April 18th, 2024 was Camosun Comic Arts Festival‘s (CCAF’s) 12th anniversary. It was here I released my new 40-page comic: Cult of Lost Souls.
Cult of Lost Souls is thematically about ghost stories and dark folklore. Most of the pages are printed in full colour. Leaning heavily into BC’s history and oral legends, the stories are told by a ghostly host named Luciana.
Luciana is an ancestral ghost who is depicted as a skeleton wearing a hooded white cloak with two long braids. Though not stated outright, I imagine her to be of mixed Metis-settler ancestry, like myself. Luciana’s appearance is a nod to the folklore of The Woman in White ghost stories told throughout the world. Visually, she is shapely in clothing, as ghosts depicted as skeletons sometimes are (DC’s 1970s Ghosts and Latin America Day of the Dead ancestral depictions are examples). This design choice suggests Luciana was a younger woman when she died.
As a ghost historian intent on sharing folklore with the living, Luciana wearing white acts as a counterbalance to medieval images of the cold and masculine Grim Reaper. She carries an orange-glowing lantern that symbolizes acceptance, family, and respect for the living. As Luciana does not need a lantern herself, the light makes her a guide for the living reader.
Luciana is a friend of cats—most especially the often misunderstood and feared black cat. Unlike other supernatural hosts of “horror” comics, the stories she shares are never comedic. Luciana does not introduce or close stories with a joke and she will often use sources.
Inside, Luciana narrates two eight-page stories and shares other dark folklore throughout the rest of the comic. The first tale, “The Ghost of Grouse Mountain,” is based on a haunting described in The Province newspaper in 1903.
The second eight-page story, “Jack O’Lantern Jack,” is a dramatic reinterpretation of the Irish folk legend about how Jack O’Lanterns came to be–with Robert Johnson (who reputably sold his soul for musical talent) and “The Devil Went Down to Georgia” elements added throughout.
I’m happy with how Cult of Lost Souls turned out. Some of the back covers of the first print have small tears in them made by Camosun’s printers, but the quality, overall, was what I had hoped it would be.
Legends Comics and CAVITY Curiosity are selling copies of Cult of Lost Souls. So far, it has only been available in Victoria, BC. I have a few comics left, but not enough to list them for sale online to the general public before I order a second printing for Halloween.
(UPDATE: Cult of Lost Souls sold out! So I ordered a second printing. It is now also being sold at Well Read Books in Nanaimo, Cozy Corner Comics in Coombs, and Little Shop of Strange in Victoria’s Market Square.)
Leave a message below if you’d like to order a copy and you live outside these areas (I will have your email address attached and will message you). Or message me if we are friends and you have my email or phone number. As above, the price is $14.95. It might take 4-6 weeks if I am away from Victoria so please be patient.
I will ship anywhere in Canada for $5. But I would need an exact address to determine international rates if there is interest further away. If there is interest, I might make Cult of Lost Souls available digitally in the fall.
If you’d like to learn more about CCAF, and see photos of my table, here’s a second post for you!
Congratulations! Can’t wait to see it. Nice to see you hard at work.
Thank you Shawn! I appreciate your words of support when I first signed up for this program 🙂