These stories are about superheroes, or characters in a world where superheroes exist. The first of these stories, Ivy & Sorrow, did not begin as a superhero story, though. It began as a story about the failure of my then-current relationship. I had started selling occasional essays and stories, and I discovered Cyber Age Adventures, an online magazine buying superhero fiction at a better rate than my other outlets at the moment.
Inevitably, comparisons will arise between these stories and the movie, My Super Ex-Girlfriend, which came out in 2006, and the comics series Invincible (2003 to 2018) and The Boys (2006 to 2012). The characters and background for Scarlet Ivy and Colonel Wonder were published in 2001. Their debut story won a prize from the Electronic Runes reader’s poll. If there was influence passed between these universes, it did not flow in my direction!
The Golden City stories arose out of the turmoil of their times. My personal failures. A historic lockout where I was working for Brookfield Property Management on Bay Street in Toronto, which resulted in almost no media coverage. The attack on the World Trade Center. Harbingers, as it turned out, for the decreased workers’ rights and increased global violence that were to come. These were things that I wanted to talk about. I also wanted to talk about hope. With or without powers, there has to be a reason for people to keep struggling on a day-to-day basis.
At the same time, things have changed, and we cannot simply pretend that thing are as they once were.
Cyber Age Adventures (later iHero) had a feature called “Anytown Gazette” for fictional newspaper clippings within a superheroic world. I have included those Anytown Gazette entries I wrote, under the names of the fictional reporters these items first appeared under.
I hope you enjoy them.
