OniPress and Joe Flood Present: ‘Knee Deep, Book One’
Imagine its 200 years into the future and the long predicted environmental dangers have befallen the earth. To escape the resulting cataclysm, many have taken to underground. But in this underground community, a hodgepodge of various mutants, misfits, and scavengers have gathered in this subterranean subtopia. They are known collectively as “sewerfolk.”
Amongst those trying to survive is a young girl named Cricket. She has been separated from her parents and in her search, stumbles across this vast new world. Her main goal is attempting to find her missing parents. However, along the way, she also hopes to perhaps understand how this all came about. And more importantly, maybe how to possibly prevent a repeat in the future. All the while dealing with new friends, strange acquaintances and those who attempt to profit from the subterranean landscape. This is Oni Press and Joe Flood’s Knee Deep, Book One. Coming to stands on May 30.
Exclusive Excerpt
With its release approaching, we are proud to offer this GVN Talking Comics exclusive excerpt into the world of Knee Deep, Book One, thanks to the good folks at Oni Press and creator Joe Flood. This is followed by the Press Release for the book.
Press Release:
Oni Press to Publish Joe Flood’s KNEE DEEP, A YA Graphic Novel
Full of Misfits, Mutants, Scavengers and Renegades
Oni Press, the multiple Eisner and Harvey award-winning publisher of comic books and graphic novels, is publishing KNEE DEEP by cartoonist Joe Flood. This young adult graphic novel follows a teenage girl in the year 2223, who must venture through underground tunnels and canals in search of her missing parents.
Joe Flood
“This is definitely a fun apocalypse. Imagine your life sucks, your work is boring and unfulfilling and is nothing to look forward to but a lifetime of drudgery. Then you learn there’s a whole nother world beneath your feet. It’s the world’s biggest secret clubhouse, everyone of your new friends is super-cool and you just go on adventures all day. The only drawback, there’s no sunlight and your former boss wants you dead.”
Synopsis
Two hundred years in the future, refugees from an environmental cataclysm have fled underground. Scavengers, misfits, bandits, renegades and mutants are among the citizens of this subterranean realm. They are sewerfolk, their home the bowels of a utopian city that was never completed. Life is hard enough, but an overzealous mining company PERCH wants to get their claws on this new underground frontier — and they don’t mind bulldozing any sewerfolk that get in their way. Caught in the middle is a young girl, Cricket, in a desperate search to find her family who fled underground. Join Cricket as she explores this savage new world, to find her parents and unlock the secrets of a past long forgotten.
Relating the Story to the Character
“When setting up a post-apocalypse, typically you see the decrepit remains of famous monuments or landmarks,” said Flood. “I wanted the crisis to directly relate to Cricket, my main character’s background. So, the collapse of the Amazon basin, (Cricket’s mom is Brazilian) and the destruction of the nation of Japan (her father’s country of origin) due to rising sea levels are directly linked to Cricket’s upbringing. Her parents are part of the diaspora from these ecological disasters. She not only carries with her the destruction of her parents’ home, but their sudden disappearance is also traumatic. Not only does she want to reconnect with her family, but Cricket has an underlying desire to learn how the world got to the way it is.”
Oni Press Editor-in-Chief Sierra Hahn
“Written and illustrated with verve and style by cartoonist Joe Flood, KNEE DEEP harkens back to the YA dystopian era with its subterranean adventure full of delightful oddballs trying to survive in a shattered world. Like the best dystopian stories, the world building is vast and exciting, but the story itself is deeply personal and moving.”
ONI PRESS KNEE DEEP, BOOK ONE will be available in stores on May 30, 2023.
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Senior Writer at GeekVibesNation – I am a 60 something child of the 70’s who admits to being a Star Trek/Star Wars/Comic Book junkie who once dove headfirst over a cliff (Ok, it was a small hill) to try to rescue his Fantastic Four comic from a watery grave. I am married to a lovely woman who is as crazy as I am and the proud parent of a 21-year-old young man with autism. My wife and son are my real heroes.
