See jessethomascomics.com for some of his short stories, including a preview of his comic from issue seven of Night Craft, entitledThe Deal. In the story, Leroy Strife has to track down a wealthy politician’s daughter who’s fled to the Forbidden Jungle. If he finds her, he’ll be able to get off the planet on an unmarked seat on a flight to the Ascraeous Mons settlement. It’s his only chance to escape android assassins. But all is not as it seems.

Jesse Thomas likes to read sci-fi, too, as well as other genres, and he lists a few of his favorites in this interview.

READERSVOICE.COM: You said that you liked Warren magazines and I was wondering which ones you liked the most and what pattern their stories followed and how they influenced your comics.

JESSE THOMAS: Creepy and Eerie as well as 1984/1994 are my favorites. [1984, which later had a name change to 1994, was publisher James Warren’s answer to Heavy Metal magazine.] I liked that the stories were usually self-contained, and they often had this grindhouse feel to them. It seemed like those were outlaw comics, the stories could be about anything, and anything could happen.

RV: I know you liked The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury. What other horror and fantasy or sci fi tales or post-apocalyptic stories and novels have you liked?

JT: Dracula, 2001, and Inherit the Stars [1977] by James Hogan are a few that come to mind. I recently read The Magic Goes Away by Larry Niven, which was also illustrated by popular Warren artist Esteban Maroto. Pretty much every bad post-apocalyptic movie from the 1980s is an influence on me!

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