21: Captain Coyote

This episode of Jetsam brings the first chapter to a close. Initially, I had intended for this to be the end of my work on this comic; I love endings that leaves the mind open to make up stories about what happens next. However, my test readership group (my wife) read the comics and when she got to this point said, "That's it?" So I decided to write another chapter.

I had learned a lot of things during this run about writing a comic. By the time I was at this strip, I had developed a process and decided it would be fun to apply that to a continuation of the story. During that run, I had taken the foundation of process I created with this first chapter, and built on it and improved on it for the second.

Right now, you are seeing the end of chapter one, but I am finishing up chapter two, so I am a whole chapter ahead of you. I'm going to develop chapter three next, after a short break-- you will only notice one week between chapters where I don't update. The third chapter will hopefully wrap something up, leaving open ends for our minds to explore, or loose ends that I might build off of in the future. I think chapter three might be the last one, however.

I won't be stopping because I've lost interest; I am in love with the process at work here and I have a lot more to tweak and build on in terms of both story and art. I simply (as always) have other interests developing, ones that are taking up considerable time. I'm moving in positive new directions in life. Hopefully while you are in the middle of this next chapter, I will be opening my own business here in the real world. I expect that will take over my life once it becomes fully realized.

But that's not the future you have come here to see. You're here to see much farther. To a future in which we inhabit the orbit of our planet, and not much else has changed as far as human nature is concerned. So take a week off, and then I'll be back on July 8th with the beginning of the second chapter of Jetsam. If you thought the first one was good, wait until you see what I can do when I don't have to waste time figuring out the basics.

See you in two weeks!