Q&A: Writer Alisa Kwitney Discusses the Sci-Fi Elements and Fascinating Research Behind New Comic Book Series HOWL
Something controlling and not of this world is making its way through the thriving artistic community of Greenwich Village circa 1957 in the new comic book series Howl. Written by Alisa Kwitney with artwork by Mauricet, the first issue of Howl hits shelves this Wednesday from AHOY Comics, and Daily Dead caught up with Alisa in a new Q&A feature to discuss the new five-issue series, including the story’s connection to her parents, the fascinating (and surprising) research she conducted to prepare for the story’s ’50s setting, and reteaming with the talented artist Mauricet to bring out the story’s distinct ’50s pulp sci-fi style.
You can read our full Q&A with Alisa below, and be sure to keep an eye on AHOY Comics’ website for more details on Howl and their other comic book series!
Thanks for taking the time to answer questions for us, Alisa, and congratulations on Howl, which does an amazing job transporting readers back to the beatnik scene of Greenwich Village in 1957, a time and place that is integral to your own family history. When did you initially come up with the idea for this story?
Alisa Kwitney: The original idea occurred to me in 2018 or so, when I realized that I wanted to learn more about the Greenwich Village of the late ’50s and the time before my conception, when my parents were young and hungry and just discovering each other. My father was never around when I was growing up, so I got to know him through my mother’s stories and through the books he left behind—his own absurdist science fiction stories, and the books of his peers and the people who had shaped him.
I can thank Karen Berger (my former boss, who created the Vertigo imprint at DC Comics) for the twist of making this a science fiction story about science fiction writers. She planted that seed (heh heh, pun intended) at a Comic Con where she also made the perfectly awful suggestion that I order an expresso martini. If you ask me, alcohol and caffeine are not compatible. Biography and pulp sci-fi horror, on the other hand, go down very smoothly.
Tom Peyer, my editor and former Vertigo colleague, helped me really lean into the pulpish aspects, as did my artist and collaborator Mauricet. Mauricet was so excited every time I gave him a ’50s-style pulp cover to do that I just kept doing more of those. The last ingredient was a class I did in non-fiction—I had been thinking about writing about Mildred Newman, the celebrity therapist who saw my parents and just about everyone else in the late ’50s into the ’60s. She was a force of nature, leading groups which included some of the top artists, writers, actors, and directors of the day. In the end, I decided to treat her fictionally, and she became the chief antagonist of the series.
Greenwich Village in the late ’50s is not just a backdrop but also a major character in Howl. How important was it for you to set this story in that specific time and place in history, and how much research did you have to do to authentically capture that moment in time?
Alisa Kwitney: I grew up with my mother’s stories about her own adolescence in the 1950s, reading many of the novels and watching the films of that decade, and I still have some of her clothes from that time. I also knew the version of the ’50s that was popular on sitcoms and movies from the 1970s. In researching the series, however, I became fascinated by the ways in which writers and artists and musicians and intellectuals of the time contradicted what I thought I knew about the decade.
As for research, well, I read David Halberstam’s The Fifties and Ninth Street Women and The Mayor of MacDougal Street. I watched Bucket of Blood and lots of other B-movie classics. And I reread my mother and father’s old letters to each other. My mother didn’t like American Graffiti, by the way. Something I only discovered from her journals, though I can’t recall her objection. Maybe the boys’ club-ishness of the POV.
In Howl, your powerful prose reunites wonderfully with amazing artwork by Mauricet, whom you’ve worked on previously in the comic book worlds of Creepshow and Project: Cryptid, respectively. What is it about Mauricet’s vibrant visual style that made him the perfect fit for Howl?
Alisa Kwitney: Mauricet is excited by the same challenges in his artwork as I am in my storytelling. We love capturing the authentic nuances of human emotion—what in comics art is called “acting.” We love toggling between humor and tenderness, humor and horror, humor and the psychological. About ten years ago, I had a very well-known artist take a look at one of my scripts and turn it down because there weren’t enough big fight scenes. Mauricet doesn’t require big fight scenes, but when I do write them—and there is a doozy at the end of this series—he just goes to town with them.
Jack Finney’s The Body Snatchers is one of my favorite books of all time, and Howl certainly pays homage to Finney’s timeless sci-fi story. Were you influenced or inspired by The Body Snatchers and its film adaptations while working on Howl?
Alisa Kwitney: Oh, yes, very much so. I am a particular fan of the Philip Kaufman version. It’s a deeply psychological and sociological film, and Kaufman really lets the actors shine. I also have fond memories of running into my mom on Broadway shortly after we both saw the film, and her making a Donald Sutherland face and doing the classic “Point and Howl.”
Howl #1 includes two great bonus stories: “Gently Down the Stream” written by Kirk Vanderbeek with artwork by Carol Lay, and “Life on Mars” written by Bryce Ingman with artwork by Ameilee Sullivan. How did the opportunity come about to include these thought-provoking tales, and can readers look forward to more companion stories in future issues of Howl?
Alisa Kwitney: The inclusion of terrific extras is all the work of my fearless leader, Tom Peyer. I am sure he has other delicious nuggets in store for future issues.
What has it been like to work with the team at AHOY Comics to bring Howl to life?
Alisa Kwitney: Rob Steen is an amazing letterer. When I discovered that many young humans don’t really know how to read script, Howl #1 was already all lettered and ready to go, but Rob zipped in and redid the Ziva captions. He is a gem.
Ultimately, what do you hope readers take away from Howl?
Alisa Kwitney: Oh, man, that is difficult! One possible answer: I suppose I want everyone to go back and rewatch Buffy the Vampire Slayer and question the whole “vampires have no souls so it is okay to execute them on sight” theory. Another possible takeaway: Being very smart in one area does not inoculate one against being very stupid in another. But most of all, perhaps this: The past was neither as simple nor as safe as nostalgia would have you believe.
Howl is initially a five-issue series, but do you and Mauricet have plans to continue this story beyond the fifth issue if given the opportunity?
Alisa Kwitney: I think I speak for Mauricet as well as myself when I say, I am a pushover for opportunity. All opportunity has to do is give me a tiny little wink or nod and I am fluffing my hair and putting on lipgloss and coming up with prequels and spinoffs and sequels galore.
What advice would you give to writers who are just getting started?
Alisa Kwitney: Write what you want to read. Read what you want to write. Know that while you are trying to figure out how to do something that will garner some success, the established writers who dole out advice are trying to remember how they did whatever they did that garnered some success.
And last but not least, know that anyone who says they are a pantser is probably doing some outlining, and anyone who says they are a plotter is doing some improvising. I myself am a hybrid—a plotzer.
With Howl #1 coming out on January 15th, do you have any other projects coming up that you can tease?
Alisa Kwitney: If you haven’t read Mystik U, my Zatanna goes to supernatural college book, it’s being rereleased by DC Comics in a nifty YA format on March 4th.
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HOWL #1
(W) Alisa Kwitney
(A) Mauricet
Cover A: Mauricet
Cover B: Bill KoebMarry a science fiction writer, become science fiction! That’s the law of Greenwich Village in the late 1950s, home of poets, artists, musicians, writers, their put-upon partners—and the extraterrestrial spores that are secretly taking them over! Novelist/comics writer Alisa Kwitney (The Sandman Presents) mixes science fiction with family memoir, featuring stunning art by Mauricet (Star Wars Adventures).
January 15, 2025
$3.99
Press Release: The latest collaboration from novelist and comics writer Alisa Kwitney (The Sandman Presents, G.I.L.T.) and artist Mauricet (Star Wars Adventures, G.I.L.T.) is HOWL, a witty bohemian sci-fi that can best be described as Mrs. Maisel meets Invasion of the Body Snatchers. The five-issue series is set in Greenwich Village in the late ‘50s, home of poets, artists, musicians, sci-fi writers, their put-upon partners — and the extraterrestrial spores that are secretly taking them over. HOWL is the latest series from AHOY Comics, the Syracuse-based independent publisher known for its acclaimed creators, witty satires, and commitment to risk-taking storytelling. Issue #1 will feature an A cover by Mauricet as well as a B cover by renowned illustrator and painter Bill Koeb and land in stores on January 15, 2025.
“I wrote this series for anyone who loved the 1959 Roger Corman movie Bucket of Blood and thought, When is someone going to do a feminist version of the ‘frustrated beatniks on a rampage’ trope?” said writer Alisa Kwitney. “This may be my most personal work yet, as it is loosely based on my mother’s stories and letters about the period when she lived in the Village with my father, the science fiction writer Robert Sheckley (former Omni editor, author of The Tenth Victim and unacknowledged influence on Douglas Adams). Mixed in with all this family lore is my lifelong love of pod-people stories, especially all versions of Body Snatchers, Starman and The Thing.”
In most of late 1950s America, Senator McCarthy is hunting down communists and teenagers are making out at the drive-in while B-movies warn about flying saucers and alien invasions — but in the bohemian Greenwich Village, it’s a different story. It is there, amongst the turtlenecked, sandal-wearing, reefer-smoking free-thinkers, intellectuals and artists, that we find the members of Scylla, a boys’ club of brilliant science fiction writers and editors. Yet even as these futurists sip their cocktails and spin tales of life on other planets, they do not suspect that the real aliens are already here among us, planting the seeds — or rather, the spores — of their empire.
Aliens are the last thing on 23-year-old beatnik and proto-feminist Ziva Rodblatt’s mind — she’s too busy trying to keep her mother from discovering that she is living out of wedlock with her boyfriend. But when said boyfriend falls under the sway of celebrity therapist Myrtle Morel, she begins to grow suspicious. Why is Bert sneaking out before dawn to meet with strangers? Why does he have a sudden taste for cream of mushroom soup? And Ziva is not the only one who believes that she is living with someone who looks familiar, but is unmistakably and disturbingly different. All of a sudden, there seem to be a lot of writers, artists and musicians falling under Myrtle’s spell. But what can one feisty college-drop-out do to fend off the alien invasion?
“This is not my first collaboration with Alisa, but it’s certainly our most accomplished and ambitious work so far,” said artist Mauricet. “As an artist, I love to be dragged out of my comfort zone and be challenged — but boy, was I in for a real adventure here! Trying to be accurate and nail this weird time period between 1950s conservatism and the beginning of the swinging 60s without falling into clichés was really something. HOWL is science fiction horror, a genre I wasn’t at ease with at first — but Alisa convinced me I was capable and turns out she was right. I do have this genre in me and, without even knowing it, my main influence was probably John Carpenter’s The Thing. How convenient, as you’ll see if you give our book a try!”
“The Fifties have this reputation, probably from sitcoms, as staid, conformist, prosperous — oh, man, it’s definitely from sitcoms, because you couldn’t write Naked Lunch in the Leave It to Beaver house,” says editor Tom Peyer. “In HOWL, Kwitney and Mauricet reveal the essential truth about this fascinating time: that it was as much a bubbling cauldron of change and fear and danger and weirdness as any other moment in American history.”
“You might say I’ve repurposed the ‘alien hidden among us’ trope to reflect my own concerns,” added Kwitney. “Back in the fifties, the prevalent fear was of a fifth column of nefarious outsiders pretending to be one of us. After spending years dealing with a family member’s dementia, I wanted to explore the psychological horror that comes from watching someone change so profoundly that they seem like a stranger. Since I can’t take horror straight up, I like to serve it with humor — the jello shot method.”
“This series sums up without a doubt for me the beauty and magic of what a real collaboration should always be,” added Mauricet. “Alisa and I — we ‘click!’ It all seems like a dance where each of the dancers knows the steps the other one is going to take. And working together under the AHOY banner again makes me feel like this is the best part of my 30-something years long career so far. I hope you as a reader will enjoy the ride too. I sure do.”
HOWL will be published by AHOY Comics, the independent publisher perhaps best known for SECOND COMING, a controversial satire by Mark Russell, Richard Pace and Leonard Kirk in which Jesus Christ resumes his holy mission; JUSTICE WARRIORS, the acclaimed political satire by Matt Bors and Ben Clarkson; and BABS, the profane sword-and-sorcery satire by Garth Ennis and Jacen Burrows. The company is the brainchild of journalist and satirist Hart Seely (publisher), an award-winning reporter whose humor and satire has appeared in The New York Times and on National Public Radio; comics writer Tom Peyer (editor-in-chief); and cartoonist Frank Cammuso (chief creative officer). AHOY Comics launched five years ago with four acclaimed comic book magazine titles featuring full length comic book stories, poetry, prose fiction, and cartoons.
HOWL #1 will be on sale in comic shops everywhere on January 15, 2025.
About the Creators
Alisa Kwitney is a former DC Comics staff editor and the author of the Eisner-nominated mini-series Destiny: A Chronicle of Deaths Foretold. Her novels have appeared on The New York Times New and Noteworthy in Paperback list and Barnes and Noble’s Discover Great New Writers program. She has an MFA from Columbia University and has taught writing at Fordham University and McDaniel and Manhattanville Colleges. Her mother, Ziva Kwitney, wrote non-fiction for Ms Magazine, Cosmopolitan and the New York Times. Her father, Robert Sheckley, was the author of the novel The Tenth Victim, which became a cult classic film. He is considered a master of dark, funny science fiction, and is best remembered for his short stories. Much of his best work was done in the late fifties and sixties, when he was living with Ziva in Greenwich Village.
Website: www.alisakwitney.com
Twitter: @akwitney
FB: www.facebook.com/alisa.kwitney.sheckley/
Instagram: @k.witty
Mauricet is a Belgian comic book artist. He has been drawing since he could hold a pencil in his right hand. His career started 36 years ago in Belgium and France working for some of the big publishers in Europe. For the American market, he has worked on such titles as Tellos, The Crossovers, Harley Quinn, The Gang of Harleys, Dastardly & Muttley, Future Quest, Star Wars adventures, Swine and Creepshow.
More recently he has been steadily collaborating with AHOY Comics drawing stories for Edgar Allan Poe’s Snifter of Terror and Project: Cryptid as well as the miniseries G.I.L.T. co-created and written by Alisa Kwitney.
About AHOY Comics
AHOY Comics debuted in the fall of 2018 with the bold promise for readers to expect more from its line of comic book magazines, featuring comic book stories, poetry, prose fiction, and cartoons. The independent, Syracuse-based company is the brainchild of publisher Hart Seely, an award-winning reporter whose humor and satire has appeared in The New York Times and on National Public Radio. AHOY’s editor-in-chief Tom Peyer is committed to publishing comics with a (dark) sense of humor with titles like the religious satires SECOND COMING and HIGH HEAVEN, the superhero parodies THE WRONG EARTH and HASHTAG: DANGER, the sci-fi spoof CAPTAIN GINGER, the time travel tales PLANET OF THE NERDS and BRONZE AGE BOOGIE, and the humor/horror anthology series EDGAR ALLAN POE’S SNIFTER OF BLOOD.
Howl #1 Preview Pages:
Howl #1 Cover Art by Mauricet:
Howl #1 Cover B by Bill Koeb:
Howl #2 Cover Art by Mauricet:
Howl #3 Cover Art by Mauricet:
Howl #4 Cover Art by Mauricet:
Howl #5 Cover Art by Mauricet:
