I'm a comic book geek. 

 

The art. The storytelling. The heroes and the villains. What's not to love?

 

Like many kids in the 70s, I started out with the DC guys: Action Comics, The Justice League, the old World's Finest Superman/Batman team-ups, The Flash, etc.

 

As I got older, I grew into Marvel's slightly more sophisticated tales, heroes who were not quite as black and white as the Super Friends. The outcast, alienated, socially awkward characters of titles like the X-Men and Alpha Flight were perfectly written for teenagers like me, who often felt just that way.

 

In high school, as I was devouring every reprint of Robert E. Howard's pulp stories that I could get my hands on, I got hooked on black and white books like "The Savage Sword of Conan." Seeing the bloody, violent world of Hyboria visualized on the page in all it's barbaric detail seemed like the perfect compliment to Howard's stirring prose.

 

Comic versions of Moorcock's Elric saga, Edgar Rice Burroughs's John Carter and even Tolkien's books all brought those works alive for me in a way that did not detract from the written word, but enhanced it.

 

Now, while I still love the oldies, there are all kinds of new graphic novels elevating both storytelling and comic art. Neil Gaiman's amazing work is just one of the many (although a particular favorite of mine.)

 

Maybe because fantasy and sci-fi are such speculative genres, where wild imaginings and strange creatures are so much a part of the fabric of the tales; to me it makes perfect sense to see almost any work of that sort visualized in pictures.

 

Which is all a long-winded way of saying that I don't think illustrations are just for kids. And another way of introducing this section of the site, which is dedicated to my own imaginings of the characters from my works -- in comic art form.

 

So if you've read The Lucifer Messiah or Eye of the Storm you'll recognize a few of these guys and girls (and monsters.) And don't fret if the way I imagine them is not how you imagined them. That's the thing about imagination ... the only limits are what your own mind can dream up.

 

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                                                             THE LUCIFER MESSIAH

 

 

The five that follow are all characters from my 2006 novel The Lucifer Messiah. So if you've ever read a book, pictured the characters in your mind and wondered "how close is what I see in my head to what the author actually saw when he was writing it?" Here's your chance to find out, because ... more or less ... this is how the folks in my novel look in my head.

 

Of course, you're free to see them any way you want.

 

 

 

                                                                        ARGUS

 

 

 

 

 

                                                                                  SCYLLA

 

 

 

 

 

                                                                              CHARYBDIS

 

 

 

 

                                                                         THE MORRIGAN

 

 

 

 

                                                                            SEAN MULCAHY

 

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                                                          EYE OF THE STORM

 

Here is some "concept art" for my dark fantasy book released in 2016. If you've read the novel you might be able to guess the characters, seen here in a few poses with some minor variations.

 

The Lord of the Pestilence. The SEAL-turned-barbarian warlord. The Black Wizard. The Red Warrior Queen. The Wizard's Apprentice.

 

 

 

 

And last, but not least, a bunch of delightfully ghoulish, creepy pics of no particular significance. Enjoy!

 

 

Inspired by the incomparable Frank Frazetta's iconic character "The Death Dealer." Of course, since

            I can't hold a candle to the master himself with a paint brush, I used Hero Machine.

 

 

                                                        A second version of the faceless purveyor of doom.

 

 

 

                                                                    An undead Vampire Lord

 

 

 

                                                         A Necromancer and his minions