Pay a Visit to HEARTBREAK MANOR with STEVE NILES
- Andrew Irvin
- Jun 9
- 7 min read
Steve Niles drops back into the Yeti Cave to chat with Interviews Editor, Andrew Irvin about his latest title, Heartbreak Manor, available through its Zoop campaign!
COMIC BOOK YETI: Welcome back, Steve! Last time you stopped by, we were chatting about your recent Storm King releases. We’re here to discuss the new title you’ve got on-deck, Heartbreak Manor, but what else is new since we last caught up?
STEVE NILES: Hey! Great to be back. All kinds of new stuff going on. I have Heartbreak Manor going at Zoop, I also have a new slice-of-life comic based on my days playing music in a punk band coming in September. It’s called Take it Back: Life, Anxiety and Gray Matter. I also have a new Cal McDonald prose collection coming out. It will be a Kickstarter with Clover Press. I’m staying busy!
CBY: It sounds like purposeful movement toward worthwhile outcomes - we'll have to chat about Take it Back when the time comes, because my curiosity is already piqued. This time around, your latest graphic novel, Heartbreak Manor, is coming out entirely independently, with access to the publication offered through a Zoop campaign. What led to the decision to work through Zoop instead of returning to Storm King (given it’s another horror title) or another genre-aligned publisher?
SN: A couple different reasons. Mostly I wanted to try something new and a friend recommended Zoop, and I liked how they did things. They’ve been great to work with.
CBY: I haven't gotten complaints from any of their campaign partners yet! You’ve also collaborated with artist, Damien Worm, on previous IDW releases in recent years; October Faction and Brynmore. Can you share a bit about your partnership - how did you two meet, and when did this project originate amidst your other projects? How has your partnership evolved over the years, and what new elements might you have introduced with this story compared to your prior work?
SN: Damien and I met on Facebook of all places. I saw some work he posted and immediately contacted him. This was around 2013 and we’ve worked together ever since. But it’s funny, all these years and all these projects, Damien and I have never spoken. We do everything through email. I’m in L.A. and he’s in Spain. It’s just never happened, yet I’d say we are close. I usually send my ideas to Damien first because he’s just the perfect horror artist. His stuff is so moody. When I wrote Heartbreak Manor I thought of him right away. It’s a period piece like we did in Monster & Madman and a ghost story. Damien was and is the perfect artist for it. As far as new territory, this is our first ghost story. We've done all sorts of monsters but never a story that focuses on ghosts and hauntings.
CBY: I'm constantly impressed by the depth of relationships people are able to forge entirely remotely, and often to enduring success, such as in this instance. While you and Damien are credited as the creators of Heartbreak Manor, are there others you’d like to acknowledge who were involved in the process of making this book a reality?
SN: My wife Monica has been a huge help. Not only is she doing the lettering but she also is laying the book out and helping with design. She’s a musician like I am, so one of the rewards for the Zoop campaign will be an original soundtrack by her. I’ll lend some bass and guitar, maybe, plus she plans on calling in some musical friends.
CBY: It's wonderful that you can find a creative way to collaborate with your spouse, particularly when adding value to a project you've got on-deck anyway. Damien has delivered a sepia-soaked experience, with a rusty, sooty quality one might expect in the post-Gilded Age industrial malaise of New York City. What sort of guidance did you provide to Damien regarding the aesthetic tone you sought, and what elements did he add to the mix that most surprised you upon first seeing his interpretations of your scripting?
SN: I really pushed for a gritty look and Damien is delivering. I generally don’t give him too many guidelines but for this one I wanted to keep the tone as serious as possible. Damien came through in a big way. The art for Heartbreak is haunting and moody. Perfect for a ghost story.
CBY: It definitely captures a mood removed from the present age. Set in 1912, what did the period offer the narrative that you couldn’t get out of another era? On the heels of the dime-store pulp novel, genre fiction was exploding in popularity. What sort of prose fiction and comics were you keeping in mind as you put together Heartbreak Manor?
SN: I love a story with no tech. We are overrun by technology now and it has had a deep effect on storytelling, I think. I just like the isolation that the lack of phones and computers gets us, a world that still has privacy.
CBY: You mentioned in our last interview that you prefer to leave some mystery in your scripting and story construction. I’ve only had a chance to look at the preview pages, but how sweeping in scope a story have you created? Is this a standalone graphic novel, or have you left things open to sequels?
SN: It’s a self-contained story. I don’t see a sequel in this one…not yet at least. I tried not to over explain things because I do like leaving some mystery to the reader's imagination.
CBY: Only explaining what is required is a quick way to deliver narrative utility. We were speaking about your process setting the stage for adaptations of your work in our last interview, and I see you’ve got a couple projects in pre-production, including Aleister Arcane, an adaptation of the title you and Breehn Burns released through IDW starting in 2004. Is there anything you can share on the process of putting both of these projects together?
SN: As for Aleister Arcane, it is in Hollywood limbo once again. I haven’t heard any updates for a long time. I think it’s probably dead.
CBY: Ah yes - the morass of development hell - I remember asking David Mamet about his Roscoe Arbuckle script at the prompting of a friend about fifteen years back, and the response he gave was similar in both content and brevity. We talked a bit about your music background last time, and the Do-It-Yourself ethos underpinning the independent contingent of both rock music and comics. I just had an old friend/bandmate close down his space, VCR, in Chicago, because he had roommates who, as I frame it, see people who embody DIY principles and energy, and think, “hey, do it for me, too!” I know I’ve been burned plenty over the years by people who didn’t want to carry their own weight in a venture, so from your career of experience across multiple media formats, what are the hallmarks of building sustainable, reciprocal relationships as a creative?
SN: You can’t be competitive with other artists. If everybody cooperates and pulls their weight you can pull off anything you want. I just had an experience with the old band Gray Matter. We're in our 50’s and 60’s now. We haven’t recorded in decades but we started writing music again. We practiced via Zoom and all sort of other ways. We met last week in Washington, D.C., and I was nervous as hell because we only had Zoom practices and only two days of real practice before the studio. We went in, everybody came together and we pulled off eight songs in the end. Everybody did their thing. Now we have a label putting it out and we’re working on cover design. Anything is possible if everybody works together.
CBY: That is deeply exciting, and doubly inspiring - I look forward to hearing what you've all put together when it's released. Back to horror; following my chat with Jeff Whitehead, connecting with the Horror Matters working group. Many people appreciate horror because of the ability to explore scenarios of fear from a position of security. Given the uncertainty and insecurity a lot of people feel in what seems to be a bit rudderless a world at the moment, I’m interested in your thoughts; what media, or genre, provides an emotionally resonant antithesis to horror? What do you think represents the contrapuntal narrative tone of security and relief in the world of genre fiction and comics?
SN: It’s a tough time right now and I think it’s being reflected in art in general. People are mad. People are scared. We are living through a time of degradation. Horror fiction is a direct way to confront those fears and find some relief I believe. Why? I have no idea, but during times of strife, horror and escapism rises in popular culture. I’m curious to see how it pans out in a world of anti-intellectualism.
CBY: Hopefully we can combat sentiments of anti-intellectualism from proliferating too rapidly through keeping up efforts at engaging discourse, and bringing people into the fold of greater understanding and self-reflection (but again, that's a hope). You had a few great horror recommendations for us last time. What new material unrelated to your own work have you been enjoying lately that our readers should give a look once they check out Heartbreak Manor?
SN: Anything by Charles Burns. The man is a master, both as an artist and storyteller. I just checked out Final Cut and it was beautiful.
CBY: No arguments there! Steve, thanks for sharing some of your process on Heartbreak Manor. If you have any additional publication, portfolio, and social media links to include, now is the time and place!
SN: I mentioned my new books in the intro and I hope people will check them out. I can be found online on Instagram. I’m @steveniles65. I’m also on Facebook and Bluesky. With all these projects coming soon, I’ll be posting a lot!
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