Having lived near the Pacific Ocean for most of my life, there’s a particular “west coast” vibe that strikes a chord with me whenever I detect it in a story or piece of writing. It’s in the music of Loscil and Tycho, the writing of Douglas Coupland and Kim Stanley Robinson, and as I am increasingly delighted to discover, the work of JD Laclede.
JD writes and draws Ask The Werewolves and he also wrote the outstanding story “Broken Colors” for Werewolves Versus Fascism. He does a lot more than that – see for yourself on his Patreon and at his site – but anything he creates that depicts his vision of California comports especially strongly with my own tough-to-articulate feelings about the land between Alaska and the Baja. There’s love, hope, sweet melancholy, and that distinctly Pacific mashup of glittering new cities and ancient coastal forest.
All of that is encapsulated wonderfully in the animation he posted recently in response to an Ask The Werewolves question. You don’t even need to be familiar with Blackbird (the werewolf depicted), the city of Midnight, CA or the conceit of ATW to get that vibe. I’m grateful that JD and so many other artists, writers and musicians are able to express what I can’t about this place… and I’m particularly thankful that JD can do it with wry humour and werewolves.