Home is where the heart is

A Bank Holiday treat for you all your horror lovers, here's a story that appeared in the 5th issue of everyone's favourite Halloween comic, Hallowscream. Written and lettered by my most excellent self, and pencilled, inked and coloured by the splendiferous, The pXd.

The idea for this 5 page story came from purchasing my own house from a lovely lady called Jennifer who had lived in the house her whole life. Inspiration comes from all around.

 

Hallowscream 2013

Bit of a delay getting this posted here due to illness but better late than never. Ghosts and ghoulies, feast your eyes on this.

The fifth annual Hallowscream! Hallowe’en Special is here! Available to download as a totally free pdf file, this year’s comic features 96 pages of shocks and scares to chill your blood over the Samhain season! We’ve also uploaded an horrific hi-res version this year, to give the gore and ghosties an extra gloss.

Here Are The Download Links :
Lo-res Version (file size = 46.3mb) :      MEDIAFIRE      DROPBOX
Hi-res Version (file size = 125mb) :       MEDIAFIRE     DROPBOX
You can also read the issue online at :      ISSUU

Full contents of the terrors lurking behind that gloriously icky cover by “The Gurch” are as follows…
Page 3 : Pumpkin Soup  Art & Recipe by Simon Mackie
Page 4 : A Mother’s Devotion Story by Chris Charlton, Art by Rowel Roque, Letters by Brant W. Fowler
Page 9 : Bestiary of Beasties : Lurking Tut Article & Illustration by Malcolm Kirk
Page 10 : 6 Seconds To Die by Gordon Innes
Page 17 : And Now A Few Words From Our Sponsors Story by Stu Perrins, Art by Israel Huertas
Page 19 : Wicked Stepmother Story & Art by Philip Sneyd
Page 23 : The Claws of The Catman Story by Paul Bristow, Art by Andy Lee
Page 29 : A Grim Tale : No Bones About It Story by ‘Clark Holland’, Art by Malcolm Kirk.
Page 31 : Empty Story by Chris Charlton, Art by Gregory Woronchak, Letters by Brant W. Fowler
Page 39 : Curse of The Season Story & Art by Carol Kewley ( Merry Xmas Everybody lyrics © Copyright Slade 1973 )
Page 43 : Terrorvision Guide by Malcolm Kirk
Page 44 : Hellevator Story & Art by Paul Gordon Innes
Page 48 : Apocalypse The Board Game Concept & Colour by Tim West, Illustration by Mike Legan
Page 50 : Home Is Where The Heart Is Story by Tim West, Art by The PXD
Page 55 : Bestiary of Beasties : The Spring-Heeled Jackalope Article & Illustration by Malcolm Kirk
Page 56 : Full Moon Jacket Story & Art by Gordon Innes
Page 59 : All The Fun of The Fair Story by Jamie Lambert, Art by The PXD, Letters by Tim West
Page 63 : Bestiary of Beasties : The Pear Wolf Article & Illustration by Malcolm Kirk
Page 64 : Artificial Unintelligence Story by Chris Charlton, Art & Letters by Joe Badon
Page 72 : Bestiary of Beasties : The Crypt Id Article & Illustration by Malcolm Kirk
Page 73 : Hair Scare! Story & Art by Gordon Innes
Page 77 : Run Story by Chris Sides, Art by Simon Bennett Hayes, Letters by Chris Travell
Page 83 : Dead by Dawn ZX Spectrum Game Advertisement
Page 84 : Many Happy Returns Story & Art by Michael Crouch
Page 89 : The North Wind Doth Blow Story & Art by Russell Hillman
Page 90 : Help! Mummy! Story & Art by Simon Mackie
Page 91 : Bestiary of Beasties : The Glook-Gonk Article & Illustration by Malcolm Kirk
Page 92 : Happy Family Story by David Stoddart, Art by Graham Stoddart
Page 95 : Hierophantom’s Poeticorner : Ghost Train by Paul Bradford, Art by Eric Hurley
…and…
Page 96 : Back Cover Skull by Malcolm Kirk
Previous issues of Hallowscream are available to download from backfromthedepths.co.uk/hallowscream or you can buy real-life monochrome paperback versions from Lulu.com.
HAPPY HALLOWE’EN!

Hallowscream 5 Cover - Sneak Preview

Unable to contain my excitement any longer, I've decided to post a special sneak preview especially for the few thousand* viewers of this blog.

* Figure may or may not be accurate**
** It's bollocks!

Specially created for the 5th edition of everyone's favourite indie horror anthology, this piece of original artwork was produced by the most excellent of horror artists, The Gurch. This is nasty!

The Gurch is a stalwart of the horror comics scene, most famous for his disturbing imagery in the 80's horror comic Gore Shriek. Hopefully this is the beginning of a long relationship bewteen 'The G' and Back from the Depths.

Buzz

This was my second story, which again, was drawn by the talented Andrew Milne, and appeared in Hallowscream 2009. At this time, myself and some comic loving buddies were planning our first Hallowscream.

As you can see from below I had sketched an initial first page, which I believed made use of a very clever optical illusion. Unfortunately this idea was pooh-poohed by the artist as unworkable. Rather that waste the excellent creepy imagery of the reveal page I sketched a another page with an alternative story.

The artist took both these pages and reworked them in to a single page, and a great job he did. However, as the artist re-scripted the story, I no longer feel 100% comfortable claiming this is a story that I’d written. Based on my idea, sure, but some anal writing nuance means I can never truly claim it as my own.

This isn’t really a problem. The script was done in the spirit of collaboration and I’m cool with that. These were my early frontier days of script writing and I was still finding my feet.

Stone The Crows

This was my first comic strip since I was a wee child. I'm a huge fan of one page shockers and this fits the bill perfectly. It appeared in the 2009 issue of Hallowscream.

The idea for this strip came while driving past signs advertising the Belbroughton Scarecrow Weekend. The signs had lifeless scarecrows hanging off them and of course my finely tuned horror brain kicked in to gear.

Originally titled 'Scarecrow Scare', I actually sketched this bad-boy out myself but was fortunate to have the skilled Andrew Milne on hand to draw it proper like.

A pleasant surprise in my Inbox

I had this lovely image sent to me today from artist Pete https://twitter.com/thepxd that shows his pencils for the first page of a 5 page script I've written called Home Is Where The Heart Is, set to appear in this year's Hallowscream.

Pete's drawn some lovely tight lines and I have high hopes for a top notch strip when it's finished. Hopefully he'll have all 5 pages drawn and inked sometime in September. It's then over to me for lettering duties.

This story is kinda based on the little old lady I purchased my house from, just with an evil twist.