Stepping Into Other Worlds – A Look at Difference Engine’s 2024 Catalogue!

After many months of brainstorming, tinkering, and hopeful dreaming, we’re excited to finally have our 2024 catalogue out in the world! In the works are five new projects and titles which stretch from Southeast Asian fantasy to narratives couched in the chaos of everyday reality.

In the spirit of building new things and reaching new communities, we’ve also set our sights on our very first web and audio comics which we hope will expand our definition of comics and make our stories more accessible to fans out there.

Download our catalogue here or read on to find out more!

Tiger Girls

By Felicia Low-Jimenez and Claire Low
Category: Young Adult Fiction
Theme: Fantasy, Mythology
Release: Jul 2024 (webcomic) / 2025 (print)

Synopsis
Marked by their zodiac sign, the Tiger Girls live in constant fear and anxiety, mounting their resistance against impending attacks while living in the shadows.

Behind the scenes, young Suling resentfully toils as a record-keeper, while yearning to be on the frontlines, fighting alongside her sign sisters. However, an unexpected visitor arriving at their hidden location will upend her world entirely…

Chinese superstition would have us believe that girls born in the year of the tiger are bringers of bad luck. Tiger Girls turns that myth onto its head in an epic tale that features amphibious water warriors, mysterious islands, and an incredible cast of strong female characters. If you love stories that take place in a fantastical Southeast Asian setting brought to life by a manga-inspired art style, this is one you won’t want to miss.

Tiger Girls will be released episodically as a free eight-part webcomic beginning in July 2024. The print edition which includes never-before-seen bonus content will be released in 2025.

To the Last Gram

By: Shreya Davies and Vanessa Wong
Category: Young Adult Fiction
Theme: Eating Disorders, Mental Health
Release: Oct 2024 (print) / 2025 (audio comic)

Synopsis:
Through her school days, where she must negotiate a precarious balancing act between her culture and fitting in, to her teenage years where appetites must be managed to keep up appearances, to her early adulthood where responsibilities feel overwhelming, Divya journeys from feelings of emptiness to once again finding fulfilment within.

Combining evocative comics and expressive prose, To the Last Gram is an honest and hopeful story of feeling at odds with and finding a home in one’s community, family, and body, and of the yet-unfurling journey to embrace the fullness of life.

To the Last Gram is the fourth title in our DE Shorts imprint which spotlights stories of lived and shared experiences around a range of social issues. Shreya Davies offers a sensitive and nuanced take on the heavy subject of eating disorders in her depiction of Divya’s relationship with food, body image, and identity across various stages of her life. Accompanied by Vanessa Wong’s endearingly off-kilter illustrations, mundane moments are transformed into evocative scenes of modern anxiety as Divya navigates the struggles of cultural acceptance, growing up, and fitting in.

The October 2024 print release of the comic will be followed by an audio comic adaptation in 2025 – a growing audio format which not only translates the dialogue in comics, but uses sound effects, narration, and dialogue to capture all of its visual elements into an immersive narrative experience.

Unbecoming Maya

By Andeasyand
Category: Young Adult Fiction 13+
Theme: Menstruation, Coming-of-Age
Release: 2026

Synopsis:
For as long as Maya can remember, she has meandered through life at the same rhythm: Waking up at 6.30AM. Putting the kettle on. Making oatmeal for breakfast and leaving it to cool to the perfect temperature. Straightening her bed. Getting into her school uniform. Gobbling said breakfast down to rush out of the house to meet her best friend Jacob.

But one day, everything changes.

First she sees it in the little things. Then it comes all at once.

As Maya seeks to hold onto her sense of self in a changing body, she must also navigate the unspoken expectations and traditions of her community as they start to reveal themselves.

Unbecoming Maya is a coming-of-age story that explores the intricacies of adolescence, friendship, and bodily changes — and that sometimes, help can be found in the most unlikely places.

After the overwhelming response for A Drip. A Drop. A Deluge: A Period Tragicomedy, Andeasyand returns with her first full-length comic, Unbecoming Maya. Colourful musings on adolescence, friendship, and bodily changes are captured in this coming-of-age story illustrated in her signature whimsical style as she continues the conversation about menstruation and periods in an even bigger way.

Magical Sweet Gula 2 & 3

By Johanes Park & Jessica Leman
Category: Children’s Fiction
Theme: Fantasy, Friendship
Release: 2025 & 2026

Synopsis:
The adventures of Gula and her friends continue! Stay tuned for the next two instalments in the Magical Sweet Gula trilogy, which will see more spellbinding showdowns, adventures spanning both the Terran and magical worlds, unexpected encounters with new characters, and a whole lot more delicious treats!

If you haven’t had enough of Gula Gulali, the sweet-toothed magi returns for more inter-dimensional hijinks across the decadently illustrated worlds of magic and non-magic in Magical Sweet Gula 2 & 3! See Gula continue to turn more things into dessert with her magi powers in the final two instalments of their Magical Sweet Gula trilogy.

DELAY: A Comics Anthology

Co-editors: Charis Loke and Paolo Chikiamco
Category: Adult Fiction
Theme: Anthology
Release: 2025

Synopsis:
Looming milestones, and missed connections. Resisting mainstream expectations, and doing life at your own pace. What does DELAY mean to you? Writers and illustrators from all around Southeast Asia take on this theme in an anthology curated by guest editors Charis Loke and Paolo Chikiamco, telling stories close to their hearts while exploring the potential of the comics medium to depict the passage of time.

We had such a blast with SOUND: A Comic Anthology that we’re launching a second collection of short comic fiction, DELAY: A Comics Anthology! We’re inviting Southeast Asian creators to submit story pitches that interpret the theme of “delay” in unexpected ways. Creators whose pitches are chosen will get a chance to work with the powerhouse editorial team made up of Malaysian illustrator and educator Charis Loke as well as Filipino prose and comics writer Paolo Chikiamco who was previously a contributor to SOUND. Click here for more details on how to submit your pitch!

Creator Bios

Felicia Low-Jimenez believes that stories have the power to change the world. She’s also one half of the writing team behind the best-selling Sherlock Sam series of children’s books. Find her at www.sherlocksam.wordpress.com.

Claire Low is a highly visual individual with an interest in telling stories. Her works range from illustrations and graphic design to filmmaking and scriptwriting. In her spare time, she draws fantasy-inspired works on her art account on Instagram: @comatomato.

Shreya Davies has edited comics, literary fiction, and non-fiction publications. Her short stories have appeared in The Epigram Books Collection of Best New Singaporean Short Stories (Vol 4) and Mahogany Journal. She never leaves home without a book in tow.

Vanessa Wong is an illustrator and graphic designer who finds beauty in mundanity. Drawing inspiration from people and interactions in her daily life, she hopes to use her art to find humour in and celebrate such moments. When she isn’t drawing, you can find her somewhere, staring at nothing. Instagram: @tradervans.

Andeasyand is a Nurulhuda Izyan who wrote and illustrated A Drip. A Drop. A Deluge: A Period Tragicomedy. She peddles puns and observations surrounding mental health, the period cycle, and everything in between through illustrations and long captions. When she isn’t, she is making a crafty mess.

Johanes Park and Jessica Leman are an artist-writer couple based in Jakarta, Indonesia. Inspired by Johanes’ childhood experiences growing up with both Korean and Indonesian identities, the duo first created Magical Sweet Gula together in 2015, to share a story of acceptance and friendship with young people who feel “different”.

Charis Loke is a Malaysian illustrator and educator telling stories with images. Her work takes root in both fictional and real-world cultures, whether she’s making fantasy maps or board games about Malaysian markets and kaki lima. She has an MA in Visual Sociology from Goldsmiths and has an interest in drawing and mapping as arts research. She also edits and curates non-fiction comics and visuals for Southeast Asian nonprofits and publishers, including co-editing SOUND: A Comics Anthology, published by Difference Engine. Visit her website here: www.charisloke.com.

Paolo Chikiamco, from the Philippines, is a lawyer and writer of prose, comics, and interactive fiction. His prose has been published in anthologies such as The Sea is Ours and The Best of Philippine Speculative Fiction, and his interactive wrestling novel Slammed! was released by Choice of Games. As an editor, he put together Alternative Alamat, an anthology of stories that reimagine Philippine myth and folklore. As a comics writer, he has collaborated with some of the country’s most talented artists.

*Titles and illustrations are not final.

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If you have a story you’d like to tell, click here to find out more details on submitting your pitch or manuscript to us. We’d love to hear from you!