In A.D. chapter 6, “Flotsam & Jetsam,” we discover how Denise withstands the hurricane in her apartment. (Answer: just barely.) In addition, we check in with our other characters, including The Doctor and his guests in the French Quarter, Hamid and Mansell at the grocery store in Uptown, Kevin and his family in Tallahassee, and Leo and Michelle in Houston. It is Monday, August 29, 2005, and no one is aware that the levees have been breached.

I worked my butt off to get this new chapter done in time for Katrina’s second anniversary. In fact, to get it done for the Sunday before Katrina’s second anniversary. And it paid off, as the outside world has really begun to pay attention to A.D. In the past week alone, A.D. was featured in:

the Toronto Star

the Atlanta Journal-Constitution

the New Orleans Times-Picayune

And I was interviewed by NPR and Canada’s CityNews International.

… with the L.A. Times, the American Prospect, and CityTV WebNation coming soon.

I can’t say how gratifying it is to know that new eyeballs are coming to the strip just as it’s beginning to hit its stride. Some of the reader comments have really made me proud to be a comics storyteller. I’ll always be able to go back to them for inspiration the next time I’m working 14-hour days, sitting up ’til 3 A.M. nightly to get the next chapter done. Thanks, everyone!

Better late than never, now up at SMITH is A.D. Chapter Five: “Katrina Comes Calling.”

As the hurricane’s pre-winds hit New Orleans, The Doctor hosts friends for a hurricane party. Meanwhile, Hamid and Mansell hunker down at the store. And Denise learns just what a mistake it was to foresake the refuge of the hospital for her apartment.

Comments are welcome at the site.

Hey there, where y’at? I just finished, and SMITH just posted, the latest chapter of my serialized graphic novel, A.D.: New Orleans After the Deluge. It’s chapter 4, but is pretty much the second part of chapter 3, as our characters do what they can to avoid and/or prepare for the hurricane.

So go now, please, and check it out. And feel free to comment (at the site), if you feel so inclined…

Chapter 3 of A.D., “…Or Should I Go?”, is now live on SMITH.

Hamid sends his family off to Houston, Kevin fills the bathtub with water, and Denise seeks shelter — but finds only chaos. It is Sunday, August 28, the day before Katrina.

Check it out now at smithmag.net/afterthedeluge.

Chapter 2 of A.D., “Should I Stay…”, is now live on SMITH. As Katrina bears down on New Orleans, Kevin prepares to leave for Florida, The Doctor invites some folks over to ride out the storm with him in the French Quarter, and Leo & Michelle debate the pros & cons of evacuating. Please check it out.

After a manic month of writing and drawing (and only a couple of days behind schedule), I’ve completed the first chapter of A.D.: New Orleans After the Deluge. In chaper 1, we meet our five protagonists — Leo, Kevin, Hamid, Denise, and The Doctor — and follow their pre-Katrina preparations. You can read Chapter 1 (as well as the two-part prologue) for free right now on SMITH Magazine.

Katrina slams into the Gulf Coast in part II of the prologue to A.D.

Check it out over at SMITH.

Fresh from our trip to NOLA, we’ve posted the initial foray into the A.D. experience. It’s part I of the prologue, titled “In The Beginning…”, documenting Hurricane Katrina as it builds from a tropical storm in the Bahamas and moves inexorably toward New Orleans. Check it out over at SMITH.

I hope to post the second part of the prologue in a couple of weeks, with chapter 1 — and the introduction of our five central characters — to follow within a month.

I’m getting excited about my next project, A.D.: New Orleans After the Deluge, which debuts on SMITH Magazine this weekend (which is also Smith’s one-year anniversary). Following (belatedly) in the footsteps of Anthony Lappé and dangoldman‘s critically acclaimed (and justifiably so!) Shooting War, A.D. is about Hurricane Katrina and its effects on the lives of five real New Orleans residents.

I’ll also be dealing with the effect of the storm on other regions, such as Biloxi, in the parts of the project dealing with my personal experiences as a Red Cross volunteer.

This is my most research-heavy project ever, and is going to be a major focus of my time for the next six months (at least). I plan on putting up a new chapter at least once a month, and hopefully more often than that. And it’ll all be free for viewing at SMITH.

As part of the research, I’ll be visiting New Orleans this weekend (along with A.D. editor/SMITH founder Larry Smith), where we’ll meet with the characters from the project, tour around a bit, and take lots of photos. This’ll be the first time I’ll be visting NOLA since shortly after the hurricane, when I came through just for an afternoon.

We’ll have the good fortune to be put up right in the French Quarter, in the guest-house of one of our subjects, a doctor and local NOLA character. And dinner at Galatoire’s is on the agenda!

Should be quite a trip.