Pitch

Liz is 11, and obsessed with robots. That works out in her favor because, like all kids in the Interstellar Empire, she’s being trained to work with space drones. Every Empire kid is trained to someday join the army and conquer even more planets for the growing nation. But ever since Liz’s grandma was executed for helping refugees, Liz doesn’t give a fart about the Empire. Now that the parents of one of Liz’s BFFs also have been arrested, Liz’s two best friends agree that they don’t like the stinky Empire. So, the three girls spend their free time gossiping about their Empire-appointed fart of a teacher. At the same time, they dream of a bigger and better future.

When Liz finds an old and snarky space drone in her grandad’s basement, she’s over the moon. She hurries home to test them, but that goes wrong very quickly. The drone, Charlie, accidentally bumps into a military spaceship that shoots at them on sight. Charlie escapes with seconds to spare but is now Empire enemy no. 1. As for Liz, she finds out she’s not as powerless as she thought. Now, she can’t help but wonder if Charlie could help save her friend’s parents before they meet the same fate as her grandma.

LIZ BUILDS A SPACE DRONE SQUAD is a stand-alone 212-page middle-grade science fiction graphic novel with series potential. Think WITCH HAT ATELIER meets BIG HERO 6. Readers who liked CLEOPATRA IN SPACE and ZITA THE SPACEGIRL might also enjoy Liz’s story.

Sample pages

Concept art

Bio

I write and draw kids comics from my studio in Ghent, Belgium, generally accompanied by my husband, our cat and our baby boy. In a previous life, I got my Master in Psychology, started a PhD, and even ended up co-authoring an award-winning academic article in a top journal in my field. Luckily, these days, my hours are filled with less statistics and more robots. I am on most social media platforms using the username @myrjamvdv.