Anthologies Galore!
November 22, 2019 Jamey Alea 0 Comments
Lately I’ve been making a conscious effort to focus more on writing creatively, and it has been a really rewarding experience so far! In fact, I’ve even been doing NaNoWriMo this month for the first time and trying to devote time to working on poetry, which has been pretty cool. I’ve added a page to my site to highlight some of the creative writing that I have been working on, and I’ve had a few poems and short stories published with various magazines that you can read now, but I also wanted to talk a little bit more in depth about a few anthology projects that I have been a part of recently! (Especially since I received hard copies of a couple of them very recently, and holding a hard copy of the book that you’re featured in is officially the best feeling ever in the world.)
The first anthology project that I have ever been a part of is called “Why Faith?” and it’s a comics anthology from Arcane Inkdustries about personal faith systems and the ways they’re meaningful to individual people. It was my first time ever writing a comic and collaborating with an artist, and I was lucky enough to work with a really great local friend of mine who is also really talented, Matt Taylor! Together we made “The Dweller on the Horizon” – a comic about my relationship with Fharlanghn, the god of travel from Dungeons & Dragons, and what it means to have a relationship with a deity who I don’t actually believe is real! I’m really proud of this project. I think we made something really special, I found out that I love writing comics, and collaborating with Matt was super rewarding. (This book was funded on IndieGogo and there’s not currently a place to purchase hard copies online. Check out the digital version on Amazon or if you’re interested in buying a copy of the book, email me because I have copies for sale!)
Another genre I’ve been excited to dabble in for the first time is writing for tabletop games! I was part of the Uncaged Anthology, a really important project headed up by Ashley Warren that focuses on feminist reimaginings of fantasy monsters that are traditionally female-depicted. I’ve been playing D&D for 15 years and this was my first time writing and playtesting a module meant for other people to play, so it was pretty cool to experience it from the “other side” if you will. My module is called “The Necromancer’s Brother” and it’s a story about banshees, magic, secrets, and what it means to be beautiful. It’s featured in Uncaged Volume 3, which is available on DMsGuild as either a PDF or a gorgeous hardcover edition. The response to the Uncaged project has been really overwhelmingly positive – the first volume was even nominated for an ENnie award! – and it has been a real honor to be part of it.
And not only have I written my first comic recently, but I’ve also written my SECOND comic. I also have a piece called “The Updrafters” in another upcoming anthology called Life Finds A Way, with Cloudscape Comics in Vancouver. (This is particularly exciting, as they’re a publisher that has done some previous anthologies that I’m quite fond of!) The theme of LFAW is hope in the face of post-apocalyptic situations, and I collaborated with the incredible Melissa Capriglione on a story about a future where the earth is flooded and only diving communities living in raft cities remain. This project recently had a very successful kickstarter campaign, and there isn’t a way to order additional copies at this exact moment, but they will be sold through Cloudscape once they’re available. (I also did an interview about my creative process, and it was super exciting for me to be the interview-ee instead of the interviewer!)
I’ve really enjoyed working on these kinds of projects! It has certainly been rewarding to express myself creatively, but it also feels cool being a part of something bigger when I’m a part of an anthology with other talented folks, coming together to convey a message about something that feels important. I’m proud to share my work with the world, and I hope to have the opportunity to participate in more projects like this in the future!