Poor Isabella finds her life turned totally upside down in a way she would never have expected… But then it gets worse. The ultimate indignity a teenage girl can suffer: being cut off from social media! That tips things over the edge, and when the going gets tough, the tough ...

Failure is the stepping stone to success. That’s what I teach my students and my clients, and it is true, right up there with “whatever doesn’t kill you makes you stronger”: If you learn why you failed, you won’t fail again the same way- and that brings ...

The Hated, part two: Heroes we hate

Last week I blathered on a bit about villain Protagonists. These are evil, or “bad” characters who get to be Protagonists!

But what about more traditional heroes, or supporting characters are written to be the “moral compass” or “voice of reason”, or just ...

I came across a little blurb the other day about Mary Sues, and fanfiction, and how the writer of a fanfiction is basically writing a fantasy, inserting themselves as the character at the center of attention, immaculate, glittering and perfect. Basically everything you want to smack into a different galaxy ...

No matter what the genre, plot and general tone of your comic, death always is absolute.

Or alternatively, death is used as a very efficient comedy device (if anyone remembers the numerous ways Dirk dies in Dragon’s Layer). Unsurprisingly so, I think, since real comedy is based on tragedy ...

A story can be strengthened by coordinating the first and final images in some way.

It's not a hard and fast rule; it's not a rule at all. But it can be worth trying out in your writing!

The movie Halloween (there it is! I had to start ...

There's some down time at work sometimes, where I either grab a coffee, chat with coworkers, or pull out my wretched, beloved phone and disappear into it. Sometimes a combo of all three activities.

But a few weeks ago, I grabbed my clipboard and did some sketching instead. I ...

For several years I've been doing a comic called Typical Strange here on the Duck. And I'm still doing it, I swear!

The characters are a fairly diverse assortment of different temperaments and personalities, and the adventures they've had and will continue to have will hopefully be ...

I've recently been watching Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries on Netflix. Phryne Fisher is undoubtedly a wish-fulfillment character – almost unapologetically so. She is sexy, bold, and intelligent. Whenever a new challenge is put before her, she reveals a previously-unmentioned skill that saves the day (see the above image where ...

Jesus is running for president under the republican ticket! What could go wrong? Quite a lot it turns out… His beliefs contrast a little bit with those of the party. Jesus goes off message and cross-country on an iconoclastic road trip with Pope Francis and a kid documenting the whole ...