Hello everyone! If you've been browsing through the new Naimoli Universe, you may have noticed something unexpected in both the Books and Comics pages: the reveal of two new properties that I will provide more details of in the future! The first one is a chapter book in the Books page I hope to put out by August or September of next year titled Operation Awesome!
The story of a boy trying to make friends in middle school, Operation Awesome was an idea that I had been working on for a long time. Based on childhood accounts that I documented in journals a-la Greg Heffley, it started out as a prior version that I made into a series of short stories for my Children's Book Illustration and Writing course in college. Some stories were better than others, and I learned from that experience as far as writing was concerned. For my final project, I made the first chapter for that version, and I wrote much of the plot as well. However, I always felt iffy about the premise, so I ultimately abandoned it.
Later, as I was trying to find ways to get onto the Internet (which ultimately became the blog), I started plans to turn it from a chapter book into a comic strip for Twitter. This was before I learned to digitize my artwork; had I went ahead with this plan, the strips would have been completed without color and in the original pencil line. I actually drew quite a few strips, but when I started sharing it, I rubbed some people the wrong way with it, so I again abandoned the project. Then came my Illustration college thesis; in which I made a pitch that my instructor didn't really like. I was told to make two backup pitches, but my instructor didn't like them either, so I struggled with what I would change my thesis to for a fairly long time. That's when I forced myself to revisit the project, but as it turned out, a college thesis was exactly what the book needed, and it turned into the version you will see here next year. I improved the parts of the premise I didn't like and got help from writing teaching assistants for the plot. I got much praise for the story, which really boosted my confidence in the project and motivated me to finish it. Since my projected release date is a long way away, I plan to gradually reveal more information about the book as I work on it.
The second property is a graphic novel series in the Comics page that I plan to publish in the future like The Bermuda Adventures, but may be more familiar: Captain Console!
Captain Console is about a boy who gains video game powers that he uses to save Los Angeles. Originally, I didn't plan on writing an entire series about a supporting character from The Cross Dimensional Awareness of Izzy Speechbubbles, but I was getting so many ideas for a series that everything just fell into place in a rather interesting way. I hope to reveal more information about the series soon, but I will say this for now. The Captain Console you see in Izzy Speechbubbles is NOT the same version of the character you will see in this graphic novel series, instead inhabiting the same universe as The Bermuda Adventures. As for what the Captain Console in Izzy Speechbubbles actually is, I'm thinking of a multiverse approach of some kind, but I'm not entirely sure yet.
So, are you excited about my plans for Operation Awesome and Captain Console? Let me know what you think, and as usual, stay enlightened, educated and entertained, folks.