F-STOP and THE LONG HAUL, he also encouraged me to talk a little about my work habits and how I approach this wacky business of writing the comics. Good stuff.

In other news, I wrote a three-issue miniseries last week, and now I'm piling into another six issues of NIGHTJAR. I do wish they'd hurry up and perfect cloning.

  The last couple of weeks have been a time of finishing. The F-STOP script is finished, the Big Secret Avatar Project is finally done, and the LONG HAUL book design is finalised in anticipation of the final art.

But, as with all endings, it's really just a new beginning - or rather, a batch of new beginnings. I'm starting Book Two of NIGHTJAR (tentatively titled Inferno), there's a hush-hush miniseries for Oni, and a one-off for a Rather Large Publisher which I'm hoping will lead to bigger things. Not to mention a couple of pitches I need to get finished soon. Ideally, all of this should be written by the end of December...

I suppose I should start thinking about Christmas shopping, too. Gah.

  And just to prove that the stereotype about writers being absent-minded is sadly all too true, today I realised I have another book solicited in this month's PREVIEWS that I hadn't even mentioned yet.

F-STOP is a romantic comedy set in the world of high fashion photography, in which a talentless but charming photographer somehow finds himself lauded around the world... Then discovers what the lies that got him there will cost.

My collaborator on this one is Matthew Loux, previously seen in REFLUX COMICS and GETTING THE SEX OUT OF THE WAY. He's great.

Published by Oni Press, F-STOP is featured on page 310 of the November PREVIEWS, scheduled for publication in January 2007. Give your comics retailer order code NOV042850.

  FOUR LETTER WORLDS is solicited in PREVIEWS this month. Mike Hawthorne and I contributed a story to the 'Fate' section, but don't let that put you off ordering it. It's on p139, in the Image Comics section; 144 pages for $12.95. The order code is NOV041533.

  And on a sadder, infinitely more sombre note: legendary DJ John Peel died today at the age of 65. He'll be sorely missed by everyone who cares about modern music.

  There's some new desktop wallpaper for THE LONG HAUL in the downloads section, for anyone who wants to gaze at Eduardo's linework all day. And who wouldn't?