Sluggy Freelance

Here's references for "Krohnus" and "Pete" if you need them.

So it feels like Halloween was just the other day. "Hey kids, did you enjoy your Halloween? Nice costumes!" Suddenly I get tapped on the shoulder : "Pete, you need to get those turkeys in the brine!" I'm like, "it can't be Thanksgiving already?!?" This is followed by my wife saying "No, Thanksgiving was days ago, you were supposed to announce store order deadlines because it's almost Christmas." "Oh well, what day do international orders need to be placed by?" "Yesterday. Deadline has past"  Me: "Fuuuuuuhhhh....."

So this is how time has been going for me lately. Speeding by while my creative output has slowed down.

The current story-line, Immortal King, has been a culmination of so much of Sluggy lore coming together and being revealed, and it’s been a lot of work. It’s more involved then just about any other story. Although this process is more difficult, I am really happy with how it is coming together.

But coming to the end of the year, I find myself over a year behind on mailing out physical Pawnz and Bookmarks to eligible Defenders, and we've been two years without a new book (I'm not counting re-releasing Megatome 02).

Being a one-man show, things can be difficult, take longer and I can get behind on tasks, but this is way too far behind. It has been stressing me out and it has to stop. I have a solution, and it’s not great, but it is the better than falling further behind or stopping the comics all together.

Starting next week, I will restrict myself to one comic a week. The weekly comic will mostly land on Wednesdays. I will NOT increase comic output until a) I'm caught up to the plan of quarterly Pawnz and Bookmarks releases, and b) Sluggy Freelance Book 22 'R&D Wars', is off to the printers.

How long will this take? I honestly don’t know, and I don’t want to guess wrong. Did I say how much I hate to do it? For me, it extra painful because we are hitting an action-climax, and the momentum is going to drop from slow to a trickle. Grrr.

I remember the frustration from when I did this "one comic a week" thing last February-ish. So I understand this will be difficult for you as well. But I feel strongly I need to do this to attend to the eligible Defenders who have been supporting the strip and deserve the book and bookmarks and pawnz rewards.

Plus I want to catch up with the books! I’ve never been more proud of my publications than the books for the 4U city saga, including the bonus stories in Books 20 and 21. I look forward to the relief I’m going to feel when I have Book 22 in my hands and know I’m on top of the pile.

Thank you all again for your patience and support! I couldn’t have made 25 years without you guys. And let me say “Happy Holidays and Happy New Year” now because I’m going to start gift-shopping and reach for the egg-nog (squishy-nog?) and then realize its February. Stupid Time God.

-Pete

12/7/2022