I have always been fascinated by the deaf. Sign language, too. On the one hand, I love music so much that it scares me a little to even think about what it would be like to be deaf. But at the same time I have such an enormous respect for people who live without it because I’m sure they’ve heard that exact sentiment a thousand times – how do you live without music? I’ve only met one deaf person in my life so far, and I tried my best to hold back on my questions. Something about the fact that I literally could never understand the way they see the world intrigues me to no end.

At some point I wondered if there had ever been any (well known) stories about a deaf main character. I couldn’t think of any, but that might’ve just been a lack of luck. (If you do know of any, please email me! Books, movies, short stories, comics, anything!)

So, being a wannabe writer, I figured I’d write one. Not long after the story started brewing I realized it would carry so much more depth as a more visual medium than writing, and I stubbed my toe over that dusty old comic book idea. I had never really been a fan of comic books (I have issues with most superheroes…) but the idea behind the medium was one I had every respect for. This was about six or seven months ago.

I spent some time trying to doodle out an acceptable comic book style of art, and eventually gave up. Lineart goes against everything I find fun about painting. Eventually I was clocked on the head by some unseen force of reason and it dawned on me that I didn’t have to come up with a whole new style of art for this to work. I could do it in my own painting style. It’ll just be, y’know, difficult.

And so the complete vision of Pastel Sun promptly popped into my head; a story about a deaf priestess in a fantasy culture that worships beauty and believes demons literally travel and breed by word of mouth.

I’m still outlining, so that’s all I’ll say for now. If all goes well, finishing this story will be the proudest moment of my life.

Cheers.