Running With the Gutter Cogs

in which our hero is up for some awards and is writing about himself in the third person

Dear Readers,

This week, I’m excited to begin sharing images from issue #4 of The Blood of Seven Queens. But before we get to that, I want to take a moment to announce that my work has made it to the final round of voting for the 5th World Anvil Worldbuilding Awards. If you like what I do here, you can vote for me for “Artist's Most Beautiful World” and for the “Myths & Legends” award.

Voting is open until a week from today, Saturday, March 22, and I would appreciate your support. Thanks so much!

And now, on with the sneak peeks at the art from issue #4.

This first one, along with the big image above, helps to establish “the mean streets of Watersmeet”—the setting for both our modern day and flashback scenes. This is a town that inexplicably mashes up the American Wild West and Soviet Moscow. It’s weird in the most ChrisClark way, and I was excited to spend 24 pages here.

Until I had to spend 24 pages here.

This issue is perhaps the best example yet of how Writer Chris is asking the impossible of Artist Chris. Artist Chris, as you may know/remember, was stunted in his growth—discouraged by a college art professor and only reawakened for real a few years ago. Writer Chris, by contrast, went to grad school and has been pumping out stories for most of his 40+ years.

Artist Chris is proud of himself every time he finishes a page, but he’s also not as capable of recognizing burnout in himself as Writer Chris is. And so, while he’s chasing that feeling of pride and accomplishment, he has been doing so at the cost of his sanity.

Case in point: he—me!—is right here writing about himself (myself?) in the third person.

Writer Chris would have taken a break months ago. He would’ve known that he was pushing too hard and what that was going to feel like, and he would’ve stopped. Artist Chris is still learning. Artist Chris needs to be pulled away from his drawing table, tucked into bed, and read a bedtime story to get him to stop. That’s why I’m going to push back the release schedule a bit after issue #4 is done and out. I need to tuck myself in and read my copy of The Monster at the End of This Book.

Thank you for coming to my therapy session.

At any rate, paid subscribers can keep on scrolling for full look at pages 1-4. Everyone else, I’ll see you back here next week. And remember that you can vote for me for the next seven days for a World Anvil Worldbuilding Award.

Yours,
Chris