City of Legends

Maybe it is time to revive the graphic novel project, but take it a step or ten further (farther?).

1. Start with the concept of merely doing a graphic novel. Nothing else on the table.
2. Decide the story, or at least the main characters. The original project was to be called "The Slightly Deranged Adventures of Skye Meadows" and my second wife, the model, was going to be the basis for the main character’s appearance. She was enthusiastic about the project.
3. Write it entirely in poetic narrative form, perhaps even as an epic poem, all dialog and narrative. This is a new element injected into the project. Put my stamp on it.
4. Concurrent with this, work with one or more of the artists/photographers I have encountered of late and have them feed the engine with photographs that can then be, by them, myself or a third party, basically rotoscoped via Photoshop, to form the basic art. Detail and colouring to be determined by later work.

I could use any or all or none or an amalgam of any of the dozen or so novel concepts I have been working with, from my sci-fi epic "Critical Radius" to "Tales of the Amomancer" to "…Skye Meadows". The mind boggles. I am bored and looking for something or someone to champion, I am in my roninspace.

A get-well quick wish to my friend and mentor (not a lot of people earn that title in this life) Yvonne Cronin, who is recuperating from a mild stroke last week. Today is her birthday. Chocolate is my prescription. Yvonne used to have a bumper sticker that read "Just give me the chocolate and no one gets hurt". She gets serious about it.

I am still waiting for final word from Barbara Holmes before I post the interview. It is more about me than the last interview I did with her, which was published in Lupi Basil’s remarkable literary magazine, Emotions, maybe a decade ago? That one was more about the poetry. But, you know, sometimes it is hard to determine where the line is.

I will not die the richest, most famous or most powerful man in the world. There will still be people who don’t like me, some with good reason, some for perversely petty or wrong-minded beliefs. I mourn that, for I wish no one ill will. But, if I die synonymous with my art, that will be enough, and more than most ever achieve in this life.

I am in a strange space, somewhere between restless and content. I know the colours here, and the vectors. All is well. It is time to make some minor adjustments before the rocket motor kicks in. Again.