Wells & Clarke: Spiritual Practice (Patreon)

My very first webcomic (and basically my first comic of any kind) was called New Adventures in the Old World. I've mostly scrubbed the internet of it because it really is not my best work - but whose first comic is?

However, my special interest in the Victorian times has never left me and neither have these characters. I've recently begun writing it again, a sort of reboot, but I'm not sure if it will be a comic, prose or nothing at all - I have to sort of gauge the interest of my audience. It would be similar to DeadEndia in terms of content (ghosts, mysteries, demons, etc) but a little bit more grown up. Pushing the upper edges of YA probably, or maybe even adult.

The basic premise is this: in the 1890s, ex-magician John Wellington Wells and nurse Edith Clarke set up a ghost hunting business - only Wells is a skeptic hoping to uncover the true scientific explanation for the supernatural while Clarke is a true believer - as she's been seeing ghosts all her life. It's basically X-Files meets Sherlock Holmes via M. R. James.

This book would also be even more gay than DeadEndia if you can believe. Wells is gay and in a Lavender marriage with a lesbian and I would love to really dig into queer culture of Victorian London in a really meaningful way.

I haven't really settled on a name either. I don't like New Adventures in the Old World that much anymore (makes me think of Old Christine anyway). I've been thinking of PHANTASMGORIUM (the name of Wells magic shop) or Wells & Clarke: Spiritual Practice. But maybe this is something my eventual publisher or editor could help me with.

Anyway, you may see updates on this in the future, but this project is probably a long way off. Would you be interested in seeing it come to fruition?