Alex Assan

Alex Assan

@alexassan.com

Artist of the webcomic Shaderunners.com and the graphic novel Sunhead ☀️ Second GN with HarperAlley to be announced soon! He/him. Berlin-based. Represented by Britt Siess. 🍉🍉🍉 Portfolio: AlexAssan.com

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This is a thread all about mine and @lindarrow.bsky.social's queer noir webcomic Shaderunners.com, a historical fantasy comic where the alcohol prohibition in the 1920s is instead a prohibition of COLOUR 🍸💚 The archive is big, it’s free to read, and the story is in its final act!

I should probably mention, since we're starting from the beginning, the art is going to be rough for a while. Please keep in mind these pages were drawn over ten years ago 🥲

Alex Assan reposted

2006 | 2016 | 2026 Keep at it I guess! Also yes this is indeed gay Cardcaptor Sakura fanart because I've always been really really cool.

Heads up for authors and comic artists that email scams have been getting a LOT more sophisticated thanks to AI. This email I just got includes actual details about my book, even though there are still some obvious AI tells in my opinion (the subject & the last paragraph especially stand out). 1/2

I think it's just a matter of time before these are ironed out though, and soon it may become near impossible to tell the difference. If you're ever approached like this: practice caution, research the company and the sender, and consult your industry peers. More about this kind of scam:

writerbeware.blogReturn of the Nigerian Prince Redux: Beware Book Club and Book Review Scams - Writer BewareA few weeks ago, I wrote about a rising and extremely prolific marketing scam that I’ve been able to trace back to operators in Nigeria. Using highly personalized (AI-generated) email solicitations th...

Alex Assan reposted

The Quindrie Comic Fund will open for submissions in May! UK-based comic creators can apply for up to £1000 to put towards a comic project or goal. Read more details and sign up to be notified when submissions open here: quindriepress.com/fund 🐉

Alex Assan reposted

if YOU are doing Trans Rights Readathon (I am, more info next week) or simply looking to read more fun things with trans people in, here's a reminder my books exist and an excuse to shout out some books I really enjoyed. Thread ⤵️ #TransRightsReadathon #trr26

you guys are NOT ready for this book!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Lin Darrow@lindarrow.bsky.social

💿 👻 ✨ I’m thrilled to show off Barbara Ciardo’s glorious cover for Dead New World, my Queer scifi book about holographically resurrected ghosts working dead end jobs, falling in love and solving ghost crimes that’s available for preorder now! buff.ly/xWdY6xp

my wrist is still fractured btw and i regret to inform you every time someone sees my cast and asks how i broke it i get closer to saying oh you know. jerkin' it

thankfully i am a chronic un-finisher of art though and so now not being able to draw the only thing i can do now is polish off old pieces lmao. so at least there's that 🤷

one funny thing about having transitioned is that my dad is really supportive and hasn't actually changed the way he talks to me at all, just swapped "daughter" for "son". so he constantly refers to me as his "lovely son" and "beautiful son of mine". i think it's so cute honestly i love it

like it's clear to me that he wouldn't be speaking like that if I were his cis son but in a way it's nicer like this. it's like i skipped some of the weird father-son awkwardness you always hear about lmao

every time i go to an adult puppet show (which is a lot of times) i always have a small hope that i'll get to see a human fuck a puppet and it never happens because everyone in theater is a coward. apparently

you guys don't even understand how good this one's going to be

Hari Conner@haridraws.bsky.social

HELLO I'm so delighted to finally officially share A TRUE GENTLEMAN, the graphic novel I’ve been working on for the last few years & is very close to my heart. Inspired by a lot of real queer & trans history and my own disability, with big marsh, big ships & BIG YEARNING #books

Alex Assan reposted

Ras Ein al-Auja, one of the last remaining Bedouin communities in the Jordan Valley in the occupied West Bank, has been completely erased through brutal Israeli settler violence. Ras Ein al-Auja has been ethnically cleansed. (1/3)

i love heated rivalry because now that it's hit the mainstream i can finally find out which of the women in my life have the fujoshi gene

Today marks mine and @lindarrow.bsky.social 's 16th anniversary as friends & creative soulmates! I lucked out with the best possible collaborator. I can't even imagine where I would be today without Lin's friendship & artistic influence. Lin, I love you and I hope we make comics together forever 🩷

one of the positive things about this development though is that i'm finding out just how many of my fellow hive sufferers i hadn't been following on bluesky! very happy to be correcting this now

Alex Assan reposted

Making a 🧵 to help people get context on Hiveworks: The Hiveworks Guild statement from Cartoonist Co-op. Make sure to check the "How You Can Help" tab

Cartoonists United@cartoonist.coop

The Hiveworks Artist Guild has released a public statement alleging years of labor abuses, financial mismanagement, and misconduct at Hiveworks at the hands of Xellette “Xel” Velamist and Isabelle “Isa” Melançon. Read their full statement at: cartoonist.coop/hiveworks-gu...

One of the crazier Hiveworks stories in the bunch. Recommend a read if you'd like an example of just how absurdly bad things got for some people.

August Brown 🏳️‍⚧️@skullamity.bsky.social

Heeeyy, we can finally talk about this! So, I would like to co-sign everything in this open letter. I would also like to tell everyone about a specific grievance that @femonologue.bsky.social and I have with Xellette after the mishandling of our kickstarter. Screencap/receipts in🧵 to follow!

Krispy has been more professional, caring and hard-working during the last few years promoting the Hiveworks artists' interests than Xel and Isa have been over a decade actually running the company

Krispy@feathernotes.bsky.social

It's been a long ten years and I finally get to talk publicly about what happened behind closed doors. Please take the time to read this letter and please avoid working with these people. You are more valuable than an opportunity for people like them to use you as cash cow for your work. 🧵

Anyone wondering why @lindarrow.bsky.social and I (and many others) left Hiveworks, read this statement. The Guild has been a source of incredible inspiration, full of amazing people who care deeply about their peers & webcomics as a whole. I am sincerely grateful for everyone's hard work in this.

Cartoonists United@cartoonist.coop

The Hiveworks Artist Guild has released a public statement alleging years of labor abuses, financial mismanagement, and misconduct at Hiveworks at the hands of Xellette “Xel” Velamist and Isabelle “Isa” Melançon. Read their full statement at: cartoonist.coop/hiveworks-gu...

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I have since been told that Isa had branded us "difficult to work with", though I can't say if the source of that claim was reliable. Either way, Hive clearly gave up on us, and over close to a decade, promoted Shaderunners exactly twice. We stayed for the (small) monthly payment, because why not.

I think them screwing up so early with us had inadvertently saved us a lot of heartache. I was shocked to hear some of the stories told in the Guild discord once people started sharing their experiences. I hope if anything can be learned from this, is to always talk to your peers. You are not alone.

Anyone wondering why @lindarrow.bsky.social and I (and many others) left Hiveworks, read this statement. The Guild has been a source of incredible inspiration, full of amazing people who care deeply about their peers & webcomics as a whole. I am sincerely grateful for everyone's hard work in this.

Cartoonists United@cartoonist.coop

The Hiveworks Artist Guild has released a public statement alleging years of labor abuses, financial mismanagement, and misconduct at Hiveworks at the hands of Xellette “Xel” Velamist and Isabelle “Isa” Melançon. Read their full statement at: cartoonist.coop/hiveworks-gu...

Shaderunners was picked up by Hiveworks when it was trying to launch its imprint Mary's Monster by Audrey Redpath. Lin and I were promised the world and then ignored for many months. We quickly realized what we thought was a serious publisher was, in truth, completely incompetent and full of shit.

When MM was canceled and we were given the Hiveworks contract, we pushed back on many clauses, and over the years we repeatedly refused any offers of "edits", not wanting Hive to ever be able to claim that they had a creative hand in our work. We also refused their offers of printing Shaderunners.

went on a hiking trip with my dad for his 70th birthday & was worried he would fall when we went down these extremely unsafe-looking steps. i watched him like a hawk and then when we reached the bottom at last with no incident i immediately slipped and fell. anyway my right wrist is fractured now

the doc said it should only take about 6 weeks to heal so thankfully not the worst case scenario. but i do feel extremely silly

don't ever accept free tickets to the theatre because the monkey's paw WILL curl and in the actors WILL shine the world's brightest spotlight on your face and demand that you sing them a song in the middle of the play. in german