An Introduction to the Legacies of Salem
Let me start by giving you the elevator pitch:
A group of teenagers battle the end of the world, their own feelings and hormones and various evils in the early 90s in Salem, Mass.
Ok. That was the elevator pitch, but Im in good with the publisher so I got to by pass that part and literally only did it for this post (Truth matters). But that is the way I pitched it to my partner originally, well with more colorful words and likely slurred speech as I was drinking that night….
But the elevator pitch is not where this story started. In many many ways the story of the Legacies dates back all the way to August of 1992. (Part of the reason it is set during that time frame). That was when my sister and I purchased Punisher War Zone #7 and would go on to create a series of comic book characters and an entire shared universe. I hope someday to bring those characters to you are readers but the important part to this story was a small subgroup of books called “The Demon Destroyers”. They were a group of supernatural themed characters who for the most part acted as super heroes but all had a unique draw to supernatural issues, either directly or indirectly would constantly end up entangled in each others business and would come together to fight the big battles.
Now do not get it twisted, this series has little to none of the DNA of that idea in its makeup. This idea was simply a young teens idea of how to do Marvel’s Midnight Sons or DC’s Vertigo “right”. I bring it up because the supernatural group dynamic that is important to the Legacies was first created here. Another key element that was developed during this time that is relevant to Legacies is wanting to comment on the then waning Satanic Panic that had swept America during the late 70s and grew to a fever pitch by late 80s. I did not fully understand that was what I was doing then, I was lacking self awareness and the writing skills that I have since gained. But never the less those stories are mainly lost to the sands of time. After years of not writing for various life related reasons, when I started to write again one of the first ideas I wanted to tackle was how the Satanic Panic never really ended and just did a great big rebrand as Qanon and Pizzgate and various other things over the years. The issue I had here was I needed a way to tell that story with compelling characters and a way to stick with those characters for a long period of time.
While that thought was bouncing around in my head looking for a home I was also launching a publishing company (Outsider Publishing Co, go head and check out our first release here: https://www.amazon.com/Christmas-Chaos-Twisted-Holiday-Terror-ebook/dp/B0DP3RW4DV?ref_=ast_author_mpb), and was trying to figure out interesting ways to tell stories in printed form in, having spent most of my “career” trying to do either comic books or film scripts, thinking so much of the visual aspect of story telling that I had kinda forgotten how fun pure text can be. One of the ideas I had as a way to have some fun and stretch my wings as a writer was to do a weekly novel. Well not a novel a week, good God man, no a novel split up into weekly releases. I am fully aware this has been don many times in many ways, but it’s my first time trying it and still had this idea about examining the Satanic Panic in my head. It was at this point that the two ideas met up and out of that meeting in my mind came “The Legacies of Salem-A Year on the Edge”.
The long term goal of using this release strategy is to get enough people interested in these characters to spin them off into full novels and short story collections of just their own. I have enough stories to tell with them were if I started writing now by the time Im gone I might have half of them written. I currently plan on eventually collecting the stories that are appearing in the weekly release form. Beyond that you can think of it as a “Pilot” to gauge the interest level, if any for the continued stories featuring these characters. I think next year, 2026 (wow crazy), regardless of how this little experiment turns out, Ill try another concept out as a “Pilot”. I’m not saying this will be a permanent thing, but I do enjoy the format for story telling, lets me rely on some of those old comic writing muscles with how I structure stories and the timing of events.
Our main characters are the “Legacies”. What that name means will be revealed slowly over the course of the coming year’s worth of stories. Let me introduce you to the cast (I apologize for using AI art for these, they are not finalized in anyway being commercialized, they are simply the pieces I will show the artist to start from.) Let’s start with the character that kickstarted this entire story and our “main” lead, Tina Barker.
Tina Barker
Tina here is named after well Tina from Nightmare on Elm street and the great Clive Barker. She is a bright, caring girl who spends her free time smoking weed and hanging out with her friends and best frenemy/half-sister. Tina is dealing with the recent death of her mother as our story opens. She is our main character but by no means is this only her story, she is just one of the driving forces behind the incidents that kick start our journey. Tina was originally conceived as more of a side kick to Nancy and in the original, less polished idea she was a basic goth girl from the late 80s/early 90s.
Nancy Craven
As I mentioned her half-sister already let’s talk about Nancy Craven next. Nancy here is named after the other female character in Nightmare on Elm Street as well as that films creator (not to mention Scream, Last House on the Left, Hills Have Eyes and way too many more to mention) Wes Craven. As the names may indicate, in the original pitch for the series their roles were very different with Nancy being the lead and the stories very much being driven by her. While she still has a huge role to play in the stories and is a way more complex and interesting character (as well as Tina and the others being better by the changes), her role as “the” lead was not to be. Nancy is a wild child, held back only by thought and desire, she seems to always be smiling at a joke only she knows. She is a former girlfriend of TJ, whom is the best friend of Tina.
Thomas Jarvis Lynch
Speaking of TJ. Thomas Jarvis Lynch, TJ to his buddies is a pothead. That is TJ. He is also a fountain of knowledge both useful and completely useless. He can also eat more than any human without a medical condition should ever be able too. He is both Tina’s smoking buddy and Nancy’s best friend and ex. TJ is named after Tommy Jarvis from the Friday the 13th films (obviously) as well as the great David Lynch. TJ has sexual tension with all living things, despite him being you know TJ. While TJ is Nancy’s best friend, TJ himself considers Kincade his bestie.
Kincade Darabount
Kincade Darabount that is. Kincade is an athletic, smart and might be the original American Otaku. Kincade’s mother was a model who was a huge star in Japan, he spent a few of his formative years in Akiba and learned both about friendship and fighting from anime and manga. He is loyal honest and brave, but not too dumb to understand self-preservation. Kincade here was originally named Kane Peele, with the name being a nod to Jordan Peele (damn modern master) as well as Kane Hodder of Jason fame. I changed it to Kincade Darabount as a nod to Kincaid from Nightmare on Elm Street III and Darabount is a nod to Frank Darabont who wrote Nightmare III as well as directed Mist and Shawshank. Change was made for multiple reasons, including the other characters being named after heroes as well as not the actors but the characters.
Ashley Hooper
This wonderful ball of joy is Ashley Hooper. Ash here is named after the groovy main character from Evil Dead, with an obvious distaff nature. The Hooper part is a nod to Tobe Hooper of Texas Chainsaw fame. Ashley will be introduced to the story later than the rest of the characters, but her role is pivotal. She is the head cheerleader, the student body president, she is the editor of the school newspaper and does it all with a smile and a level of exuberance that is either so annoying you want to choke her or so contagious it inspires you, 50/50 shot. In the original draft she was named Ash Craven and was a guy. I decided to use Hooper for her and thought many of the ideas I had worked better with a gender switch to her and that’s how we ended up with this Ashley.
Cyd Serling
Cyd Serling is Kincade’s neighbor and longtime friend. He is a loner by nature who at this point is only really willing to call Kincade his friend. He has a rivalry type relationship with TJ, both over Kincade’s friendship but also over the attention of Nancy. Cyd’s name is taken from Sidney Prescott in the Scream movies and his last name coming from my personal favorite horror creator ever Rod Serling.
Those are the “Legacies”. They are our core cast that we will follow over the next year in 4–5-page weekly stories. Each month we will get a new story arc (or simply think of it as each month being a complete short story or think of each as episodic look into these characters lives, all should hopefully still give you an enjoyable experience.) What can we expect as far as story? Well, our narrative begins in December 1992, right before Christmas when a few friends realize they are having strange dreams at the same time. We will spend January establishing the themes and character relationships that will drive the series more than anything else. In February we get a nice small town love story, with a pickax swinging serial killer running around, like some sort of Bloody Valentine. From there we will get a bunch of stories all building to a showdown with a Dark Shadow that lingers over everything….
