Meath-based artist Leeann Hamilton is also an advocate of diversity in comics. Diversity encourages original stories, so we should embrace it,” she advises. “In the past few years a strong network has developed as well as a wider variety of comic book storytelling styles. “The Irish scene is thriving and very supportive,” says Maura McHugh, a Galway-based writer who is developing a formidable reputation comics and whose latest project, Witchfinder, sees her collaborate with horror writer Kim Newman on a comic book that links into Mike Mignola’s Hellboy universe. This image of solidarity is mirrored throughout Ireland’s comics community. West’s novel, The Earthbound God, may glory in the realm of dark fantasy but at it’s heart is the friendship of two women. But more and more women like West are becoming empowered to tell their stories in graphic form. If ever there was a starkly eloquent reminder of the power of story, the pain of being excluded from it serves as an illustration. “So tall girls, fat girls, girls of different race, gay girls… all of them who wouldn’t get as much representation in these stories. West wanted to draw girls like herself and all the other females who would also be feeling this. It was because I knew I could never have my own story because only thin girls got to be in stories. “Not because I thought no guys would like me. “I gained a lot of weight and that really bothered me,” she recalls. Going through her teenage years this feeling of exclusion became heightened and her self-esteem suffered. And to make female characters who would be unconventional, both physical and personality wise.” “And I think that a huge reason why I write is to make these female characters that I always wanted to see. “I’d always be sitting there thinking why can’t there be someone like me in these shows? Why can’t a female character go through the same story arcs these guys are going through? Why can’t they do the big epic fights or the big epic character arcs? And there was always that hunger for that growing up,” says West. But while she watched them something puzzled her deeply.

When Dublin-based comic creator Anthea West was growing up, she had an appetite for the type of television shows and films that were traditionally seen as for the boys. Women often appear in this world as an adornment. Julie Maroh’s Blue is the Warmest Colour and Coco Moodysson’s semi autobiographical Never Goodnight, adapted for film by her husband Lukas as We Are The Best, represent the tip of the iceberg of a female driven comics industry that has for so long remained hidden beneath a male dominated sea of musclebound male superheroes.

The Earthbound God by Anthea West