Without Fear

This week sees my latest trade paperback collection hit shelves – BEAUTIFUL CANVAS is coming to stores through Black Mask Studios and I could not be more proud of this madness coming into your hands.

This hitwoman pulp fu miniseries from me, Sami Kivela, Triona Farrell, Ryan Ferrier, and Dan Hill is like nothing else, and we think you’ll dig it.

Beautiful Canvas is 2017’s smash hit warped crime miniseries about Lon Eisley discovering the similarities and differences between her job as a hitwoman and her new role as a mother-to-be when she finds out her girlfriend is pregnant. Going from destroyer to creator/protector is a major swerve, but parents still have plenty of violent and brutal moments to contend with, especially when the world is full of pyrokinetic sleeper agents, animal/hybrid muscle-squads, and one hell of a nasty boss pulling your strings. From the creative team of Sami Kivela (Abbott) and Ryan K Lindsay (Negative Space, Eternal, DC Writers Workshop) comes this gonzo world of future noir, where the story aims to deliver a brutal blow to your heart and piss in your brainpan.

This book distills so much of the weirdness I can’t shake out of my brain. Old video nasties, and weird sci fi paperbacks meld with a love of comic storytelling and a desire to push a few boundaries. It’s a really personal tale because it’s about parenthood, and fear, and moving forward in a world that scares you, but also as a person you’ve become that also scares you. It’s about wondering if you’re built for the jobs life gives you.

This story felt like it was madness trapped on the page, and I never thought it would actually be told, truth be known. I worried it might be too weird. But here it is, complete, and real in our hands. It might be high pulp, but I hope people see the beating heart beneath it all. It’s there, raw, and outta time, and it means the world to us.

The art from Sami on pencils/inks and Triona on colours is breathtaking in ever literal sense of the hyperbolic phrase. You will fall into this world, and in love and hate with those of this world.

Black Mask Studios was a perfect home for this and they let us run wild. The result was a book we call home, and a slew of positive reviews, earning us an accumulative 8.4/10 score on ComicBookRoundUp.

It’s in stores this week, we hope you enjoy it, and the fun new back matter we slipped into it, and if you’ve got a friend who likes sharp stories about awesome things, pick up a spare copy and make the world a better place.