When I first got my books on Godless.com, I had no idea what to expect. I knew that it was another venue for distribution, a chance to make a little more money, something I am never opposed to, I didn’t know what would happen. The next day the owner of Godless called me by my hated nickname, I corrected him and this conversation followed:
“Ok, fine, from now on your Stabberger.”
“Only if you call me ‘Stabberger the Nazi Annihilator”
“I would publish that book.”
“I would write that book.”
“Stabberger the Stabber.”
“Stabberger II: More Stabbery”
“Stabberger: This Time with Slicing”
“The Crimes and Passions of John Stabberger, the Nazi Annihilator.“
From there it devolved into me and Drew Stepek giggling like school children as we made dumb puns and dumb jokes. About three hours into the conversation, we had a concept, a small team of Drew Stepek, Lucy Leitner and myself would write incredibly vapid, ultra-violent, tone-deaf superhero parodies. A new series, exclusive to the Godless platform:
GODLESS LEAGUE
I started working on it immediately. I had been looking for an excuse and a venue to write something that was just murdering nazis and neo-nazis on paper over and over again, and this seemed like the perfect venue. Drew pushed hard for me to have a completely bizarro character with knives for hands, but I wanted to do something that would allow a bit more creative freedom in my violence. For inspiration I looked to Wolverine, I wanted a man who could use any knife and any bladed weapon at any time. I also wanted someone with the moral compass of Frank Castle. A man who knew that there was only one cure for those who crossed over into Nazi territory: grisly vividly described death.
My original tagline was “Wolverine meets Punisher by way of Mortal Kombat.”
I don’t want to spoil much, but I leaned hard into the ridiculousness of the 80’s action movie genre.
From conception based on a stupid joke, to releasing one of the best-selling books that Godless has seen (so far), took about a month. A month from an idea to the execution of a brand new series. You can read it right now here, and before anyone asks, yes, Stabberger Issue 2: AntiVa is already written.
