Posted in: Comics | Tagged: Comics, Dan Wickline, entertainment, Linda Sejic, matt hawkins, tales of honor, top cow

A Few Thoughts On Tales Of Honor: Bred To Kill

Published Mon, 29 Feb 2016 15:00:17 -0600

I've been writing for Bleeding Cool for over 2.5 years now and in that time Rich Johnston has said to me on more than one occasion that I should talk more about my writing. The stuff I do outside of BC. I've been a freelance writer for 15 years having gotten my first paid work back in 2001 from Avatar Press, the company that owns BC. In that time I have had the privileged of playing in a few different universes having written stories for the Green Hornet, ShadowHawk, Lady Death, 30 Days of Night and so many more.

Last summer I got an email from Matt Hawkins over at Top Cow asking if I would be interested in co-writing the second volume of Tales of Honor. The series is based on the Honor Harrington series of novels written by David Weber, but unlike the first volume that was an adaptation of the first novel On Basilisk Station, the new volume would be an original story. Matt had a plot in mind that the property owners already liked, so I was going to come in and expand on it and work with him to make the scripts for artist Linda Sejic.

Now licensed properties can be a nightmare because you have to be careful not to conflict with established parts of the overall story. And you also have to keep in mind that there is a novelist writing more of these books… Well, the process of working with Matt and Linda and everyone else was far from a nightmare. I was able to get in there, find the voices for the characters and expand on their backstories with a surprising amount of freedom.

Now the series has wrapped up and the collection hits stands on Wednesday. There is a growing movement in comics, bringing smart science fiction back to prominence and Matt Hawkins and Top Cow are at the front of that charge. I'm very proud of what we put together and I think it stands up strongly next to each of the Honor Harrington novels. And now that it's done, I miss hanging out in the world of Honor, Nimitz, Scotty and Harkness… especially Harkness… he's my kind of people.

Here is a few pages from the trade.