Click the image below to have a listen to the Coffee with Creatives interview with Vanessa Shealy, a Writer and Actor (and Producer) fresh off a successful Kickstarter for her co-created indie comic,Couri Vine.
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Couri Vine Blog Posts
New Review of Couri Vine
Have you ever wished you could travel to the moon? Cou
ri Vine is already there, on the dark side of the moon, to be precise. Unfortunately for her, she’s so much going on that it could even make the man in the moon lose his smile.
Couri Vine is charmingly written by Vanessa Shealy and effectively illustrated by Leah Lovise. The first (and hopefully not only) issue of this comic book series is set in a future where the earth is so polluted that humans have created a settlement on the moon. The settlement is depicted with intriguing detail, full of domes, nooks, and crannies. In fact, a map of the settlement is included with the names and pictures of the main characters for reference.
Couri herself has a tragic flaw—she can’t breathe without a helmet that looks like a smaller version of one of the domes that creates the settlement, or like a modern-day astronaut suit. It’s one of the tricks that make the first issue work: what on the cover appears to be just part of a science fiction plot is what makes the protagonist unique. Couri looks like a young astronaut, but she’s really a little girl with a very specific challenge.
And yet Shealy and Lovise don’t ever treat their characters or their audience condescendingly, and there is a diverse enough cast that you don’t need to be young to appreciate the well-crafted story. Like The Little Mermaid or Alice in Wonderland, having a preteen lead doesn’t prevent the tale from being universal. And also like said stories, Couri Vine is a cautionary tale, exploration, and celebration of what it’s like to be different, marginalized, ostracized, ridiculed, and/or challenged.
Couri Vine also adds to a welcome, increasing niche in the comic book industry: a series written and illustrated by women about a female protagonist. The new series joins the ranks of fellow girl-power pieces, such as Batwoman and World’s Finest.
And last but not least, Couri Vine is in essence a science fiction comic. For those of us geeks who don’t quite understand why there hasn’t been a Star Trek series on TV since 2005, this is definitely a step in the right direction. And if you’re simply a fan of the astronaut element of series like Fantastic Four and Green Lantern, you’ll love Couri Vine.
Kickstarter Buzz
The Couri Vine Kickstarter was named the “Kickstarter of the Week” in the the popular blog Women Write About Comics. Here’s a little of what they had to say:
Couri Vine is a new kid’s comic Kickstarter from all-woman team of Leah Lovise and Vanessa Shealy, with colouring by Indigo Rael, and it’s pretty darn cute….I don’t know about you, but I am always here for girl detectiving and adventuring.
Read the entire post HERE, and Share!
Kickstarter Update
We’ve got more than one week left of our Kickstarter campaign, and we’re happy and proud to say that we are already FUNDED! So far, 62 people have backed this comic book, and we are extremely grateful.
So, we’re gonna keep on going! We’ve put a lot of time (and money) into creating this book. Now that we have exceeded our initial goal, additional funds will go toward creating Couri Vine Book #2!
Thanks to all for your support!
Couri Vine Kickstarter!
And we’re off! This week we’re launching our Kickstarter campaign!
That’s right – we’re going for it. We’re completely finished with COURI VINE: Young People for the Leader, and we want you to have a copy! So we’re creating a Kickstarter with a copy of this comic book as the PERK that you will receive for any donation above $20.
Because we’re passionate about this comic book!
We decided early on that we wanted to make an action-packed adventure story about a young person who is hiding from her disability, who then discovers that her difference can become her superpower. We’re personally inspired by this goal; Vanessa is the mother of a child with autism, and Leah’s father was wheelchair bound due to muscular dystrophy. These two heroes in our lives inspire us and instill endless admiration. We hope that our science fiction story will speak to children and adults who live with challenges of all kinds.
Our Kickstarter is for $3000 so that we can print 1500 print copies. With that many copies, we can sell them (online and at festivals), submit them to publishers, and, most of all, entice people to support us as we work on the next three books, which together make up the first complete COURI VINE Story.
Here’s what we plan to do with it:
- $1,798 – this is the quote we selected from One Touch printers for 1500 saddle-stitched copies of the 28 page book.
- $300 for Kickstarter and credit card fees (about 10% of our total goal).
- $100 for taxes (that’s 25% of anything non-deductible).
- $600 mailing and postage.
- $100 web hosting and marketing.
Which brings us to $2,898, so, in Kickstarter world, that means we better round it up to $3,000, since there’s probably some fees that we didn’t know about. Plus, we like round numbers.
Notice that we aren’t taking any money for ourselves, or putting aside any money for our collaborators. We’ve been funding this project ourselves for the past 2 years. If we exceed our Kickstarter goal maybe we can finally pay down some of these nasty credit cards we’ve been living on.
You’ll get more info on our Kickstarter page, but these are the PERKS that come with donations at various levels:
- $20 = the comic book!
- $40 = the comic book…signed by the creative team!
- $80 = the comic book…signed…with a big THANK YOU to you printed inside the book.
- $160 = one of Leah Lovise’s original drawings! Plus all the stuff above.
- $320 = we will make YOU one of the characters in Book 3! Plus all the stuff above.
That’s a lot of great perks if you ask me. Once our Kickstarter page is live, there will be a link to it right HERE!
We hope you’ll contribute. We want you to have a copy, like this guy:
This charming chap (aka, Marty Percy) is holding one of the 50 copies that we printed for the STAPLE! Independent Media Expo in Austin, TX, where we SOLD OUT immediately. Of those 50 copies, here’s what @s_orem said about the copy she bought:
“Probably the most exciting to me is Couri Vine by Vanessa Shealy and Leah Lovise. It’s about Couri, a young girl with a disability who “discovers that her difference can become her superpower.”
What happens after this Kickstarter?
This Kickstarter is for part one of a four part series, so we really need a Kick in the Start to get this going in a way that we can sustain. We’re already working on books two, three, and four, and we plan to release each book on a digital platform, followed by a limited printed run. Below are blurbity blurbs for each of the subsequent books:
Book Two: Journey to the Planet Earth
Couri travels to Earth, where she finds Doo Dad’s InData device, but is pursued on land and sea by the evil Anaxia Nervosa.
Book Three: Hostages
Couri learns the origins of a dangerous compound, Sathrite. Enforcers seize her and transport her to the Near Side of the Moon where Moon Leader Todal reveals his evil plan.
Book Four: Sacrifice
Couri realizes how she can stop the Moon Leader, but it will do irreparable damage to her life support system. What further damage can Moon Leader Todal do?
SPECIAL THANKS goes out to the following heroes:
- Editor extraordinaire, Angela Pires (AngelakPires.com)
- The beautiful young actress, Indya Kevern
- Litsa Litsa for voice-over and creative counseling (aLitsa.net)
- John McIver (ElephantProductions.com) for shooting and production assistance
- Web developer and master of the universe Steven Olson. You’re seeing his mastery now. (CouriVine.com!)