Hello
I am a mom and artist based in Southern California. This webcomic is a return to the comics medium many years after illustrating a few small self published works. These days I primarily sketch and paint, but I’ve long held onto an idea for a mystery comic that has finally crossed over into reality.
The Long Grave began as some doodles on the beach at Coney Island in 2011 with the idea of creating a comic that would jump through eras and world events following the career of a female reporter. Back then, the idea was lighter and sillier, and I was collecting locations to draw more quickly than plot points. When the 100 year anniversary of the commencement of World War 1 saw the release of a trove of online resources about the war, I finally found the starting point of my heroine’s journey.
Over the last 10 years research has reshaped the story and it has become something very different and darker than what I started with. In the years since, I quit my office job, switched coasts and started my family. I now have two kiddos and my day job is their care and growth. I have never worked harder in my life. And somehow, I’ve also never been as creative (though in smaller spurts). Because I’ve been blessed with children that sleep, I have finally organized my notes into a script and begun drawing. The progress is slow, but I credit the existence of the comic to some shift within myself that occurred when I became a mom. I can’t put it into words. All I can say is because of my kids my drawing skills are probably worse for the lack of daily practice, but my story is so much richer than it would have been. I think the gift my children have given me is the faith in myself to commit to something.
You can reach out to me at courtneyzellart@gmail.com. See more of my artwork at www.courtneyzell.com.
A Note on Sensitive Subject Matter
If you’ve found this site, I hope you enjoy the story. Please visit my reading list to see further notes about my research.
This comic deals with the topics of colonialism, war and PTSD. The British and French creations and occupations of modern day Syria, Iraq and other countries (not to mention Palestine, a huge topic not covered in this comic) is something I am enormously under-qualified to create a full depiction of. I am on the journey of learning about the traumatic legacy of colonialism and the effects it had then and continues to have in our lifetimes. If there is a point of view I have missed, I deeply apologize. Please feel free to reach out.
Also, no matter how much reading I do, I will never understand what it was like to be a soldier in war. I have a great deal of empathy for those fighting in The Great War, not only for their own countries, but as colonial troops or labor corps transported to fight in or clean up after other countries’ battles. I hold in my heart my great, great uncle who fought in the American Expeditionary Force in France. He returned home suffering from PTSD, shell shock as it was called then, and he and his family suffered the horrible consequences, so much so that my older relatives would not speak of it and so I won’t either. He died a long time ago on the same date as my birthday. Beyond a generation lost, the enormous waste of life, love, and potential that World War I wrought leaves me feeling ill.
Thanks for reading. If you’d like to support my work, please visit https://ko-fi.com/courtneyzell. I very much appreciate you being here.
Courtney Zell