Nemo: Heart of Ice set for February 2013 release

By John Freeman on September 3, 2012

(via GOSH London): In a fast-paced, self-contained adventure, Alan Moore and Kevin O’Neill will be expanding on Janni Dakkar, one of their most memorable characters created for League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: Century in Nemo: Heart of Ice next year.

Alan Moore first announced the 48-page project, which will again be published jointly by Knockabout and Topo Shelf back in February, describing it as a refresher between courses.

Venturing into dazzling polar territories and fictional domains including those of Edgar Allen Poe and H. P. Lovecraft, the story, due for release in February 2013, is being touted as and “unforgettable encounter at the living, beating and appallingly inhuman heart of ice”.

It’s 1925 – and fifteen long years since Janni Dakkar (aka ‘Pirate Jenny’) first tried to escape the legacy of her science-pirate father, only to eventually take on his mantle and accept her destiny as the new Nemo; the next captain of the legendary Nautilus.

A 30-year-old Pirate Jenny, tired of punishing the world with an unending spree of plunder and destruction, now resolves to finally step from her forebear’s lengthy shadow by attempting something at which he’d conspicuously failed, namely the exploration of Antarctica.

In 1895, her father had returned from that ice-crusted continent without his reason or his crewmen, all of whom appeared to have mysteriously perished or to otherwise have disappeared. Now Captain Nemo’s daughter and successor plans to take her feared and celebrated black submersible back to the world’s South Pole in an attempt to lay her sire’s intimidating ghost forever.

There are others, though, who have become as tired of Janni’s freebooting as she herself. An influential publishing tycoon, embarrassed by the theft of valuables belonging to a visiting Ugandan monarch, sets a trio of America’s most lauded technological adventurers on the pirate queen’s trail, commencing a nightmarish chase across the frozen landscape with the pinnacles of the forbidding mountains where Prince Dakkar’s sanity had foundered growing ever nearer…

John Freeman

The founder of downthetubes, which he established in 1998. John works as a comics and magazine editor, writer, and on promotional work for the Lakes International Comic Art Festival. He is currently editor of Star Trek Explorer, published by Titan – his third tour of duty on the title originally titled Star Trek Magazine.

Working in British comics publishing since the 1980s, his credits include editor of titles such as Doctor Who Magazine, Babylon 5 Magazine, and more. He also edited the comics anthology STRIP Magazine and edited several audio comics for ROK Comics. He has also edited several comic collections, including volumes of “Charley’s War” and “Dan Dare”.

He’s the writer of “Pilgrim: Secrets and Lies” for B7 Comics; “Crucible”, a creator-owned project with 2000AD artist Smuzz; and “Death Duty” and “Skow Dogs” with Dave Hailwood.