Larry Correia Announces Graphic Novel Art and Audiobook Narrator For His Ark Press American Paladin Release
It seems Ark Press is ramping up the marketing on Larry Correia’s forthcoming American Paladin book, as today he’s revealed two big pieces of the Kickstarter campaign in comic art and the audiobook narrator.
A few months ago, Ark Press announced they had poached Larry Correia from Baen Books for his forthcoming urban fantasy series, where Fandom Pulse learned through insiders that Correia had both offered the book to Baen Books who declined it, and that Peter Thiel, who owns Ark Press, had also attempted to buy Baen Books in some of the biggest fantasy and science fiction book publishing moves of the year so far.
On July 8th, Correia announced the title of his book and that Ark Press would be taking it to Kickstarter to get in on crowdfunding revenue. He said:
Today I can announce the name of the new series I'm doing for Ark Press. American Paladin.
This is my take on that whole lone vigilante genre, only it's also a contemporary fantasy with monsters and supernatural elements. It is set in the western US and the main story takes place in 2022.
What can I tell you about it so far? Well, imagine a country boy ends up as a Missing 411 case, survives, and decides to wage a one man war against the forces of extradimensional evil, except until he can find them again he might as well take out his anger on regular human bad guys who'd normally get away with. And when the monsters do show up again, we get to play cowboys vs. Aztecs.
That series name works on multiple levels. I can't wait for you guys to read this one.
While the book sounds very similar to Monster Hunter Intl., and indeed Ark Press has already come out and said it’s similar to the popular series by Correia already, this campaign is going to be accompanied by a graphic novel, the first Correia has said he’s producing. On X today, he revealed the artist as well as some preview pages from the graphic novel.
He posted the cover along with the message, “Mike Spears is a drifter with a gun, a grim code, and a habit of following blood trails no one else will touch. Across the forgotten towns and backroads of the American West, storms roll in from places no map can find—“Sometimes Places,” where the boundary between worlds wears thin. When those borders weaken, monsters get through. Spears makes sure they don’t make it back. Now a girl has gone missing, a lost waif most would write off as expendable. But for Spears, she is someone’s daughter, and he isn’t writing anything off. The trail leads to a dying town, a masked killer, and a door that shouldn’t exist—one that opens into a twisted empire of blood, sacrifice, and ancient, hungry gods.”
He also posted some of the interior art:
Of note, the art is in a much more manga-influenced style than traditional American comics, and it appears as if it’s going to be produced in black and white.
Correia also announced that Nick Searcy would be doing the audiobook for the American Paladin novel, saying, “Nick is super talented. He brings gravitas, humor, and humanity to every role. I'm so looking forward to this.”
Ark Press and Passage Press both retweeted the information out to their follower base as the marketing for the campaign begins to ramp up. There’s still no release date mentioned so far.
What do you think of Larry Correia’s Graphic Novel art?
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This has a better shot of adaptation and not running into branding issues that MHI had (Capcom says hi)
I wish Larry luck and am curious to see how this does for him. Doesn't interest me, though.