Proof of Life (Patreon)

Hey y'all! Just checking in here and letting you know that I have not vanished from the face of the earth. I know updates have been slow and sporadic. I want to show you everything I am working on! Unfortunately I am deep into the writing of the next chapter and sharing scripts in progress would only spoil the pages once they're finished. That said, the next bits bring back a lot of the main cast that hasn't already appeared in Book 5 and it's been fun to be writing some of those voices again.

Writing has not gone quickly. First, I had to re-review all the old material and refresh my memory and figure out where all the dropped story threads were. Then I made copious notes about each character, their journey so far, their motivations, where they wanted to be next. I thought about what bits of lore need to be dropped now, what bits of exposition will advance the action and give the characters motivation. What plot points we need to hit. All this before scripts even began. I'm a bunch of pages along now, and hoping to finish scripting in June, with drawing commencing immediately after.

All this is very different than how my old process used to work, which was basically a tightrope walk. "Seat of the pants" is a phrase you could use to describe it. I would write a single one- or two-row script, draw it, and figure out what came next later. It was a fun process but I wrote myself into tons of corners and I don't think it lends itself well to resolving a storyline (although it's great at creating new ones).

So I'm trying to do something a little different here. Each chapter is being finished before I draw, a cohesive unit that I hopefully won't look at later and wish I had had the foresight to do things differently at the beginning. it's not nearly as enjoyable for me than switching back and forth between tasks. But I think you deserve a satisfying ending that wraps up as much of the story and character arcs of the first four books as I can (without becoming too engrossed in the fiddly details).

All this is to say that I'm trying my best to make Goats 5 a good time for you, even if there's radio silence for a bit here and there. The scripts are good, I think! I can't wait for you to see the end result. I'll try to post a little more frequently and let you know what's going on in the interim. Thanks so much for sticking around! I'll have more for you soon.

Your cartoonist pal,

-Jon