Paul Cornell's Friday Newsletter

Close Encounters Signing on 1st November

This is a bit last minute, and I don’t yet know what time I’m appearing, but on Saturday, 1st November I’ll be signing early pre-release copies of The Mighty Avengers vs. the 1970s (and anything else you want to bring) at Bedford’s excellent Close Encounters comic store.

Broken Frontier Interview

In advance of Thought Bubble, Andy Oliver of Broken Frontier interviewed me about everything I have out and available at the convention this year, and it’s a lot!

Thought Bubble! (Now with gallery show opening night!)

Lizbeth Myles and I will once more be tabling at the wonderful Thought Bubble comic convention in Harrogate on November 15th and 16th. (You can find the full list of exhibitors here.) I’ve also once again been given guest status, bless them!

You’ll be able to find us at table D4 in the ComiXology Hall (along the right wall, right by the entrance!)

(We’ll have Rachael Smith on one side, which is handy for signing Who Killed Nessie? and Gary Erskine on the other, so we’re in lovely company.)

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.)

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

There’s an opening night for the exhibition on the Friday of the convention, November 14th from 6.30pm.

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

The Mighty Avengers vs. the 1970s is Out Next Month!

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!

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/Operazione Vega. 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 (Now with Commando!)

Here’s my Ko-fi store, where you can buy my books and comics, signed and personalised, for shipping worldwide. (I’ve just added my Commando issue!) 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 highly-regarded scripted SF-comedy audiodrama podcast, Jump Leads returns for a second season on October 31st. (Many of you from Who fandom will recall its excellent lead, Ben Paddon.) You can find it wherever you get your podcasts.

“In this amazing new season, Cadets Meaney (Marissa Meizel, Mermaid High) and Llewellyn (Ben Paddon, PortsCenter) find themselves stumbling through the multiverse encountering new challenges - a space station full of pirates, an abandoned city of the future, and an evil sorcerer who always rolls a natural 20. That's assuming they don't get blown up by Herman (Dino Andrade, Strangers Things VR) first. Meanwhile, at the edge of reality, the Old House is waiting... Featuring a dazzling cast of special guests including Debi Derryberry (Jimmy Neutron), Roger Craig Smith (Sonic the Hedgehog), Grey DeLisle (The Simpsons), Dave Fennoy (Batman: Arkham Shadow), Ryan Bartley (New Panty & Stocking with Garterbelt), and Richard Epcar (Lupin the Third), Jump Leads season 2 is a bigger, bolder adventure than ever before!”

And now, three Kickstarters that have already been funded and are all from very reputable folk, so you know you’ll get your item!

Cheryl Morgan at Wizard’s Tower Press has an anthology of modern Welsh folklore in the works, which has as its theme the idea that Welsh mythological beings can still intervene in the modern world.

“They are Still Here (Maen Nhw Yma O Hyd) will be an anthology of contemporary fantasy tales of resistance and resilience. The threats will be very modern, but the resolution will contain a hint or more of the fantastic.”

Rian Hughes: Typeractive is the great designer’s collection of his company’s fonts. (Yes, and it’s amazing!) It’s a “sumptuous, 600-page hardback, showcasing complete glyphs sets, specially-designed type specimens, notes on process and background research, and hundreds of examples of type in use.” (If you back the project you get an exclusive font.)

And finally, Nap Comix by Rachael Smith, the acclaimed webcomic, is now a very successful Kickstarter. These cartoons about Rachael’s experiences as a new Mum are incredibly relatable, cute and heartfelt, and everyone should see them.

My Week

Thomas’ birthday party, with Lego City themed cake, was a success, and the big Lego set we got him was reacted to pleasingly, built properly, and then customised to join his extraordinary seaside resort on the lounge table.

Caroline is away for over a week, and so (with occasional help from the wonderful Nanny Louise) I’m solo parenting over half-term holidays. Yesterday, I took Thomas on his first ever train journey, just twelve minutes, to a nearby town with a railway museum. He’d been worried beforehand about the noise the train would make going through a tunnel, but navigated that with no problem also. He was pretty much amazed by how quiet trains were, and was proud of himself having unlocked this achievement. Today we’re off bowling, and I have various other distractions planned across the week. He did end yesterday doing annoying things because he’d kicked a ball into a bush in the dark and wanted it back immediately, but all in all it was a pretty satisfying day and I managed to get my word count done while hanging out with him.

If you’ll forgive me, I’ll thus leave this here. I have to keep my strength up for the days ahead!

To Be Continued

There are going to be a few more signings and such in the coming weeks!

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