Legion World Forums LEGION COMPANION Dr. Gym'll's Cultural Rarities Buy my graphic novel now!

Greetings, Legion Worlders! For the past 5 years I have been working on my very own graphic novel, based on characters from Greek mythology. It is FINALLY done and is now available for purchase on line at:

http://indyplanet.com/store/product_info.php?products_id=5633

It will also be available soon in digital format!

Please help me spread the word! I need to make a killing on this thing so I can quit my job and live like RJ Brande! LOL!

Hey - that's awesome! Congratulations on getting it done - good luck!

My website is comiing along. The Characters and Sketches sections are now live and the Buy the Book link takes you where you need to go. The How I did it section is coming along but not up yet. The contact the author link is not up yet.



http://www.dodeka12.com/

The How I did it section is now up!

The Talk to the Author message board is now up and running!

I had *NO IDEA* you were an artist and author--! Seems strange I didn't know, as long as I have "known" you via the web.

HUGE CONGRATS to you on this milestone!! I'm very very proud and trying to eradicate my smidge of envy!

Looks great, Jim!

That IndyPlanet site has a LOT of interesting books. Didn't know about it before.

So, have you placed your orders yet?

The first review is in!

Ronn Karr, one of the guys on one of the other comic book message boards I subscribe to had this to say:

Parts of it I didn't quite follow what was going on, but overall I enjoyed it. My favorite parts were about the animal characters, like when the spider helps the minotaur. That was really fun! The artwork is mostly good, if unconventional (which is fine by me). I would have liked to see the women generally look a little more feminine and less masculine, even the ones with wings and claws, but that's me. I'm not sure how much that was in the penciling and how much it was maybe in the inking. You kind of have to exaggerate female features and tone down anything masculine (like strong chins) to make women read as feminine in comic book art. More half tones thrown it would've been cool too, but would've meant more work and more time I guess. Anyway, you're definitely a talented guy. If you ever want to go more mainstream I think maybe you could do a graphic novel telling the mythology straight up based faithfully on the source material. I think there's a market for that sort of educational stuff. What you did is good though... really unique and interesting... you should definitely be proud of it. One of the cool things about the book is that it does relate to the original myths, and (in my case anyway) gets you interested enough to get on Google (or the Wikipedia links on your website) and look stuff up that you either forgot over the years or just never learned before.

Okay, so considering how long I've been posting on these boards I can't believe at least a few of you people aren't curious enough to buy my book! Come on, Folks! Support your fellow Legion fan in his creative endeavor!

I've visited your website, Jim, and I can tell you put a lot of hard work into the graphic novel. Just the same, the subject matter does not interest me and, even though $12 is more than reasonable, I'm choosing to spend what little money I have on other things these days.

I imagine others feel the same way I do: message board posting has nothing to do with whether or not I will buy a product. I have several RL friends who write books, but I won't buy some of them if the subject matter does not interest me. Nor do I expect them to buy my book unless it's something they are genuinely interested in.

If it's a good book, it will find its audience.

I got the book (took a while to reach the hinterlands here) and started it last night. Will post more when I finish, but it's a very absorbing read. Like Ronn Karr, I'm somewhat familiar with the Greek mythological characters, but don't remember them all. Jim does a great job of explaining concisely who is who and what they're known for.

The story opens with an old woman being attacked, so you're rooting for the poor old woman and then...surprise! It was a good hook to get one interested.

Also, it was nice to see the Titans towering over the other characters, as Titans should. Can't say I've read many myth-based comics before!

I finished Jason and the New Argonauts a while ago, just slow to get to reviews.

The book was a great read; it had some meat to it, which a lot of current comics lack. Themis assembles a group of people/gods who Zeus has wronged in order to demand justice. They plan to bring their case to the Fates but first, they must find out where the Fates are - either nobody knows, or nobody's talking. You get the impression that the Fates are like mafia kingpins; nobody wants trouble from them. The group travels on Jason's ship, the Argo (hence the title) seeking information about the Fates, having their own internal squabbles and encountering many mythological (to us) characters.

I love the idea of these characters seeking redress; in most mythological stories, no one questions what happens to them. In this story, you find characters who are actually suffering from being turned into half-arachnid, or compelled to cry endless tears, or turned into harpies, and they all have distinctive personalities.

The story ends with the three Fates, having dispatched one member of the team, discussing what they should do next. A sequel may be in the works, but the story feels complete enough as it stands.

Jim does a great job of bringing these mythological characters to life, explaining succinctly who each one is and how they came to be as they are. There's also a glossary at the back with a brief summary of the players.

I thought the art was great; I never gave much consideration to how any of these characters might look in real life. My favourite page was Themis battling the Gorgons.



For $12, I felt like I got a lot more story than three or four comics from DC or Marvel would provide.

That sounds really interesting.

Wow! I just revisited this thread after giving up on it months ago. I had no idea that Fat Cramer had bought or read my book! Thanks a lot for the great review, FC!!!

Duplicate post deleted.

Here's another review by Madscrawler:

This story is built around the clever idea of creating a new band of Argonauts based on the signs of the zodiac. Author Gallagher ingeniously uses real figures from Greek mythology to fill each of the roles. Jason, with his Golden Fleece, is the perfect choice to represent Aries the Ram. Others that fit seamlessly are Chiron the Centaur (Sagittarius), Pan (Capricorn), the Minotaur (Taurus), and the Nemean Lion (Leo). In a couple of instances, Gallagher had to rewrite mythology a bit to squeeze his characters into their parts, but it all makes so much sense that a reader unfamiliar with Greek mythology would probably never know which parts are the author's inventions.

Given the large cast and relatively small space he had to work with, Gallagher does an excellent job of imbuing his characters with distinctive personalities. My favorite is Celaeno the Harpy, with her odd speech pattern and nasty sense of humor. She's the feminist from Hell, with arrogance to spare and the chops to back it up. Using this amusingly abrasive monster to fill the role of Virgo the Maiden was a strange and inspired choice.

There are some nice inter-Argonaut relationships that help to flesh out the characters. Themis (Libra) and her sons Prometheus and Epimetheus (Gemini) make a tidy family unit, complete with a lovable pet, the Nemean Lion. The bond between the unfortunate Arachne (Scorpio) and the abused Minotaur is quite touching. There's even a love story, albeit an unconventional one, involving Jason and Iphicles (Cancer).

The Argonauts are presented as a band of mismatched misfits, but they are superheroes nonetheless, pulling off feats of derring-do and prevailing against all odds. And the most powerful among them are not always the ones you'd expect. That Gallagher manages to surprise us at every turn with these ancient characters is a testament to his skill as a writer.

At first, I found the whole ye-thee-thou style of speech to be rather off-putting. But it grew on me, and by the end, I was loving it. When written by someone who knows what they're doing, as Gallagher clearly does, it reads like poetry. In retrospect, I don't think the story would have worked without it.

I found The Adventures of Jason and the New Argonauts to be one of the most intelligent and entertaining graphic novels I've read. I recommend it highly.

Can't believe only ONE person on this board has bought my book.


Harrumph Lad

One of the harsh realities of being a writer, Jim, is that no one is obligated to buy your work.

It can be discouraging... I post my and Dean's stuff for FREE and we rarely get a comment; talks of setting our work up for sale elsewhere have fallen through....

Still, DON'T be discouraged... just continue to plug yourself and who knows what might happen.

And remember- a lot of the people who post here are unemployed, struggling financially if they ARE employed, or not even reading graphic novels/comics anymore...

Harrumph!!! Harrumph I say!