A Good Noir Story Needs a Great Femme Fatale

In the opening of Booh and Babbott in "The Haunted House of Dracula," we will come across a young Romani woman who is calling upon the Guardian Watchers for help.  She talks to them from a sacred place and she is one of the children, so the Guardian Watchers decide to help her.

When one calls upon the Guardian Watchers for help, there are two things that the caller must always remember; one, they work within their own sense of help, which can be more than mysterious; two, they have an odd sense of humour and when they provide help, they can be a bit impish.

"The Haunted House of Dracula" should be seen as a Noir story with tongue firmly planted in cheek. I am hoping to reach a younger audience while I also appeal to an adult audience also. I hope to draw the younger audience into stories that take complex problems and provide an entertaining story which exposes a message without being preachy. I hope to appeal to an older audience with humour and enough sophistication enwrapped with colorful illustrations to entertain them.

With every good Noir story, we need a Femme Fatale, but in this case, just who is she, and what is her agenda. Lara Calleja has provided me with the character I was looking for.

 While the typical Femme Fatale is blonde, cool, married, and hales from the right side of the tracks, Sarafina is dark, red-headed, fiery, and a member of a special Romani Clan. Her story: She has inherited a mansion from an uncle who moved to Los Angeles from Romania. She has been warned not to take possession even though there is a hidden treasure there. She decides to seek out help from a private detective agency.

Both she and the men she meets are in for a surprise. She is not entirely all she seems. But that's okay because neither are the two she meets.  The Guardian Watchers are gathering around, grabbing the popcorn, and sitting down to see what they have wrought.


Booh and Babbot are gentlemen cleaners working in a private detectives office. While cleaning they come across a manual on how to be a private detective. Then they come across a machine for making business cards.

Bartholomew Hardgrove

&

Jonathan Babbot

Detectives at Large

Meet Sarafina, she is Romani, gifted in many ways, and when she meets Booh and Babbot, well you'll just have to wait and see.

There Is More To Come...          

Moving An Illustrated Book Up In My Priorities

Her Name is Lara Calleja, and she is an Illustrator who applied for one job without knowing there was another one. That is the great thing about the internet, you can find talented people all over the world, even in  Legazpi, Albay. If you don't know where it is, look it up. I asked her to do a couple of sketches for me and a scene. She came through with amazing results. But judge for yourself.

Meet Bartholomew Orenthal Orfeo Hardgrove, yes I finally settled on this name for Booh. For those of you, who like me are older than dirt you may see a resemblance to Lou Costello. While this is not Lou Costello, the familial possibilities are there. Lara looked at images I had, I gave her some additional information and she gave me Booh.

Now meet Jonathan Valpone Babbot. Yes, his middle name is Italian for Fox. There are a number of differences between Booh & Babbot and Abbot and Costello. Booh is an innocent with a good heart but he is not quite dull as Costello was presented. Babbot is a man in search of a fortune, he is sly as a fox, but his devotion to Booh is unbreakable. Now the only thing I needed to do was create more than just a game, I needed a story that would launch this pair into stardom.

I decided to pay homage "Abbot and Costello Meet Frankenstein", only no Frankenstein Monster. I needed a haunted house, vampires, a Femme Fatale, a mystery, some ghosts, and a traveling Zombie. Now I needed two twists, How to put my two reluctant heroes into harm's way and a Twist at the end. Lara put my duo into a graveyard for me. She has done six more character sketches which she will be coloring in for me. For now, you'll just have to be satisfied with the Graveyard scene.

To Be Continued...          

Finding An Illustrator, Sometimes It's Kismet

The argument within my imagination with Booh and Babbot sent me to the internet. I had a great backstory and several ideas for adventure games highlighting Booh and Babbot as reluctant heroes. They were two underdogs, and everyone loves an underdog. They insisted on being visual which unfortunately highlighted my shortcoming as an artist or illustrator. Internet, here I come.

I found Cartoon Solutions. There were a number of elements that I could use in creating a graphic novel or an Illustrated book. I investigated the site and looked for images that I could buy and use in my effort to bring the Adventures of Booh and Babbot to life. Cartoon Solutions also added new life to my web cartoon series "In the Kingdom" that also suffered from my inability to draw. But that's another story and it will have its own blog.  To the right is an updated version of the outside of the haunted house. The rich blues appealed to me and I was okay with the scene that was created using layers. Remember I have some skill in image manipulation and I hoped I could create scenes using the various layers present in the haunted house image. Cartoon Solutions also offered a limited interior of the haunted house. Again I would be able to manipulate layers to create additional rooms. Next, I needed Booh and Babbot.

Booh

Babbot

 Cartoon Solutions had a number of characters available and I found two that were reasonably accurate for what I was looking for. My major concern was the characters were older than what I was hoping for. I thought I might be able to adjust the individual features and develop them into younger characters. Though at the time this was not a priority.

I was finishing the second draft of the book "M'Lady's Gentlemen" which is the first book in the "In Her Majesty's Service" series. It is a book with illustrations rather than an Illustrated Book. The first is a story that is enhanced with images to help tell the story, but the narrative the main source of the story. In an Illustrated Book, the images becomean intrgal part of the storytelling.

I have always loved books with illustrations and I have always wanted to create one. So for "M'Lady's Gentlemen" I bit the bullet and went searching for an illustrator. Through "Good Reads". Two responded and I contacted the first and looked through her online portfolio. I informed the second illustrator that I needed to see how the first one would work out. Then Kismet set in...

To Be Continued...

How Does An Illustrated Book Come To Life?

The Haunted House of Dracula started out life as a potential for a third-person adventure game. I developed multiple levels of gameplay. It started in an office where my reluctant heroes were working as Gentlemen Cleaners. The gameplay was set up that the object to achieve was to; find a beginner's guide to being a Private Detective, find a machine and the supplies to make business cards for a Private Detective, and finally to create cards for themselves.  That would trigger the arrival of a Femme Fatale with a story about inheriting a mansion that had a buried treasure but it was haunted. Booh was smitten with the lady and Babbot with the potential for treasure. 

Bartholomew Hamilton

Jonathan Babbot

I started using Unity and iClone as tools to create my adventure game.
As can be seen from the images that appear the page, poor Booh and Babbot never had a chance. My artistic skills consisted of trying to create characters using iClone, badly and manipulating them in PaintShopPro.

Please note that in a former life I was a very good Programmer Analyst Hacker. I was also an excellent writer for storyline development. I was and am a lousy artist. I can manipulate images with PaintShopPro and do a pretty decent job, but I was not up to the level I needed for the quality of the game I wanted to produce.

I turned my writing talent to creating the "Jonas Watcher Detective Adventure Series". I have written and published four short novels that have been relatively successful. I am not yet in James Patterson's league financially but I'm working on it. I have a half dozen additional stories for Jonas Watcher. Add to that I have just finished the rough draft of the first book in a new series, the book, "M'Lady's Gentlemen" and the series is "In Her Majesty's Service " circa Victorian England in the mid-nineteenth century

Things were moving along just fine when Booh and Babbot raised their heads and said to my imagination, "Why can't we have a book?" I had no answer...

To Be Continued...