What’s coming up? One last short on the way, due surely before the summer, and that’ll be a wrap on shorts for a while. What an awkward situation now, with nine in print as What Divine Anguish, and two more — including “The Animal King” — hanging out in limbo, as if appearing to suggest the next collected edition but silenced. Yes, it would’ve been nice, and maybe it’ll be possible someday, but as far as financial viability goes, that’s not today.

This is something I learned in real time at the Baltimore Comic-Con, finally reckoning with the difficulty of selling a collection of short stories [from an unknown author]. Is that something I would even buy? And so, the resolution was made: if I don’t want to sit on my hands all con weekend, I’ll bring something that people might actually want to read. To my mind, that means long-form storytelling. It’s time to revel up, which is Red Velvet for “level up.”

Without getting into the nitty-gritty, I’ve got the first draft of something called My God Woman, a six-issue romance between a guy and a giant woman. It’s nowhere near done, requiring a major overhaul (this first attempt was way too plot-heavy, leaving little room for the romance). In between drafts, then, I’ve been developing an action-thriller which is coming to me more naturally. It’s called The Right Man, about a terrifying vigilante and the wannabe gangsters who accidentally kill her dad.

I have an artist in mind for My God Woman, but I’m still a while off from delivering the first script. I’ve also been anxious about funding, there being a difference between eleven short comics over, like, four years, and six 22 or 26-page issues within a reasonable time frame. I’m ready to fund the first and maybe second issues myself, but beyond that, it’s either crowdfunding (booo) or getting a part-time job (booooo) and hoping all the writing is done before then. Just makes me wonder how anyone has any time for friends or dating.

In this interim period, I’m returning to the drawing board, literally, and will try to illustrate The Right Man myself. Try. It’s not science fiction, so there’s no imaginative designs involved, which was always part of my problem attempting to draw Human Hunter over the years (also, lack of ability, somewhat problematic). Will it all work out as I desperately hope? Or will I end up reaching out to an artist and pretend like none of this ever happened? Stay tuned!

I’m sure I’ve mentioned Human Hunter before, right? Eh, another time.