Magic is returning to the realm after an untold era of banishment.
Sorcerers have been fighting wars across a dimension in limbo -- unable to die or escape -- until a wizard appears before before an Irish boy named Finn. The reason that humans have summoned magic's return will reveal a deep secret ...
... as soon as Merk finishes drawing it.
Christopher Merkley, better known by his pen name Merk, launched an Indiegogo campaign Friday to raise funds for his third graphic novel, Season of the Dead Hours.
The artist of the Thunder Bay-based, zombie apocalypse graphic novel Nowadays and comic book digest Victor's Legacy has resurrected a fantasy tale he wrote a decade ago.
He's aiming to publish Season of the Dead Hours as the first graphic novel that will name him as both author and illustrator.
"It's not like I haven't been writing my entire life. I've written other stuff, I just never stepped up to that level of self-publishing and spending the next couple of years doing this on my own and publishing it." Merk said.
"It wasn't that strange to me. It's a natural fit. It's what I've been doing and I'm just telling everyone this is what I'm doing now. A lot of people just think of me as the guy who draws it."
Merk has made a specialty out of drawing overwhelming tides of zombies over the last decade but he's focusing on magic at a time when the topic's surging in a broad scope of fantastic literature.
"Themes like that are cyclical. The zombie thing in the '70s, it always seems to be a reaction to something else, whether it's us rising up against a corporate thing, against order, against things trying to force our lives to be contained in some sort of way. That's what I thought of the zombie apocalypse kind of thing," he said.
"I don't know if magic has that same thing as well. Society becomes more science-based and people want to have a little bit more magic in their lives -- a little more mystery -- so maybe that's an unconscious reaction they have and want to express something else."
Although Merk feels comic art as a storytelling medium is still unfairly stigmatised as being for children, he pointed out this weekend's first two-day ThunderCon is evidence new audiences are being attracted to the culture.
That's fuel for his career because although children can read his work with their parents' consent, much of his content throughout his career has been aimed at adults.
Alongside contract art work, Merk has been able to construct a primary career out of the dream he has held since he was five years old: making a living from his drawings -- and now words -- through comic books.
"There's very little money to be made. It's a passion but at the same time, I don't want to downplay that I get paid for stuff. I also do photography illustration, logo design and stuff like that. To be an artist in nowadays market, you have to be very flexible."
Merk has set a May 2017 release date for Season of the Dead Hours. He is accepting donations and pre-orders here.
