Paul Cornell's Friday Newsletter

MCM: My Apologies

I’m terribly sorry, but due to circumstances beyond my control, I can’t attend London MCM Comic Con after all. I hope to see you all on another occasion, and hope I can come back to MCM at some point.

Young Avengers Epic Collection: Dark Reign

Out now is this new collected edition of various Young Avengers titles, including all of my issues, with artist Mark Brooks! It’s a pleasure to see this material, which I’m really proud of, made available again. Check it out here.

Who Killed Nessie? at Gosh and on Mayamada!

Who Killed Nessie?, the graphic novel by myself and the great Rachael Smith, is out now

You can read all about it, and see lots of sample pages, here.

And you can order it here, direct from the publishers, Avery Hill, from Amazon UK and Amazon US, and it’s in all good bookstores, physical and online!

Take a look at Rachael and I on the Mayamada YouTube channel!

And on Friday, 10th October at 7pm, Rachael and I will be participating in the Avery Hill Publishing Triple Launch Party at Gosh! Comics in London!

The Lychford Collection is Out This Month!

Up for pre-order, and coming out on 14th October is The Lychford Collection, which contains my first three Lychford novellas.

The Mighty Avengers vs. the 1970s is Out in November! (Now with Video!)

On November 13th, I’ve got a book coming out from Bloomsbury that’s part of a new range of popular studies of Marvel Comics! The Mighty Avengers vs. the 1970s is fully illustrated with panels from the comics, and is my journey through how Marvel’s main super team navigated that difficult decade. You can read the announcement here at AP News. This is very much a labour of love for me, a book I’ve wanted to find a way to write for the longest time.

And you can now pre-order it from the publisher (and from all good booksellers), now with some preview pages at that link that really show off our full colour art!

I’m a guest at Thought Bubble!

Lizbeth Myles and I will once more be tabling at the wonderful Thought Bubble comic convention in Harrogate on November 15th and 16th.

And those lovely people have given me guest status!

And if you’re an aspiring comicker, and want a pro to check out your portfolio, I’m one of many at the show who’s signed up to do just that! Check out all the details at the link.

And Vision & Labour: Making Comics, The Art Of Avery Hill Publishing is an exhibition at the Mercer Art Gallery, Harrogate which is going to be running between 18th October and 26th April. (Neatly over the weekend of Thought Bubble.) To quote from the press release:

‘Harrogate’s Mercer Art Gallery has teamed up with indie publisher Avery Hill Publishing to create an exhibition showcasing some of today’s most exciting comics creators. Opening in October in time for this year’s Thought Bubble Comic Art Festival, the exhibition offers a fascinating glimpse into the work of leading comic artists, and an important snapshot of the UK comics landscape over the past decade.’

And included in the exhibition will be a display case featuring the process of Rachael Smith and I making Who Killed Nessie?!

I’m really looking forward to it, and I very much want a copy of Kristyna Baczynski’s poster below.

Of Intrigue and Espionage

I have a story in this just-announced forthcoming volume from Stars and Sabers publishing, which is due out in October 2026. I’m in good company, as you can see from the full announcement here.

Cosmic Lighthouse and Salvation’s Child

Check out the new website for my comics company Cosmic Lighthouse, with a first glimpse at Sophie Aldred (Ace in Doctor Who) playing Adrian Tchaikovsky’s cloned soldiers The Partheni!

Cosmic Lighthouse is the brainchild of myself and Lee Harris, with Anthony Cronin helping out with the day to day business. I’m the Editor-in-Chief.

Our mission is to publish original graphic novels by bestselling SFF authors.

And here, via this news story at IGN, where you can see lots of preview pages, is our launch title!

Salvation’s Child is the digital graphic novel Prologue to Adrian Tchaikovsky’s best-selling SFF novel series The Final Architecture. (So new readers can start here!) It’s by Adrian himself, artist Mike Collins, colour artist Pippa Bowland and letterer Simon Bowland. We’re publishing it together with our partners ComiXology.

It’s 110 pages of comics, plus extras, at what we think is quite the wonderful price. (Under a fiver!)

Check out these pre-order links at Amazon US and Amazon UK.

You can read more about the company and the project, with biogs, blurbs and histories, in our press release here.

And you can find Cosmic Lighthouse at these links on BlueSky and Instagram.

Salvation’s Child will be released by ComiXology Originals on June 16th, 2026!

Telefantasy Time Jump

The new podcast from me and Lizbeth Myles covers the history of SFF on TV, from 1953 onward, with our regular episodes (on the 14th of every month) covering a show released that year in the UK, and the Patron Bonus episodes (on the 28th) covering a show from the rest of the world. The shows for October (covering 1962) are Fireball XL-5/Out of this World and Space Angel. The main episode is available free wherever you get your podcasts. To get the bonus episode, you need to follow us on Patreon at £3/$3 or above. (And you get access to seven years of Hammer House of Podcast bonus episodes!) You can find all the info here.

My Ko-fi and eBay Stores

Here’s my Ko-fi store, where you can buy my books and comics, signed and personalised, for shipping worldwide. And here’s my ebay store, full of Bronze Age Marvel comics at bargain prices.

My Linktrees

You can now find all my social media links, my website/blog and links to where you can buy my books, in one place here, thanks to Linktree! And here’s the one for Cosmic Lighthouse!

The Work of Friends

The Heist Of Hollow London, out today, is the new novel from under-valued SFF writer Eddie Robson. You can find it here. Check this out for a blurb:

“Arlo and Drienne are ‘mades’—clones of company executives, deemed important enough to be saved should their health fail. Mades work around the clock to pay off the debt incurred by their creation, though most are Reaped—killed and harvested for organs when their corporate counterparts are in medical need. But when the impossible happens and the too-big-to-fail company that owns them collapses, Arlo and Drienne find themselves purchased by a scientist who has a job for them. The reward: Debt paid off, freedom from servitude, and enough cash to last a lifetime. The job: Infiltrate a highly secure corporate reclamation facility in the heart of dead London and steal a data drive. They’re going to need a team.”

And novelist Jendia Gammon has a book launch in California this month! It’s on Saturday, October 25, from 1pm to 3pm at the Underdog Bookstore, in Monrovia. She says she’ll have double chocolate brownies too!

My Week

To be honest, that was a rough week. For one thing, the business of pulling out of MCM was pretty difficult, and I really can’t go into the reasons here (except to say everyone is fine, and nobody was in danger). For another thing, last Sunday, when I was rushing to drive Thomas back from the Arboretum, because he gets very anxious about timekeeping, I found myself, on the way out of a little town, behind a convoy of motorcyclists. The one at the rear was hanging quite a long way back, and kept looking over his shoulder at me. (In retrospect, I think he thought I was tailgating him, but at no point was he at risk.) I took that to mean he wanted to enjoy the sights, and that he was wondering if I was going to overtake him. So I did, entirely safely, getting between him and the other three bikers. He suddenly accelerated, rode up beside me, waving his fist, and stopped in front of me to get off his bike. Especially with Thomas in the car, I wasn’t up for a confrontation, so I drove around his bike. But not before he’d slammed his fists into the side of my car. I made off, as fast as I could, and ended up behind the other three bikers, one of whom must have realised something had happened, and so stopped and went back. I kept going, feeling really shaken. ‘He shouldn’t have done that,’ said Thomas. Then the two bikes together appeared behind us, caught up, and kept behind us. I knew that coming up was a side road which Thomas and I always go down on this weekly outing, to see some aeroplanes on display at an airfield. I didn’t fancy the idea of trying to turn in that cramped space at the end of the cul de sac with four bikers after me, but Thomas was much more agitated by the thought that we wouldn’t be following our routine. I stuck my hand out of the window, palm raised, hoping they’d take this sign of apology as all they required. (I think the biker who attacked my car might have been slowed down in returning by getting into a row with the motorists behind me.) In the end, the two bikers just went past me, and accelerated into the distance. When we got back home, Thomas said ‘the motorcycle men can’t find us’, which is his way of asking an urgent question, by asserting what he wants the answer to be. I said indeed they couldn’t. And that seems to have been enough for him, because, in his very secure, stoic way, he went immediately back to his happy old self.

I, however, have not. I feel I put Thomas in danger by rushing. I have the fact that I was made to feel afraid and pursued. And I was taken back to my childhood by that feeling. I’m fine now, but… it’s put a weight on my shoulders.

I had a lovely time at the Nessie signing at Bristol’s Excelsior Comics (where there are now a few signed copies on the shelf) and Thomas did very well at his dental appointment midweek, one of three coming up as the dentists catch up with him, after he dropped off their reminder list. On the same day as taking him to that I went to parents’ evening at his school, and was again told how lovely he was. There’d been a bit of shouting and one thing thrown this week, by other children, but Thomas wasn’t the target and we’d only been told about it because the school believe in communicating even the smallest incidents, to show how seriously they take them.

How different, I thought, to how it was back in my day. And how obvious the difference in the results.

To Be Continued

Liz and I will be recording a new official Hammer blu ray commentary just after this comes out!

And I hope to see all of you here again next week!