Xino

＂If you like your sci-fi comics as weird as they are high-concept, then you’ll definitely want to be on the lookout for Xino.＂ --IGN

＂An absolute who’s who of rising creators. Every story in this collection is a banger, and I can’t recommend it enough.＂ --Comics Beat

Because the future is getting weirder everyday, we give you XINO--an intra-ocular lozenge of subversive, surrealist science fiction to cure your awful awareness of it all. Try not to worry--the insertion process will be guided by the megawatt brilliance of comics’ brightest talents as they slowly tune your hopes, dreams, desires, paranoia, alienation, anxiety, and adrenaline to produce the desired results.

Join Melissa Flores (The Dead Lucky, Mighty Morphin Power Rangers) and Daniel Irizarri (Judge Dredd) as they surgically activate the hidden dimensions of the human senses; cult phenoms Christopher Condon (That Texas Blood) and Nick Cagnetti (Pink Lemonade) debut the world’s first intravenous video game system; underground radicals Jordan Thomas (Weird Work) and Shaky Kane (Bulletproof Coffin) surveil the suburbs for signs of covert infiltration; plus much, more from a startling cast of megawatt talents, including Phil Hester (Gotham City: Year One), David Lapham (Stray Bullets) and Maria Lapham force our collective psyche into unrecognizable new dimensions; award-winning and bestselling author Alex Segura (Secret Identity) and Zander Cannon (Kaijumax) embark on an intergalactic journey of revenge; François Vigneault (Titan) and Artyom Trakhanov (First Knife) deliver bleeding-edge technology to Paleolithic man; Dan McDaid (DEGA) takes weaponized incompetence to the next level; Connor Willumsen (Bradley Of Him) digs deep into our capacity for self-delusion--which doesn’t seem to be getting any better.

All that and much much more in this dazzling deconstruction of our past, present, and future!

Phil Hester has been writing and drawing comics since the dawn of time. He has drawn Kevin Smith’s Green Arrow, Mark Millar’s Swamp Thing, Robert Kirkman’s Ant-Man, and Jeff Lemire’sFamily Tree, as well as notable runs on Nightwing, The Flash, Batman Beyond, Justice League, and many more. His recent penciling assignments include Kevin Smith’s Tales from the Quick Stop, and Gotham City: Year One with Tom King.

Phil has written Wonder Woman, The Darkness, Deathstroke, Mythic, Titans Giant, Swamp Thing Giant, and his co-creations The Coffin with artist Mike Huddleston, and Firebreather with artist Andy Kuhn, which became an Emmy-winning feature on Cartoon Network.

He wrote and drew The Wretch, which was nominated for an Eisner Award for Best New Series. He lives in the sticks.

A writer/producer based in Los Angeles, Melissa worked as a creative executive for the Power Rangers brand for nearly a decade before transitioning to becoming a full-time writer. Her Image comic book series The Dead Lucky, a Massive-Verse title, released last year. She co-writes the Massive-Verse comic book miniseries Radiant Pink, Mighty Morphin Power Rangers for Boom! Studios and has also written for Marvel and Oni Press.

Alex Segura is the bestselling and award-winning author of Secret Identity, which the New York Times called ＂wittily original＂ and named an Editor’s Choice. NPR described the novel as ＂masterful,＂ and it received starred reviews from Publishers Weekly, Kirkus, and Booklist. It was also listed as one of the Best Mysteries of the Year by NPR, Kirkus, Booklist, LitReactor, Gizmodo, BOLO Books, and the South Florida Sun Sentinel.

His upcoming work includes the YA superhero adventure Araña/Spider-Man 2099: Dark Tomorrow, the spiritual sequel to Secret Identity, Alter Ego, and the sci-fi/espionage thriller Dark Space (with Rob Hart). Alex is also the author of Star Wars Poe Dameron: Free Fall, the Anthony Award-nominated Pete Fernandez Miami Mystery series, and a number of comic books, including The Mysterious Micro-Face (in partnership with NPR), The Black Ghost, The Archies, The Dusk, The Awakened, Mara Llave - Keeper of Time, Blood Oath, stories featuring Marvel heroes Sunspot, White Tiger, Spider-Man and DC’s Superman and the Question, to name a few. His short story ＂90 Miles＂ was included in The Best American Mystery and Suspense Stories for 2021 and won the Anthony Award for Best Short Story. Another short story, ＂Red Zone,＂ won the 2020 Anthony Award for Best Short Story. A Miami native, he lives in New York with his wife and children.

Dan McDaid is a comics writer and artist from Scotland. Following a well regarded run on the UK Doctor Who Magazine, he co-created cosmic comedy drama Jersey Gods for Image Comics and cult hit TimeShare for Oni Press. Since then he has worked on such properties as Judge Dredd and Firefly, co-developed and drew TKO’s TheFearsome Doctor Fang, and collaborated several times with fellow Scottish legend Irvine Welsh. He lives in a draughty old building overlooking the river Tay. Dega is his first graphic novel.

Andrew Carl is an Eisner- and Harvey Award-winning editor, writer, and cat guy. His credits include the Once Upon a Time Machine series (Dark Horse), Little Nemo: Dream Another Dream (Locust Moon), and Comics for Choice (Silver Sprocket).

Chris Condon is the writer of the ongoing Image Comics series That Texas Blood with artist Jacob Phillips. He has also written non-Texaswork for DC, Marvel, Z2, AfterShock, and others.

David Hahn grew up in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and currently resides in western Montana. He is a founding member of Helioscope Studio in Portland, Oregon, and is known for his work on Batman ’66, Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane, Marvel Adventures: The Fantastic Four, Fables, and The Six Million Dollar Man, as well as commercial jobs for clients such as Microsoft and Northrop Grumman. David is currently working on Impossible Jones with his co-creator, Karl Kesel, and Aztec Empire with co-creators Paul Guinan and Anina Bennett.

Hagai Palevsky is a comics writer and critic from Israel. His creative credits have appeared in anthologies such as Dagger Dagger and online publications such as PanelxPanel; his criticism has been published in SOLRAD, The Comics Journal, The Gutter Review, and PanelxPanel. When not writing, he can probably be found taking photos of street cats.

Alissa Sallah is a cartoonist (and cosplayer) from small-town Ohio. She edits and contributes to the Bonfire Yearly Anthology (Stratos, Topia, Silk & Metal), has been featured in the Bitch Planet Triple Feature, the Yakuza 6 Song of Life artbook, and was the colorist on the Image comic series Sleepless. Her work can be found at alissasallah.com.

Jordan Thomas hails from the South of England but is currently living in Valencia, Spain. His first published comics work was the 1920s postwar, farm-based horror series Frank At Home On The Farm. Since then he has written a sci-fi western, The Man From Maybe, for Oni Press, and the alien world crime story Weird Work at Image Comics. He likes dogs, swimming, and swimming with dogs.

François Vigneault is a freelance illustrator, designer, and cartoonist (not necessarily in that order). His work includes Titan(Oni Press), Orcs In Space (Oni Press), 13e Avenue (Éditions de la Pastèque), and his comics and illustrations have appeared in publications such as Planches, Papercutter, Kayak, and Study Group Magazine. His work has been nominated for numerous awards, including the Joe Shuster Award, Prix des Libraires, and the Prix des Collèges. Born in the United States to immigrant parents, he has lived and worked in Montréal, Québec, since 2015.

Since 1993, Zander Cannon has written and drawn comics about gods, robots, astronauts, police officers, paleontologists, aliens, feng shui masters, superheroes, and monsters. He lives in Minnesota with his strong wife, Julie, and above-average son, Jin.

Nick Cagnetti is a cartoonist based in Arizona and a graduate of Arizona State University with experience doing storyboards and commercial art but he’s been drawing forever thanks to a life-long love for comic books. He’s been making his own regularly since 2012 with books like Infinite Wonders and The Spirit of The Shadows but he’s best known for his work on Pink Lemonade.

Bathed in the cathode ray thrum of 1960s television, Shaky Kane nurtured a deep love for Americana, in particular the four-color comic books displayed wedged into the spinner racks of British newsagents.

Inspired by the DIY ethic of the early punk movement, Shaky contributed to the burgeoning small press scene before finding a regular spot drawing for British music paper The NME. Shaky’s work found a home in a whole host of popular British comic strip publications during the late 1980s to the early 1990s, including Deadline, Revolver, Judge Dredd the Megazine, and 2000 AD.

Returning to comics in 2010, Shaky collaborated with writer David Hine on the highly acclaimed Bulletproof Coffin series for Image Comics. Finding a new readership and a reappraisal of his art, brought about by the growth of online communications, Shaky has produced artwork for a growing

number of comic book publications including The Bulletproof Coffin: Disinterred, Cowboys and Insects(David Hine), Elephant Men, The Beef(Richard Starkings) Last Driver (Chris Baker), That’s Because

You’re a Robot (David Quantick), Cap’n Dinosaur (Kek-W), Weird Work (Jordan Thomas), and has teamed up with Vicemagazine regular Krent Able on the oversize anthologyKane and Able. True to his early artistic inspirations, Shaky continues drawing for independent publications to this day, and is regularly published on both sides of the Atlantic.

Artyom Trakhanov is a Siberian comic artist and video game illustrator living in Belgrade. He has worked on Undertow (Image Comics), Turncoat (Boom! Studios), The 7 Deadly Sins (TKO Presents) and First Knife (Image Comics).