Starting a new series of the comics-focused radio series Panel Borders, host Alex Fitch talks to Sabba Khan, Karrie Fransman and Zara Slattery about the comics they created for an as yet unpublished project inspired by Canterbury Cathedral’s Miracle Windows, and former animator Norm Konyu chats about his graphic novels which feature hauntings and time slippages in uncanny landscapes.
Sabba Khan is an award-winning author bringing together visual art, architecture and storytelling into a practice that asks pertinent questions of our times. Sabba Khan’s “striking” and “impeccable” debut graphic novel The Roles We Play won the Jhalak prize and was one of the Guardian’s best books of the year in 2021. Her graphic novel takes her working-class diasporic roots to interrogate class, race and gender in contemporary life in the UK.
Khan is co-director of Khan Bonshek, an architectural practice set up by her and her partner in Stratford, London, where both have just completed their self-build home and have won 2024’s Transformation Prize for NLA’s ‘Don’t Move, Improve!’ awards. She also teaches as an Associate Lecturer at Chelsea School of Art, and is a mentor at Laydeez Do Comics.
Karrie Fransman’s comics have been published by The United Nations, The Guardian, The Times, The Telegraph, the BBC, The Arts Council and The British Red Cross. She has published four books: Gender Swapped Fairy Tales (2020) and Gender Swapped Greek Myths (2023, Faber & Faber) both co-created with Jonathan Plackett, and two graphic novels: The House That Groaned (2012, Penguin Random House), and the award-winning Death of the Artist (2015, Jonathan Cape).
Karrie also created an installation for the British Council and Southbank Centre and was commissioned to make a ‘Selves Portrait’ for an exhibition with Manchester Art Gallery and the National Portrait Gallery. She is Creative Director at PositiveNegatives.org, who uses comics and animation to amplify academic research, and a founding member of The Comics Cultural Impact Collective (CCIC) that aims to raise awareness of the value of comics in the UK.
A shed dwelling illustrator, comic artist and tutor, Zara Slattery’s first full length graphic memoir, Coma, was shortlisted for the Myriad First Graphic Novel Competition 2018, The Arts Foundation Futures Awards 2020 and longlisted for the LDComics Awards 2019. Coma won the graphic novel The British Book Design and Production Award Nov. 2021.
Her current project is Sweeney’s Progress, in collaboration with writer Gregory Norminton; the retelling of the medieval Irish poem “Buile Suibhne”. It is a spiritual and ecological fable for our time. A graphic novel and hymn to the natural world as a place of trial and healing, and as such a conduit between ancient wisdom and our present desperate need of it.
A Canadian living in the UK, Norm Konyu‘s Downlands was published by Titan Comics earlier this year – evocative ghost story in the great tradition of M. R. James and Daphne Du Maurier with a contemporary edge. He is also the creator of the mystery tale, The Junction, the award-winning A Call To Cthulhu, and the paranormal thriller The Space Between Trees, out next month, also published by Titan.
He’s been a professional animator for more years than he cares to remember, working for companies such as the BBC, Dreamworks, Nickelodeon, and Cartoon Network. Norm was also Lead Animator on BAFTA and International EMMY award-winning pre-school series, Hey Duggee!.
• Panel Borders: Atmospheric Locations will air at 5.00pm, Wednesday 1st October 2025, repeat broadcast 11.00am, Sunday 5th October, Resonance 104.4 FM + DAB (London) / more info and podcast after broadcast at panelborders.wordpress.com
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John is the founder of downthetubes, launched in 1998. He is a comics and magazine editor, writer, and Press Officer for the Lakes International Comic Art Festival. He also runs Crucible Comic Press.
Working in British comics publishing since the 1980s, his credits include editor of titles such as Doctor Who Magazine and Overkill for Marvel UK, Babylon 5 Magazine, Star Trek Magazine, and its successor, Star Trek Explorer, and more. He also edited the comics anthology STRIP Magazine and edited several audio comics for ROK Comics; and has edited several comic collections and graphic novels, including volumes of “Charley’s War” and “Dan Dare”, and Hancock: The Lad Himself, by Stephen Walsh and Keith Page.
He’s the writer of comics such as 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.
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