Broom Hill ("William, can stop killing people... FOR FIVE MINUTES!?")

 

If you think this cover is disastrous, then you won't be surprised to know that I do too. But let's be frank, missing people is a difficult topic to draw. Originally, I thought of having this huge pyre and missing people flyers burning in it with our police friend Doug here staring at the whole thing, but turns out drawing falling flyers while making it clear it's missing people AND also making them burn is a nightmare. Drawing hills is also really hard for whatever reason. So you know, that on the cover is based on actual pictures of Broom Hill. The sun was supposed to be, like, mystical, but trying to merge esoteric circles and the sun had proven quite the eyesore, so I settled for the simpler design. Doug is fashioned after Agent Simmons from Person of Interest. 

So the big premise here was making a "fascinating story in the woods" that didn't involve horror. I mean, it could involve horror, but that would've been a whole new problem because monsters and people eating other people usually bring other words to mind than "fascinating."

 So, I said, "Welp, what usually fascinates people? Mysteries!" and decided to make a mystery story set in Canada.

 Originally, it was about an evil cult that drove people to suicide in the woods, but later it turned out to be uh... well. A non-evil cult that drove people to confront the insignificance of their lives, which occasionally resulted in suicide. Of sorts.

 I have received some complaints of "explicit violence" for having pulped a girl early on in the story, but I'd say that's mostly violence-free. Like, 95% of the story. Beep boop refused to proofread, which had me manually weeding out the typos. A very time-consuming task. 

Anyway. I got a bit teary towards the end, which means in my opinion that the story works. Is it fascinating? Not sure. Is it potent? Absolutely.

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1sh_rO_9uMaNEcuw1-3Oo9EitbXuv-U3G?usp=sharing