13-Year-Old Signs Deal for Contraband Books Exposing Darker Side of Social Media
Book Deal for Teen’s Graphic Novels Exposing Social Media’s Darker Side
Christiania and Charlie Dirtbags inspired by young girl’s online interactions with peers and influencers
Abi Behe, a 13-year-old Londoner has agreed a book deal with UK publisher Markosia for her graphic novels Christiania and Charlie Dirtbags. Co-created with comic artists Taka, Thomas Muzzell and Thomas John, both books will come out in 2023.
Released this spring, Christiania is set in Freetown – Copenhagen’s crown jewel of artist expression – and centres on social media’s disruptive impact on a defiant Danish teenage girl. After her parents are forced out of the community, a Christiania is left to raise herself and thrives despite excessive peer pressure – until a close connection seeking online fame begins aggressively targeting her.
“When I thought about making the female character, I wanted her to have experiences similar to girls my age,” says writer Abi Behe. “I hope people can relate to her because I sometimes feel how she feels in the story.”
In the tradition of noir Danish comics portraying idealistic societies with a darker, dysfunctional underworlds, the lead character is a personification of Freetown – an energetic community resisting mainstream superficiality whilst struggling to deal with crime within its boundaries.
“Christiania the girl represents what the real place is all about,” says Behe. “She has gone through all sorts of problems over the years and survived. But then a social media villain tries to destroy Christiania’s real spirit.”
The book’s artist Taka created wordless double-page spreads to emulate the vivid multi-character street art created on the walls throughout Freetown – a stark contrast to rapid-fire content streams flowing in the dark digital world it seeks to expose.
“We wanted to make big two-page scenes without text so readers could soak up each picture and calmly pick up all the meaning,” says Abi. “This is completely different to reading lots of social media messages or news feeds on our phone.”
Both of Behe’s books are set in the world of Contraband, an exploding dark web app attracting people jaded with state censorship, sponsored spam and cancel-culture on mainstream social media. Contraband becomes a criminal digital underground where profit hungry mobs prowl city streets filming radical events to satisfy society’s insatiable demand for sensational content. But when activists hack the app giving control to any influencer with the most followers, chaos ensues as people everywhere go to any lengths to get the money and fame of being Contraband #1.
Released later in 2023, Charlie Dirtbags is a dark action thriller about sensationalist social criminals seeking fame and wealth on Contraband at the expense of vulnerable followers. CharlieDirtbags, SeamStressed, OllyGark and other online crime titans share investment and schemes promising to split the billions if one of their ultra-radical clips hits Contraband #1 – but chaos ensues when the villains decide not to play ball.
Markosia publisher Harry Markos is excited about the upcoming publications. “Abi is our youngest ever creator. These graphic novels are both excellent. Christiania clearly shares a personal message from the author and Charlie Dirtbags will be quite a lot of fun.
For more information: tjbehe@gmail.com / harry@markosia.com / contrabandgraphicnovel.com/
Category: On Writing
Subscribe
If you enjoyed this article, subscribe to receive more just like it.
