Cura Te Ipsum – the continuing adventures of Charlie Everett

I’ve been reading and enjoying the work of Eric Trautmann and Brandon Jerwa for some time now. I’ve also been quite fond of Steve Lieber’s work. When I found out that the three were doing a graphic novel together, it made the pull list immediately. I expected a good read. I expected a fun, honest comic. It’s what those gents do, after all. They’re among the few I turn to when I want to know what I should do when creating a comic book for a reason, and their friendship has sustained me through much doubt of my own ability and simultaneously it’s given me the courage to forge on.

What I wasn’t expecting was nearly being reduced to tears multiple times. I wasn’t expecting such an amazing piece. I went in, as one often does with familiar faces, with the expectation of good or better. I got what had damned well better win an Eisner, or I’m gonna find me some judges and mete out justice.

My dad served in Kuwait. My grandfather served in World War 2. I grew up in the area where most of this book took place. I was born in a military hospital, Madigan. Fort Lewis was a place I spent a great deal of time cavorting around on in my youth. The military culture that is ever-present and a part of life in Tacoma, Washington, in the northwest in particular, gets into your bones and defines your culture. It makes us who we are even if, like me, you’re a relative pacifist and find war a last resort. Still and all, you know fifty soldiers and you almost never meet one who isn’t, to a man or woman, courageous. Worthy of a story. As this book illustrates, war and its ins and outs are neither good, nor bad. It’s not black, nor white. In point of simple fact the realities are almost impossibly complex, and dealing with it drives great men and women to their graves. Those who survive can come through numb, and even those on the periphery are touched by the brutality of war and our need for defense, a need that has costs. The book covers all of this and more, and without being on the nose or delivering a soapbox message.

Without attaching itself strongly to the heavy politics of the last decade (which played hell on formerly idealistic me), this story approaches the human side of the war without being preachy, in a strong, real, human way. Without giving away the punch of the story, the trade follows Terry Glass through a series of trials and travails that have him questioning himself, his role in the world, and the role of the military and private contractors. From the low pay given to soldiers to the perceived high life of private contractors, the graphic novel runs the gamut from the perspective of a central character you ache being close to as he gains and loses things that give his life meaning, fighting goalposts that move in sometimes severe, chaotic ways. We see the impact that loss, war, and bureaucracy have on the life of someone who, in almost every situation, just does their best to do the right thing. It’s a story of what happens when being the best man you can be isn’t good enough, and it’s also a story of finding out that even the best people, when confronted with the realities of war, can swerve on the path to righteousness.

Lieber draws as he always has, with a very human touch. Even the battle scenes are about the people, and when the shock moments come, when the brutal glorious crescendos hit, they punch you in the gut. Trautmann and Jerwa teach me (as they have since I started trying to write these here funnybooks) what it means to tell a story in pictures, and I sit here in awe, furious that they’ve kicked my ass at the craft yet again, because this isn’t just a good book, it’s a fucking great book, and if you don’t pick it up, it’s your loss.

You can find it here.

Go.

It’s DONE.

The first issue of Cura, pages 1-25, is now colored and in the can! I could start handing it out to you guys right now, but then, I have to figure out a few things first, and for that, I was hoping to turn to the readership.

This mysterious “color” thing has value in a digital medium. Maybe you fine folks can help me figure out what that is. Any comments would be appreciated.

Please note this entire conversation concerns DIGITAL copies, not PRINT copies. Print copies of color Cura are aways off, and frankly dependent upon future sales. Color is VERY expensive to print.

PRICE:
I’m guessing a good, fair price for a color comic these days is about $3.99. That’s what I see in shops. I want to price the first digital Cura color issue at $2.99. That’s a buck cheaper than your average issues, and it enables us to do the OTHER STUFF you’ll dig.

If this first issue (and the subsequent two) are moderately successful, my plan is to continue with the color issues until I have a trade, and when we get there, release the SUPER DUPER DOUBLE SUPER SECRET trade at a discount for loyal readers/buyers.. What that means, essentially, is that if YOU buy the first three trades you get the trade with all the bonuses and extras FREE, and at an extraordinary discount (33%). The prices would be $2.99, $2.99, and then $3.99 for the last one I’m thinking, because it’s 32 pages instead of 25 (1)/22 (2).

Everyone else would pay slightly more, after a deadline. Say, $14.99 for what the people who bought early and supported the cost of production would get for $9.99. Don’t worry, I’ll make the deadline for that very clear on the site, and given the fact that the SUPER DUPER trade has to be put together, you can likely buy all three after the third issue has come out and still get the deal. There will be a week to a month gap as I set up the trade.

THE SUPER DUPER TRADE
So, in the digital medium I have a ton of space to goof around. What does that mean? It means that when I do the digital color trade, I can throw in a ton of stuff I can’t put in the print trade. I can put in the FULL SCRIPT (minus stuff that gives away the big mysteries). I can put in ALL of Dex’s pencils. I can put in the ROUGH INS. I can put in EXCLUSIVE SHORT STORIES. That’s what we’d be fighting for, creating and buying these, supporting them. If that’s something you’d dig, let me know.

DISTRIBUTION
Hoo boy. Okay. I’ll be straight up with you guys. The distributors want a cut, and I don’t want to give them one. Why? Well, because all they offer me, potentially, is new exposure, and there’s no way that my comic is going to stand out next to THE MIGHTY INCREDIBLE ULTIMATE HULK AVENGING SUPERMAN. Not right now. It’s just not likely. I’m not saying I wouldn’t sell a few books, but I wouldn’t sell many, and it’s much easier to keep things simple and on this site with people who really do care to be here, as opposed to the cold sell with strangers. That said, I’m not a fool, and I know many of you probably use Comixology and/or Drivethru and/or INSERT COMPANY HERE to buy your digital comics. This brings me to a problem. If it’s on those sites, the digital copies are also easier to distribute/for you to read.

I am tech savvy with regards to digital comics. I know how to get a CBR, CBZ, PDF, or even individual images up on an iPad/computer and read them, conveniently, and easily. If you DON’T, however, if you’re one of those folks who get the comixology app and don’t want to screw with figuring out how to load a comic into a reader, then it may be frustrating to you to be confronted with local distribution. For instance, if you had to download GOODREADER to read the Cura comic, would you do it? Or would it being on Comixology with that simplicity make or break your purchase?

Rest assured, no matter HOW we did it, I’d have a set of easy directions for you to figure out the process, and it wouldn’t be more than a five minute thing.

I know I have no problem downloading/using new programs for that kind of thing, but I don’t know about you folks, and it’s important that I know so I can decide whether to do this locally or whether I’ll have to take cuts and worry about creator rights with major distribution companies.

SIZE
Right now, I am patterning my digital comic size off the average downloadable comic, which has a width of 1280. That’s about a fifteen meg file. It fills my large monitor really well. If you have a different standard/know something I don’t know, please tell me. I based it off some of the comics I’ve downloaded.

PREVIEW
Some time in the next few days, I will release a preview so you can see that what you will purchase has value. I am unsure how big of a preview is sufficient. When I see a preview on Newsarama that’s three pages, I’m like “Come on, guys, I need to see more.” When I see 10 pages, I’m like “Holy crap, they just gave away the whole comic!”

I am inclined to give away more than I am to be stingy. I am thinking a nine page preview. Any comments or thoughts would be appreciated.

SUMMATION
That’s… that’s about it. Let me know what you guys think. And let Dex know how awesome that cover is, huh? He really knocked it out!

N

And here’s why!

If you look up in your URL bar now, Cura Te Ipsum finally has a permanent home, at http://www.curateipsum.com! Don’t worry, Charlieeverett.com will still work, but as of now, you can type in the title of the comic, and GET the comic! I’ve wanted to do that from day one, and now we can!

The story of why it took a year and a half is my fault. I’ll explain. I was SHY. Convinced that the person who owned curateipsum.com would likely not want to part with it, I never sent a letter to the owner. Then, the other day, missing the last T on Charlieeverett for the fiftieth time, I thought, “Why didn’t you write that letter?”

And so I googled the Whois and shot a letter in the dark to the owner, listed as Mr. Aroles. I expected the letter never to come back, as often letters in the dark are doomed to be, but lo and behold, I got a letter back! Turns out that, having seen the comic, Mr. Aroles was willing to transfer the domain…

FOR FREE.

He could have charged me, he could have held onto the domain, but instead he was truly kind, awesome, and wonderful, and that’s the reason why right now, you’re at the URL I always wanted for the site. WOOT! Please, folks, help me thank the man in the comments!