Comics are their own discipline, panel by panel, page turn by page turn. Writing one is closer to directing than to prose, and the format is unforgiving of people who have not done it.
Comic writing takes a distinct set of skills. The structure and composition are specific to the medium, and the script carries detailed direction that a prose manuscript never has to, what is in each panel, how the eye moves across the page, and what the page turn is hiding.
Writers here know the industry's formatting conventions and the terminology artists actually use, which is what makes a script usable rather than merely readable. You do not need to have studied panel composition. You need someone who has, sitting between your idea and the artist drawing it.
Five forms with different rhythms. Comedy lives on timing, mystery on what a panel withholds, and those are opposite instincts.
- 01
Comedy
Witty dialogue and comic timing built into the panel breaks, memorable characters, and satire where it suits. Light children's comedy through to adult.
- 02
Romance
Believable characters, settings with atmosphere, and emotional conflict that earns its resolution, with the romantic plotline developed alongside you.
- 03
Science fiction
Intricate world-building with rules that hold, suspenseful plotting, and scientific ideas presented so a reader gets them from the art as much as the caption.
- 04
Fantasy
Detailed world-building, mythical creatures, quests with stakes, and magical systems consistent enough that a reader can predict what is and is not possible.
- 05
Mystery and suspense
Plotlines with real turns, paced across pages so the reveals land on the right panel. Clues and red herrings placed deliberately, and a resolution that satisfies.
Four things that make a comic script work for the person who has to draw it.
- 01
Written in the format
Industry-standard script format, panel layouts, item placement and visual storytelling, in the terminology artists expect. A script an artist has to translate first is a script that costs you money.
- 02
Built with you
Your ideas, feedback and style are worked into the script rather than received at the end. Comics are collaborative by nature and the process reflects that.
- 03
Priced fairly
Comic scripting without the mark-up. Independent comics run on thin budgets and the quote reflects the work rather than the format's reputation.
- 04
The whole object
Script editing, artwork collaboration, lettering and preparation for print or digital are all available, the stages where an independent comic most often stalls.
Eight steps from a concept to a file ready for print.
Conceptualisation
Characters, themes and story arcs explored until there is a foundation strong enough to build a series on rather than a single issue.
Plot development
The plot built with you, with particular attention to the first page, comics have less room than any other form to earn a reader's attention.
Character building
The lives and traits of each character worked out, including the parts that will never appear on the page but determine how they behave on it.
Scriptwriting
The script written panel by panel, with the direction an artist needs to build visually striking pages from it.
Artistic collaboration
Illustration developed against the script, with the writer available throughout rather than handing over and leaving.
Lettering and balloons
Dialogue and caption placement within each panel, where the balloons sit dictates the order a reader takes the panel in, so this is storytelling rather than layout.
Refinement
The comic reviewed and edited, with feedback from you and from readers who know the medium.
Publication
Formatting, cover design and preparation for print or digital distribution.
A few of the people the house has worked with, in their own words.
I had eleven years of notes and no book. What I got back read like me on a good day, my turns of phrase, my arguments, and none of the padding I would have added myself. The first chapter arrived and I stopped worrying.
Marianne ElleryIndependent author The structural edit was not comfortable reading. It told me the second half started in the wrong place, which I had suspected for a year and nobody had said out loud. Moving three chapters fixed a problem I had been trying to solve with better sentences.
Devon AlukoIndependent author What sold me was being told I did not need half of what I had asked for. I came in wanting the full package and left with a cover, a proofread and an honest explanation of why the rest would not have helped yet.
Priya RaghunathanIndependent author Three cover directions, all of them plausible, none of them the thing I had described. The one I picked worked at the size that actually matters, I could recognise it in a list of forty other books, which is more than I can say for my first attempt.
Tobias HearnIndependent author I own the book outright and that was written down before I paid anything. After two years of being quoted percentages by people who would not put them in writing, that was the whole reason I stayed.
Cecile MarchandIndependent author The audiobook took longer than I expected and they told me why each time rather than going quiet. The narrator they cast got my grandmother's accent right, which I had assumed would be the thing I had to let go of.
Nathan BoakyeIndependent author
What creators ask before commissioning a comic script.
Start with a storyline and characters that are clear in your own head, then outline with pacing in mind, comics are paced in pages and panels, not chapters. Write dialogue that is short and true to each character, because balloons take up art. Think about panel layout and transitions as part of the storytelling, and write panel descriptions that are descriptive but succinct: an artist needs direction, not a paragraph. Then collaborate closely, and revise.
Storytelling that uses the medium rather than fighting it, characters with dimension, artwork with energy, and pacing that puts the right beat on the right panel. The last is the one that separates comics from illustrated prose, and it is the hardest to fix after the art exists.
By working out their background, motivation and personality before the first panel, then conveying it through visual cues, dialogue and action rather than narration. In comics a character is defined by what they do on the page, since there is no interiority available unless you spend a caption on it.
It begins from your vision and your audience, with research where the subject needs it. Concepts, turns and conflicts are developed for your project specifically, and nothing is carried across from other work. In a medium with as much shared iconography as comics, knowing where homage ends and imitation begins is part of the job.
It depends on your audience, your genre and what the story needs, superhero, fantasy, science fiction and horror all carry their own conventions of page count, panel density and pacing. That decision is made with you at the start, because it affects the script from the first page.
You do, completely. The author holds 100% of the rights to their work, in every format, for its whole life. The house is paid for the work it does, not with a share of the book. That is the arrangement the house reopened in 2008 to offer, and it does not change with the tier, the price or the point at which you come to us.
Yes. Your name is on the cover and in the record. Everyone who works on the book (writer, editor, designer) works on your book, and none of them is credited on it unless you ask for them to be.
Yes. Your story is yours, and nothing about the project leaves the house. We will sign your NDA before you send anything, or supply ours if you would rather use one.
No. Six disciplines are available and you take the ones you need. Authors arrive here at every stage (with an idea, a half-draft, or a finished manuscript that only needs a cover and a shelf) and the work starts where you actually are.
It depends on the work: length, how much research is involved, how much of the book already exists, and which disciplines you need. There is no list price for a book, and any firm who gives you one before reading your material is quoting something other than your book. Tell us where you are and we will price the actual job.
Move the marker. You do not need to know what to call it: you only need to know where you are.
Tell us where your manuscript is, where you want it to go, and we'll show you what's possible.